Prime Minister Theresa May will try to persuade MPs for a third time to back her Brexit deal over the coming days.
The Commons will vote on her withdrawal agreement by 20 March, after MPs agreed to ask the EU to delay Brexit beyond the current 29 March departure date.
Tory MPs and the DUP are seeking further legal assurances over the deal.
Cabinet Minister David Lidington said there was “real impatience” in Europe and unless MPs agreed a deal, the EU could seek a delay of more than a year.
European Council President Donald Tusk has said EU leaders could be open to a long extension “if the UK finds it necessary to rethink its Brexit strategy”.
Over the past week, a series of Brexit votes have taken place in the Commons:
- On Tuesday, MPs rejected Mrs May’s withdrawal agreement for a second time by 149 votes
- On Wednesday, MPs voted to reject the idea of the UK leaving the EU without a deal under any circumstances. However, that vote was not legally-binding – and under current law the UK could still leave without a deal on 29 March
- Then, on Thursday, the Commons voted by 413 to 202 to seek an extension to Article 50 – the legal mechanism by which the UK is due to leave the EU
It is still technically possible that we could leave the EU at the end of this month – the law has not changed.
But politically it is now almost entirely out of reach.
The prime minister is accepting she will miss one of the biggest targets she has ever set herse.
Thursday’s vote was awkward for another reason, as it again displays the Conservatives’ fundamental divisions.
This is more than a quarrel among friends, but a party that is split down the middle on one of the most vital questions this administration has posed, with cabinet ministers, as well as backbench Brexiteers, lining up to disagree with Theresa May.
If MPs approve Mrs May’s deal before the Brussels summit, she could ask the EU to delay Brexit until 30 June.
Alternatively, there could be a much longer delay, requiring the UK to take part in elections for the European Parliament in May, the prime minister has said, in the event her deal is not approved.
Some MPs have suggested looking into whether the issues around the deal could be solved by using Article 62 of the Vienna Convention – which would allow the UK to withdraw from any treaty if there been “a fundamental change of circumstances… which was not foreseen by the parties”.
Leader of the Commons Andrea Leadsom said the government’s Attorney General, Geoffrey Cox, had considered the matter and would comment further if he thought it was necessary.
In contrast to the sound and fury coming out of Westminster on Thursday night, the silence on EU leaders’ Twitter accounts was deafening.
In part it is surely a stunned silence. Europe’s politicians gaze open mouthed at the maelstrom of division and chaos currently whirling through the House of Commons.
Three years after the UK voted to leave the EU – two weeks before the official Brexit day – Parliament appears to be in meltdown with no unifying solution in sight.
EU politicians breathe deep, shuddering sighs at the thought of prolonging the cross-Channel agony of the Brexit process.
So will they or won’t they agree to an extension? What conditions could they demand and how long would Brexit be delayed by?
Mr Lidington, who is regarded as Mrs May’s de facto deputy, told the BBC that, although the risk of the UK leaving without a deal had “diminished” as a result of this week’s votes, it could still happen unless an alternative solution was found.
He urged MPs to “reflect” over the weekend on the deal on the table, which he said had the “great virtue” of having the backing of all 27 other EU governments and, most likely, the European Parliament too.
“I think there is some real impatience among the British public, and frankly among other EU governments, with this inability to agree in Westminster on the way forward,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
“The alternative, spelt out very clearly and accepted by the House of Commons, is that you don’t just have a short technical extension to our membership. You almost certainly need a significantly longer one.”
