MPs try to assert control in countdown to Brexit vote

Parliament will have more power to guide the next steps if the May deal is rejected

Britain’s Parliament is in the middle of an epic five-day debate that will decide the fate of the country’s European Union divorce deal. The Government appeared to be on a collision course with an increasingly assertive Parliament over the next steps in the UK’s exit.

MPs found the Government in contempt of Parliament for refusing to publish the advice it had received from the country’s top law officer about the proposed terms of Brexit.

The reprimand, by 311 votes to 293, marks the first time a British Government has been found in contempt of Parliament. The Government, which does not have a majority in Parliament, said it would publish the advice from Attorney-General Geoffrey Cox.

In another sign of the Government’s weakness, MPs also passed an amendment giving Parliament more say over the Government’s next steps if the divorce deal is rejected in a vote next Wednesday NZT.

The deal, endorsed last month by the 27 other EU leaders, lays out the terms of Britain’s departure on March 29 and sets the framework for future relations with the EU. Rejecting it would leave the UK facing the prospect of a chaotic “no-deal” Brexit, but the Prime Minister’s chances of winning majority backing for the deal appear slim.

“The numbers . . . look pretty formidable for Theresa May,” said Alan Wager of the Changing Europe think-tank. “Over 100 Conservative MPs have said they are not going to back the deal, the Labour Party have said they are not going to back the deal. So it looks like the deal won’t pass next week.”

Pro-EU MPs said they had made the prospect of a “no-deal” Brexit less likely by securing an amendment giving Parliament more power to guide the Government’s next steps if the deal is rejected. If that happens, the Government is required to come back within 21 days and say what it plans to do. The amendment stipulates that Parliament can change that statement — telling the Government what to do. MPs could essentially take a no-deal Brexit option off the table.

In another boost to opponents of Brexit, a top official at the EU’s highest court advised that Britain can change its mind about leaving the EU if it wants. Advocate-General Manuel Campos Sanchez-Bordona told the European Court of Justice that EU law “allows the unilateral revocation of the notification of the intention to withdraw from the EU”.

May’s spokesman, James Slack, said the opinion didn’t change “the clear position of the Government that Article 50 is not going to be revoked”. But the advice bolstered anti-Brexit campaigners. Jo Maugham, a British lawyer who helped bring the case, said it “puts the decision about our future back into the hands of our own elected representatives — where it belongs”.