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Top stories
On and on and on it goes. Sparking a fierce backlash, Theresa May delayed MPs’ next “meaningful” vote on her Brexit deal until 12 March – barely a fortnight before Britain is due to leave the EU (a feat she described as “still within our grasp”).
The prime minister also insisted Brexit “must not, will not be blocked”, and dismissed pressure on her to step down after senior government figures told the Guardian she should go once the first phase of Brexit is delivered or face a no-confidence vote in parliament.
Faced with yet more can-kicking, an increasingly exasperated EU27 – determined to avoid the uncertainty of repeated three-month extension requests – let it be known it might just prefer delaying Brexit until 2021 while the UK sorts itself out.
With the EU unwilling to make the kind of “legally binding changes” to the Irish backstop that Britain wants, the chief EU negotiator, Michel Barnier, said there was now a high chance of an “accidental” no-deal Brexit.
But as the attorney general, Geoffrey Cox, seeks to translate the bloc’s earlier assurances over the temporary nature of the backstop into a legal protocol acceptable to hardline Brexiters, Donald Tusk, the EU council president, said the EU would favour an article 50 extension as a “rational solution” if the deal is not ratified soon.
May continues to insist she does not want an extension. But up to 25 members of her government, including four cabinet ministers – David Gauke, Amber Rudd, Greg Clark and David Mundell – are ready to vote for a Brexit delay, while dozens of moderate Conservative MPs are also prepared to vote against the government to avoid no deal.
Labour, meanwhile, has finally come off the fence, saying it will back a second vote if parliament rejects a plan it will table this week for a permanent and comprehensive customs union and close alignment with the single market. Jeremy Corbyn said the party would also back the Cooper-Letwin amendment (see below) to avert no deal.
With eight Labour MPs having now left the opposition party to form the Independent Group, May was further weakened by the decision of three moderate Conservatives to join them over her Brexit policy. The move by Anna Soubry, Sarah Wollaston and Heidi Allen underlines how the PM has now exhausted many of her MPs’ patience.
On the good news front, analysts predicted that UK food imports from the EU would face a £9bn tariff bill under a no-deal Brexit, with retailers warning of tariffs of up to 40% being imposed on key foodstuffs if the UK crashes out without an agreement.
What next
The final Brexit countdown is now under way. Crucial to it is an amendment due to be tabled this week by the former Labour and Conservative ministers Yvette Cooper and Oliver Letwin. This would instruct May to seek an extension of article 50 if she does not have a deal ratified by 13 March.
If the Cooper-Letwin amendment passes and Cox succeeds in coming up with some form of codicil making the non-permanent nature of the backstop solid enough to satisfy the Brexiters, the amended deal – with the alternative being a very long article 50 extension – could conceivably win Commons approval on 13 March.
May would then, inevitably, have to ask for a brief extension, maybe two months, to get the withdrawal agreement bill – the full Brexit legislation – through parliament. The EU27 could sign off on the deal at their summit on 21/22 March. And Brexit might then (after a lot of ifs and buts) happen at the beginning of the summer.
A lot, though, could still go wrong for May, including mass resignations from the government by members determined to ensure a no-deal Brexit is averted by voting for Cooper-Letwin. And MPs could also, of course, vote for that promised Labour amendment calling for a second referendum. It is not over yet.
Best of the rest
No-deal Brexit: should you buy your holiday money now?
EU offers lucrative tax breaks to firm of billionaire Brexiter.
UK driving licences will not be valid in Ireland under no-deal Brexit.
Ireland steps up effort to shelter economy from no-deal Brexit.
No-deal Brexit “could disrupt London commuter trains”.
Honda’s 2018 briefing undermines claim plant closure not Brexit-related.
Jeremy Corbyn inching closer to backing a second referendum.
UK public finances hit record surplus to give Hammond pre-Brexit boost.
CBI pushing hard for UK and EU to find Brexit compromise.
Britons may need £52 visa to visit mainland Europe after Brexit.
Pay farmers to avoid cull of lambs after no-deal Brexit, union says.
Honda’s decision is a vote of no confidence in Britain’s future.
Britain’s EU workforce in decline as numbers from elsewhere soar.
UK will apply food tariffs in case of no deal, Michael Gove says.
Top comment
In the Guardian, Aditya Chakrabortty argues that if Labour aids a Tory Brexit, it will be heavily punished at the next elections:
Unless something major changes, the end of next month will launch the Rees-Mogg revolution, a reconfiguration of British society as drastic as that begun by Margaret Thatcher. Why would the British left so blithely enable a Tory project that seeks to cripple it all over again? As Brexit fails to get through parliament, Corbyn should stop pushing for a compromise deal. Instead, Labour should get behind a second referendum. Leave voters would not punish Labour at the next election anywhere near as badly as its remain base: just 36% of Labour leave voters rank Brexit in the top three topics they care about; for Labour remainers, that shoots up to 60%.
In the Observer, Will Hutton says Honda’s decision to close its Swindon plant signals the end of a profitable industrial relationship decades in the making:
A new Japanese consensus has formed. The Conservative party and its leaders cannot be trusted. They ignore warnings, break their word and do not understand business – personified by Old Etonians Boris Johnson and Jacob Rees-Mogg. Brexit is a first-order disaster, striking at the heart of how Japanese companies organise themselves as “lean manufacturers”. Japanese inward investment mitigated our own failures and is now on its way out. Britain has many more bitter pills to swallow before this whole contemptible business is over.
Top Tweet
Alexander Clarkson calls it “Escher Brexit”, and you can see why:
To recap: The UK is threatening self-harm to bluff the EU into altering a treaty commitment that limits the UK's ability to take back control to win a vote in UK parliament over a deal under which for years the UK state will have to enforce EU law over which the UK has no control
— Alexander Clarkson (@APHClarkson) February 25, 2019
