Parliament ‘will seize control from Cabinet’

PARLIAMENT will seize control of the Brexit process if there is no deal by the end of the month, a former Tory Cabinet minister said yesterday.

Sir Oliver Letwin said MPs, not ministers, would have to take decisions about the future if Theresa May is unable to strike a deal in the next fortnight.

The Tory grandee said he now believed that ‘when the chips are down’, Mrs May would be prepared to take the UK out of the EU without a deal – a ‘terrifying’ prospect Parliament would not allow.

Sir Oliver is backing a cross-party bid led by Labour’s Yvette Cooper to delay Brexit to avoid a No Deal next month. The bid, which will be debated on February 27, would allow backbenchers to pass legislation that would require Mrs May to seek an extension of Article 50 if a deal has not been agreed by March 13.

But Sir Oliver said this would be just ‘the start’ of a process that would see backbenchers try to push through a super-soft Brexit based on Norway’s relationship with the EU.

He admitted the move would turn constitutional convention on its head, with Parliament ‘not just legislating’, but also taking on the role of the Government in taking executive decisions. Sir Oliver said Parliament ‘will be, so to speak, the Cabinet’ – a move which he said would require MPs to have full civil service support.