Politics

Read about the latest UK political news, views and analysis.

Wednesday

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Meaningful vote 3 in the next seven days

Theresa May’s extension motion makes clear that she intends to bring her deal back for another vote in the next seven days. The motion states that if a meaningful vote has been passed by the 20th of March, then the government will request a short technical extension to pass the necessary Brexit legislation. (This request would be made at the European Council meeting next Thursday). But if no deal has been passed by the 20th, the UK would request a much longer extension — which would require the UK to participate in the EU Parliament elections. So, it is clear that the government are going to try and pass the

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Fear and loathing in the lobbies: how the government whipped against itself – and lost

With just a few minutes to go before the division on the government’s motion on no deal, Tory MPs’ phones started buzzing. It was a message from the whips, telling them that the free vote they’d been promised since last night was now subject to a three line whip: the strongest possible instruction on how to vote. But there was no further explanation. A message from Chris Pincher, the deputy chief whip, read: ‘We are voting no to the amended motion. This is a 3 line whip.’ It was sent at 7.31pm. Some Conservatives didn’t get this message until they were walking through the lobbies, still believing that, as Theresa

Katy Balls Katy Balls

The latest government shambles could help May pass her deal

This evening Theresa May’s week went from awful to terrible. After her deal was heavily defeated for a second time on Tuesday night, the Prime Minister had planned to placate MPs by offering them a free vote on whether they wished to try and rule out a no deal Brexit. As Isabel reports on Coffee House, that plan soon backfired. A backbench amendment from Tory MP Caroline Spelman to try and rule out no deal in more explicit terms than the government’s motion passed by four votes. At that point, the government changed its voting strategy and whipped its MPs to vote against the motion – effectively voting to keep

Theresa May

Theresa May: if you don’t accept this deal, there will be a long extension to Article 50

The House has today provided a clear majority against leaving without a deal. However, I will repeat what I have said before. This is about the choices that this House faces. The legal default in UK and EU law remains that the UK will leave the EU without a deal unless something else is agreed. The onus is now on every one of us in this House to find out what that is. The options before us are the same as they have always been: We could leave with the deal which this Government has negotiated over the past two years. We could leave with the deal we have negotiated

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

Tory Brexiteers were wrong not to back May’s useless deal

Amongst the wrath we should pour upon our elected politicians – yes, especially the Tory Remainers and Labour’s bereft and shameless MPs – let’s keep some in reserve for the stoic, hardline, Brexiteers, huh? I’m with them: no deal is better than her deal. I agree. But – and this is the argument I’ve been having with people for the last three weeks, maybe longer – there is no prospect of no deal going through. None whatsoever. You can cleave to the idea of it for as long as you like, but there is not the remotest prospect of it happening. Why do they not understand this? You have to

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Government in chaos after rebel no deal amendment passes

Theresa May has just suffered another extraordinary defeat, losing on Caroline Spelman’s amendment (which rules out no-deal Brexit under any circumstances) by just four votes. This was not expected. Spelman even tried to withdraw the amendment, but was too late. This Spelman amendment said that the House “rejects the United Kingdom leaving the European Union without a Withdrawal Agreement and a Framework for the Future Relationship.”. This is different to the main motion, which offers a caveat: specifically a declaration that ‘leaving without a deal remains the default in UK and EU law unless this House and the EU ratify an agreement’. The Spelman amendment is not legally binding: it’s

The Spectator

Full list: The Tory MPs that voted to keep no deal on the table

Theresa May has just been dealt another blow after the House of Commons voted decisively against a no-deal Brexit. MPs voted by 321 to 308 for a motion which rejects the UK leaving the EU without a deal, under any circumstances. The motion did not force the government to either revoke Article 50 or to request an extension, and so the UK will still leave without a deal on 29 March, until other arrangements are put in place. These are the 265 Tory MPs that did back a no-deal Brexit being kept on the table: Nigel Adams, Adam Afriyie, Peter Aldous, Lucy Allan, David Amess, Stuart Andrew, Edward Argar, Victoria Atkins, Richard

