Westminstenders: May's Deal or No Deal

[RedToothBrush]

Tonight: Votes on Amendments after May's Stitch-Up Promise which might nerf the crucial Cooper-Boles amendment as its now deemed 'unnecessary'. I think voting starts very shortly. (They are just summing up now)

A - Corbyn's Brexit deal
K - SNP's, banning No Deal
C - Cooper-Letwin bill paving amendment (which they hope not to move)
B - Alberto Costa's EU citizens rights
F - Spelman/Dromey's to enshrine PM's Brexit extension promise

Corbyn's amendment. You can ignore. Its going to fail.

The SNPs amendment should in theory pass, but with the vote on the 13th March and the government whip, it might fail today.

Cooper-Letwin (or Cooper-Boles whichever you prefer) needs to pass to ensure May can't worm her way out of the current timetable but it looks unlikely to pass. If it does it would come into effect on the 13th March.

Costa's amendment is interesting as he was forced to resign in order to table it (and protect his parents who are EU citz) even though the government have now backed his amendment. His speech was striking in how he stressed it was about people not party politics.

Looking like Spelman has been withdrawn. So possible there will be no vote on it, as May has promised a vote on extension on the 14th March.

The battle now turns to how long the (almost inevitable) a50 extension will be.

March 12th (or earlier): Second vote on May deal.
Its still unlikely to pass.

Which would lead to Cooper-Boles coming into effect (if it passes) though it now has effectively been accepted by May though she might renege.

We now face a vote rejecting no deal on March 13th. Which should ban no deal.

This makes the all important vote effectively on March 14th which will be about the extension. The detail and amendments on this are important and will affect what happens next.

March 29th is probably no longer important as we won't be leaving then.

If we only are able to get a short extension (which the EU might refuse and insist on a longer one! But I doubt it) then the end of April begining of May is crucial. If we don't pass the legislation to take part in EU elections then May can dictate to the HoC and force her deal through as the only alternative to No Deal.

The EU elections fall on May 23-26.

The new parliament starts on the July 1st. This is now effectively the cliff edge if May has her way.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/eu_referendum_2016_/3492426-Westministenders-Abbreviation
Abbreviation thread.

Liz Truss trying to defend Chris Grayling on any questions last night was cringe worthy.

Heidi Allen was very good, especially when there was a question about loyalty. She said an MP should be loyal to the country first, constituency second and party third. I would have liked to have seen Liz Truss' face when she said that.

Grayling's failings have become an almost weekly event. How can he dare show his face in public never mind brazenly keep his position in government? May's loyalty to him is not to be admired.

Yep, susan Heidi Allen totally nailed it:

an MP should be loyal to the country first, constituency second and party third

and I'd add they should withdraw if they find they are not capable of performing their job adequately

This came on the radio the other day and I have to confess that I didn’t recognise it until it got to the chorus

I can't believe the news today
Oh, I can't close my eyes
And make it go away
How long?
How long must we sing this song?
How long, how long?

It is of course the beginning of Sunday Bloody Sunday, but it also feels relevant in a Brexity kind of way

Theresa May’s Team Fears She Will Lose The Second "Meaningful Vote" And Is Now Plotting A Third Attempt Allies of the PM conceded to BuzzFeed News that Geoffrey Cox may not be able to secure changes to the backstop that will convince MPs to vote for the deal

I wrote a while ago that another possibility is even if May loses the vote on her wretched WA, she'll just plough on as if it was passed.

1. who would stop her ?
2. she would have the argument that regardless of what parliament decided, it should be assumed to have passed as it "respects the result of the referendum".

_ Ivan Rogers on Brexit: "What Surprises Me Is the Extent of the Mess"_

Excellent der Spiegel interview (English)
and Rogers is an expert who thinks there is a serious risk of No Deal

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/ivan-rogers-on-brexit-what-surprises-me-is-the-extent-of-the-mess-a-1255789-amp.html?

"I knew that it would be a long, tortuous and potentially conflictual process.
That doesn't surprise me.

What does surprise me is the extent of the mess
and the fact that four weeks before the deadline, the political class is unable to come to any serious conclusion about what kind of Brexit they want

Of course, Brexit is a revolutionary moment, but I have never seena political crisiss^ like this in my professional career"
....
DER SPIEGEL: Prime Minister Theresa May this week cleared the way for a Brexit delay.
Is a no-deal scenarioo^ off the table for now?

Rogers: It would be a mistake to conclude that.
I think there is a serious possibility that we are still paralyzed after Marchh^, with no resolution.
There will then be a risk that we end up with a no-deal exit in June or July.
I don't think there is an appetite in lots of European capitals to simply roll forward extensions while we are still working out where to go
....
< May's aims re FOM & leaving SM>
They found that quite shocking.
The way Theresa May prioritized that very early on indicated to the Europeans that we would be going much further out of the European Union than Norway and Switzerland, or even Turkey, which has a customs union agreement with the EU.

In all honesty, I don't think she fully understood what a dramatic rupture that would have been.

Since then, she has tried to edge things back.
But her problem is: Having started with a hardline position, every time she's moved a little bit back, the right wing of her party cries betrayal.
.....
If you deliberately leave the club, it has automatic consequences, and some of them are unpleasant.
Of course there is a risk:

For the British public, who has no reason to understand every detail, it looks as if the Europeans have set up a process to maximize the British pain.
I don't think they have.
....
< future relationship >
It's not that the relationship between Britain and France or Germany is bad.
But I have never seen a thinner relationship in my lifetime.
There is an awful lot going wrong in the world at the moment.
But I don't think the European political elites are talking to each other anything like as much as they did 20 years ago.

