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Top stories
Extraordinary, historic, momentous, unprecedented: you choose. Any or all could apply to this moment in British politics – all thanks to Brexit.
A day before the crucial but apparently doomed vote on her deal, Theresa May launched a last-ditch bid to persuade MPs to back it, saying in a speech in Stoke-on-Trent that voting down her plan would destroy faith in politics and could “risk there being no Brexit”. She also refused to rule out extending article 50.
The prime minister, speaking later in the Commons, added:
Give this deal a second look. No it is not perfect. And yes it is a compromise. But when the history books are written, people will look at the decision of this house tomorrow and ask: did we deliver on the country’s vote to leave the EU? Did we safeguard our economy, our security and our union? Or did we let the British people down?
The EU’s most senior officials, Jean-Claude Juncker and Donald Tusk, rebuffed her demand for a 12-month limit to the Irish backstop but did say a technological solution for avoiding a hard border – as touted by Brexiters – could be possible, and that the bare bones custom union in the backstop need not be the basis of a future deal.
EU sources said the bloc was preparing to delay Brexit until at least July on the assumption MPs would reject May’s deal; the 29 March deadline is now seen as unlikely and a special summit could be convened to prolong the negotiating period by extending article 50 at the UK’s request.
May’s room for manoeuvre shrank further after the government lost on an amendment tabled by the former attorney general Dominic Grieve (and controversially accepted by the Speaker, John Bercow), meaning she must now set out her plan B within three working days of a defeat. The ensuing debate will last just 90 minutes.
Meanwhile the Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, promised to table a no-confidence motion in the prime minister “soon”, possibly as early as Tuesday evening if she loses the Commons vote, and confirmed if the party won a snap election its priority would be to negotiate a new deal rather than hold a second referendum.
And the positive Brexit news kept on rolling in: the Japanese prime minister said the “whole world” wanted the UK to avoid a no deal; Jaguar Land Rover and Ford announced thousands of job losses; Tesco and Marks & Spencer began stockpiling tinned food; and farmers warned that no deal would be a “catastrophe”.
What next?
MPs should vote on the deal on Tuesday evening and few observers think it could pass. So what then? If it fails heavily, say by more than 80 votes, Corbyn could demand a vote of no confidence, and the prime minister would face urgent Tory calls to resign.
Even if by some miracle it passes, the Democratic Unionist party has threatened to abandon the confidence and supply agreement on which May’s overall majority depends. A confidence vote could be held as early as Wednesday, but is unlikely to pass because neither the Conservatives nor the DUP want an election.
A narrower defeat, by perhaps 40 rebels, might encourage May to return to parliament with some kind of revised deal after a dash to Brussels; in any case, she is obliged to present her plan B by 21 January, on which parliament would vote that week.
May could call a general election, which Labour would support but her own party might not. Soft Tory Brexiters could seek cross-party backing for the UK remaining in the customs union and even the single market. If that fails, the second referendum campaigners would pounce, arguing theirs is the only option that might win a majority.
Best of the rest
PM Brexit speech changed after Welsh devolution claim disproved.
Pessimism clouds UK banking as demand for services drops.
Sadiq Khan demands plan to charge EU nationals to stay in UK changed.
“We are being abandoned”: Britons in EU on the Brexit deal vote.
MoD sends planners to ministries over post-Brexit border fears.
Brexit brings surprise boost for Bulgarian resorts.
England’s schools face staffing crisis as EU teachers stay at home.
Roy Hattersley backs second Brexit vote to “enfranchise the young”.
“We’re reactivating the people’s army”: inside the battle for a hard Brexit.
No-deal Brexit will kill startups, say eco-coffee capsule firm bosses.
“People’s vote”: backers bide their time to force Labour’s hand.
Japanese bank blames Brexit for move to Amsterdam.
Car industry malaise drags down UK GDP growth to 0.3%.
No-deal Brexit would put thousands of UK jobs at risk – CBI.
John Lewis may suspend staff bonus as retail slump bites.
Home Office to extend trial of post-Brexit registration system.
Tech developer quits UK saying Brexit has “killed” his business.
Top comment
In the Guardian, John Harris warns that a nation “bored of Brexit” risks sleepwalking into disaster – but this indifference could redefine our politics:
Whatever the noise from Westminster, for millions of people Brexit is something that happened two and a half years ago. It has since become synonymous with an indecipherable cacophony about cabinet splits, customs unions and the kind of arcana that might convulse Twitter but leaves most people cold … Think of a term such as ‘national disaster’ and you imagine burning cars and violent crowds. But a nation of sleepwalkers, little interested in its politicians and eternally unimpressed by their warnings, is unlikely to do anything nearly as dramatic. Beyond the current sound and fury, where we are headed could well be summed up by an old Pink Floyd lyric sung in crisp Home Counties tones: ‘Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way.’
And Marina Hyde lets rip with characteristic results:
May’s plan B is believed to involve a variety of tinned goods and the contact details for Ray Mears. It’s her bad deal or no deal, kids – and no deal is no longer better than a bad deal, even if she told you for way more than a year that it was. Given how well that strategy went, it’s intriguing that she should have spent this week veering between suggesting that no deal was more likely, and suggesting no Brexit was more likely. She’s good cop AND bad cop. Playing more than one character in a movie is fairly excruciating when Eddie Murphy does it; when a performer of the calibre of May attempts it, it is less watchable than gamma rays … May remains the comic character pointing the gun at their own head and warning: “One false move and I’ll shoot” – even as the timer she so foolishly set clicks down to zero.
Top Tweet
The spirit of Brexit, in one breathtaking phrase:
Boris Johnson says he is not sure that Ralf Speth, the CEO of Jaguar Land Rover, knows more about car manufacturing than he does.https://t.co/R2cocA1kSe
— LBC (@LBC) January 14, 2019
