So as predicted on Coffee House earlier, Tory rebels and the Labour frontbench did manage to conspire together this evening to defeat the government on purdah.
The Commons voted against amendment 53 to the EU Referendum Bill 285 ayes to 312 noes, and then did not oppose Labour’s amendment 4, which means that a ‘full fat’ version of purdah has been approved by MPs.
The Labour celebrations of this defeat were notably muted: it’s difficult to get too excited when your own party is in turmoil. But David Cameron has just suffered a defeat on a matter that the whips and ministers had been scheming over for months. First they snuck this report stage and third reading of the Bill in for the first day back so that rebels were in disarray. Then they snuck out their own amendments while warning MPs that they too could end up being barred from campaigning in the referendum.
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