The Spectator

Full list: The Tory MPs who voted to reject a no-deal Brexit

The big news tonight is that MPs have voted by 321 to 308 for a motion which rejects the UK leaving the EU without a deal, under any circumstances. The motion did not force the government to either revoke Article 50 or to request an extension, and so the UK will still leave without a deal on 29 March by law, until other arrangements are put in place. A dozen government ministers defied the government whip by abstaining on the motion, including work and pensions secretary Amber Rudd. The others are Claire Perry, Greg Clark, David Gauke, Stephen Hammond, Robert Buckland, David Mundell, Tobias Ellwood, Richard Harrington, Alistair Burt, Margot

Steerpike Steerpike

Tory MP: Brexit mess is like a ‘cat’s arse’

What’s the best way to describe Britain’s current Brexit situation? ‘Mess’ and ‘disaster’ probably spring to mind. But Mr S would also find it hard to disagree with the verdict of Trudy Harrison. The Tory MP delivered this verdict: ‘We were just discussing in my office how we would describe the current situation, and using good old Cumbrian terminology we were really torn between whether it’s a pig’s ear, a dog’s dinner or a cat’s arse’ Perhaps all three?

Steerpike Steerpike

Watch: Steve Baker’s catastrophic Brexit interview

Tonight MPs will have their say on whether Britain should leave the EU without a deal. The views of Tory Brexiteer Steve Baker on the subject are unlikely to come as much of a surprise. Baker thinks that taking no deal ‘off the table’ would be a ‘really catastrophic negotiating error’. But Mr S. couldn’t help but notice Baker’s objection to the word ‘catastrophe’ in the same interview with ITV. Just moments later, Baker had this to say: ‘Catastrophe is a word that should be reserved for genuine loss of life. No politician should use it.’   Perhaps it is time for Baker to take his own advice on board…

Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

Is Philip Hammond to blame for the knife-crime epidemic?

The Chancellor, Philip Hammond, breezed into the Commons to deliver a languid and greatly abridged Spring Statement. He had the genial air of a president-for-life emerging from his palace to correct the mis-steps of a bungling and soon-to-be-discarded Prime Minister. He dished out a few hundred million quid on various worthy schemes (save-the-hedgehog projects; free sanitary towels for school-girls) and he added some passing references to Brexit. A ‘cloud’ he called it. ‘A spectre of uncertainty.’ It sounded like a minor niggle which he could resolve while signing his morning correspondence. He used encrypted language, of course. He said that tomorrow’s vote on Article 50 will ‘map out a way

Charles Moore Charles Moore

Michael Gove’s Brexit agony

I feel particularly sorry for Michael Gove, because there is psychological torment here. His understandable reasoning for not resigning over Theresa May’s Chequers proposal was that he had been accused first of betraying David Cameron, then of betraying Boris Johnson. He could not face being accused of a third betrayal by walking out on Mrs May. This meant that he unintentionally betrayed the cause of Brexit. He is now the government’s media apologist for whatever piece of contortion comes out of Downing Street, and is humiliated when the line he has just peddled collapses a few hours later. This article is an extract from Charles Moore’s Spectator Notes, which appears in

Steerpike Steerpike

Philip Hammond loses the crowd

Anyone who’s ever sat through a statement given by Philip Hammond, knows that he’s not quite what you’d call a gifted orator. With his cringeworthy gags, stilted delivery and all the charisma of Milne’s Eeyore, the Chancellor’s budget announcements tend to resemble bad eulogies rather than the unveiling of exciting new policies. But even he might have been surprised this afternoon by how few Tory MPs were willing to stick around to listen to his full spring statement in the House of Commons. Although Hammond managed to draw a big crowd when his statement began, soon his colleagues began to trickle away. And by two hours in, it seems only 16 remained

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Philip Hammond tore up the Brexit script at his Spring Statement

