Historic defeat for May’s Brexit deal
MPs have rejected Theresa May’s Brexit plans by an emphatic 432 votes to 202 in a historic vote which has thrown the future of her administration and the nature of the UK’s EU withdrawal into doubt.
The humiliating rebuff was delivered in the House of Commons just moments after the Prime Minister made a last-ditch appeal for MPs to back the Withdrawal Agreement which she sealed with Brussels in November after almost two years of negotiation.
The 118 Conservative rebels included fervent Brexiteers like Boris Johnson and Jacob Rees-Mogg and former Brexit secretaries David Davis and Dominic Raab, as well as Remainers Anna Soubry and Dominic Grieve.
The 230-vote margin of defeat was by far the worst suffered by any Government in a meaningful division since at least the First World War and in normal circumstances would be enough to force a Prime Minister from office.
But Mrs May made clear she intends to stay on, setting out plans for talks with senior parliamentarians from parties across the Commons in the hope of finding “genu- inely negotiable” solutions which she can take to Brussels.
Jeremy Corbyn said the “catastrophic” defeat represented an “absolutely decisive” verdict by MPs on Mrs May’s handling of Brexit.
He announced he has tabled a motion of no confidence in the Government, which will go to a Commons vote today and could force an early general election if it wins the support of more than 50% of MPs.
But his hopes of ousting the PM were undermined when the DUP’s Sammy Wilson said that the Unionist party will back Mrs May in her fight for survival, saying: “We never wanted a change of government, we want a change of policy.”
And a spokesman for the European Research Group of eurosceptic Tories, chaired by Mr Rees-Mogg, confirmed that they too would back the Government.
Mrs May – who said she expected to survive today’s vote – has until January 21 to set out a Plan B, with the clock ticking on the scheduled date of Brexit in just 73 days’ time on March 29.
European Commission president JeanClaude Juncker, who had cancelled travel plans in order to be in Brussels for the aftermath of the vote last night, voiced “regret” at the defeat.
He said in a statement : “The risk of a disorderly withdrawal of the United Kingdom has increased with this evening’s vote. While we do not want this to happen, the European Commission will continue its contingency work to help ensure the EU is fully prepared.
“I urge the United Kingdom to clarify its intentions as soon as possible.”
And European Council president Donald Tusk asked in a tweet : “If a deal is impossible, and no one wants no deal, then who will finally have the courage to say what the only positive solution is?”