DER SPIEGEL: Whose fault is that?

Rogers: Overwhelmingly, the Brits have to take the responsibility for this, because it's the British political class who increasingly lost interest in Europe

But let's assume Brexit happens and we remain out for the foreseeable future:
Europe will then have 65 million people 20 miles offshore, theirbiggest single trading partner on this side of the planet and your biggest security partner.
And this at a time when you've got trouble to the east and trouble to the south.
The British role in this can be important.

DG I have expected ever since she signed the WA last year, that she will plough on with her WA right up until we Brexit,
because

It's WA or No Deal

• unless the HoC in the next few weeks suddenly votes for a PV

It is too late to change anything except the aim of what kind of future relationship we want,
which can't be defined as more than a rough framework - not legally binding -
since we would need several years negotiation for a legally binding trade treaty.

As Barnier keeps saying:
the UK doesn't need more time; it needs to make choices

To date, the HoC keep avoiding making choices and just delays,
whether in demanding hopeless attempts at renegotiating, or by asking for an extension

If they keep refusing to choose, then it's automatically No Deal

What if the HofC voted against TM deal and against no deal and against a second referendum, and then the next option was to extend article 50 but the EU refused? The only option then would be to revoke article 50?!

RedToothBrush
Tory recruitment drive to let 'activists' join for free
Conservative Party chairman Brandon Lewis said:‘There are people all over the country who vote for us, support us, tweet about us, knock on doors with us, deliver leaflets for us, but are not necessarily ready or looking to become full paid-up members.

Isn't this stealing the LD idea? And doesn't it sound desperate coming from the Tories?

Surely, you missed out the most important part of the quote from your link?

"People are engaging with politics in a different way now.We want to make sure that, as we move forward and life is speeding up and modernising we are moving with it."

The Conservative Party will be only too aware of how Labour dominated social media in the last election - clearly, they don't want that to happen again.

As for being desperate - have you seen the polls?

yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-reports/2019/02/26/voting-intention-conservatives-41-labour-30-22-23-

The gap in the polls, I think we all know, is a testament to Corbyn’s unelectabilty rather than happiness with the Tories.

The Tory vote is dying with the population.

Agreed Tatiana.

And ‘Other’ on 19%. Presumably that includes TIG.
It’d be interesting to know if Labour has lost more voters to TIG than the Tories have. It looks like it.

As for being desperate - have you seen the polls?

Isn't it about needing the activists to deliver leaflets and run the social media cos they haven't got the big donors that they had? That kind of desperate.

red That has been the choice for quite some time

Yes. The EU haven't said it explicitly though. Only been said by the UK side. Coming from Barnier it makes it rather more official and direct rather than just musings.

I’m just enduring Liz Truss and her incredibly annoying speaking voice, which would sound patronising even if she was asking if you would like a cup of tea, on the AQ repeat.
Agree Heidi Allen v v good.

I am really wondering in all seriousness if the bulk of our MPs are aware that all this talk of "extension" isn't up to them ?

Because the current laissez-faire attitude they seem to have with no-deal less than 28 days away now, is that they are under some sort of weird idea that if they vote for whatever amendment talks about delaying Bexit, they'll have magically pulled an extension out of their arses a hat.

Remember Nadine Dorries not realising that Brexit meant no more MEPs ?

Remember Raab discovering where Dover and Calais are ?

It wouldn't be the weirdest thing to emerge.

Isn't it about needing the activists to deliver leaflets and run the social media cos they haven't got the big donors that they had? That kind of desperate

Who reads leaflets these days? It's all about keeping up with social media and getting down with the kids like Jeremy.

{I’m just enduring Liz Truss and her incredibly annoying speaking voice, which would sound patronising even if she was asking if you would like a cup of tea, on the AQ repeat.}
I'm saving the excitement of listening to this until after tea. It is a toss up between than or finding some Youtube clips of trains to watch.

There is a good video of travelling from South Australia to Darwin.
Originally it was 13 hours, the full journey but it has been edited to 3 hours.

Here are some train related Brexit metaphors, leClerc
m.youtube.com/watch?v=3LSawZYsFII

yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-reports/2018/11/23/are-young-people-abandoning-labour

While Labour supposedly enjoyed an upswell of support from young people at the 2017 general election–the so-called ‘youthquake’–new YouGov data can reveal that it’s among this group that Labour has lost most support this year.

At the beginning of the year the majority of young people (56%) said they would vote Labour. Now the party is holding onto just 44% of the 18-24 year old vote - a decline of 12 percentage points.

The Conservatives do not seem to be the beneficiaries of this shift, however. Part of the movement is towards ‘don’t know’ or ‘will not vote’, while smaller parties also pick up a few percentage points here or there at Labour’s expense.

inews.co.uk/news/brexit/no-deal-brexit-supermarket-food-shortages-looting-preparations/

Talking of Liz Truss, I never get tired of this

borntobequiet
Fake news I expect - your link doesn't name a single retailer as far as I can see.

borntobequiet
You spoil me !!!
With 5 big engines and over a mile of coal wagons the experience is a bit different however.

Again, the dead hand of Jeremy. He belongs to the 70+ Brexit Telegraph-reading demographic.