Brexit was always going to dominate this Spring Statement. Philip Hammond even began by saying he’d keep it short to allow the Commons to move on to the ‘no deal’ debate. But the most eye-catching thing Hammond said on Brexit came at the very end. He talked about the need to build consensus across the House. This is Westminster code for a customs union style solution. Hammond has been making the case for this approach at Cabinet for quite a while now. But it isn’t yet Government policy—most ministers still think that there is a chance May’s deal could pass in a third meaningful vote. So it was quite remarkable

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Hammond to MPs: make up your mind on Brexit or the domestic policies get it

Philip Hammond’s squeeze message to MPs trying to work out how to vote on Brexit over the next few days was clear: if they don’t reach a consensus, then there won’t be lots of lovely spending on important domestic policies such as social care.  Theresa May has been so busy procrastinating on Brexit that her failure to make decisions on these policy areas has not attracted the level of attention it deserves. The social care green paper, for instance, has been pushed back by over a year. This isn’t as much to do with Brexit as ministers like to make out, by the way, but all the same it is

Charles Moore Charles Moore

The problem with Theresa May

I had forgotten, until I checked this week, that Theresa May timed the general election of June 2017 in order to have a mandate for the Brexit negotiations. They began ten days after the nation voted. She conveyed no sense, at the time, of how the election result had changed her situation. In her beginning is her end. Political leadership requires imagination. She has never displayed any. Why, for example, did she fly to Strasbourg on Monday night? She made the same mistake in December 2017 when she took a dawn flight to Brussels after making a hash of the Irish problem. The point of dramatically winging your way out

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Theresa May failed to set out her plan at PMQs

The Prime Minister’s Questions before an economic statement is usually rather pointless, with both party leaders going through the motions. But this isn’t a usual week, and so Jeremy Corbyn had genuinely important questions to ask Theresa May, and the answers mattered far more than anything Philip Hammond will say shortly. Naturally, Corbyn didn’t exactly rise to the occasion, delivering his questions as though he’d read them for the first time. But his final demand of the Prime Minister was important: he asked her to tell MPs what her plan was now. May had told the Chamber that because her voice was still coming out as a croak, her answers

Ross Clark Ross Clark

The no-deal Brexit tariffs are nothing to be afraid of

What strange knots some tie themselves in over Brexit. The attitude of some of those opposed to Britain leaving the EU is this when it comes to free trade: when conducted with the EU, it is essential for our prosperity. But when conducted with any other country it is a dark threat to our very being. How else to explain the reaction of CBI director-general Carolyn Fairbairn to the publication of the Government’s proposed tariff rates, which would apply in the even of a no-deal Brexit. The new regime would see some tariffs imposed on EU goods which currently enter the country tariff-free – 18 per cent of EU imports by

Alex Massie Alex Massie

The Brexiteers have blown it | 13 March 2019

If, as Rod Liddle says, Brexit has been killed there is no shortage of suspects. 75 of them, in fact. That’s the number of Conservative MPs who voted against the Government in last night’s second – but not necessarily final – meaningful vote. They wanted Brexit and then, when they were given it, they decided it wasn’t the kind of Brexit they wanted after all.  Fanaticism invariably devours its adherents and so it is with Brexit. The Brexiteers wanted the ball but once they had it they decided they did not actually want it after all. They had their chance and they blew it. All they had to do was

Steerpike Steerpike

Chief Whip Julian Smith’s small win

At the end of last year, Mr Steerpike was somewhat sceptical that it was a good idea to invite an ITV film crew into the whips’ office, as Theresa May headed for a defeat of historic proportions on the first vote on her Brexit deal. When Chief Whip Julian Smith failed to convince the backbencher Philip Davies to back the deal, live on camera, this only seemed to confirm that it wasn’t exactly the best decision: Perhaps an apology is in order though. Mr S can report that although Davies did not back May’s deal first time round, last night he was finally won over and supported the Prime Minister in