Theresa May is widely regarded at Westminster as cautious to the point of paralysis – aside from that ill-fated snap election. Yet as the Brexit endgame approaches, she appears to have discovered her inner gambler.
Supporting Graham Brady’s amendment, offering unspecified “alternative arrangements” to the hard-fought Irish backstop, was an extraordinarily risky roll of the political dice.
Judged in terms purely of day-to-day survival, it worked. Tuesday’s votes in the House of Commons laid out an extremely narrow path to potential success, for a prime minister whose authority is already in tatters.
Not only did the Brexit rightwingers climb on board – for the moment at least – but enough Labour MPs abstained or voted against the more constitutionally tricksy amendments, to raise serious doubts about whether parliament really has the stomach to force May to pursue a softer deal.
Received wisdom at Westminster has long been that the centre of gravity in the House of Commons is for a customs union, and perhaps for full single market membership – something like the Norway-plus deal May calls a “politicians’ Brexit”.
Yet when it came to shoving her in that direction, let alone opening the way for a second referendum, MPs essentially bottled it.
So the prime minister has won herself precious breathing space, to charge back to Brussels and pursue what many senior EU figures have set their faces firmly against – reopening the withdrawal agreement, and reworking the backstop.
The backstop emerged in the first place as a byproduct of the prime minister’s “red lines” – her determination to keep the UK out of many of the structures of the European Union, including the customs union and the single market.
And its specific structure, relying on a UK-wide temporary customs arrangement – effectively a customs union – came from an unwillingness to contemplate anything that would require checks between Northern Ireland and mainland UK.
That was May’s fervent instinct, as a unionist – but it was infinitely strengthened by her forced alliance with the Democratic Unionists, into what the DUP’s Arlene Foster has even called a “blood-red” line.
Brussels acceded to London’s demands for a UK-wide solution to the problem of avoiding a hard border – a negotiating win for May.
Yet because it relies on what is in effect a customs union, unless and until the sunlit uplands of the new trading arrangement are reached, Brexiters see it as smuggling in by the back door something they had vehemently rejected.
Now, it is far from clear what it is the government wants. The Brexit secretary, Steve Barclay, when asked on Wednesday morning what alternative arrangements to the backstop he was looking for, said simply: “That is what we are exploring.”
Among the Brexit diehards – David Davis, Dominic Raab, Boris Johnson, Steve Baker – there is a deep-seated belief that, ultimately, Brussels will just blink; though perhaps not in time for 13 February, when May must next return to parliament and explain what she plans to do next.
Downing Street doesn’t believe that; but it senses just a whiff of wriggle-room – and is hoping Tuesday’s vote sends the message that there is a majority there for the taking – “fix the backstop, and you’ve got yourself a deal, lads”, as one senior Tory source put it.
The political declaration, and the January letter from Tusk and Juncker, has an explicit reference to alternative arrangements, they point out; and some in government believe there may be more openness to technological solutions.
Other options include seeking a legally-binding start-date for the future relationship; or some kind of review process to allow an exit-route from the backstop.
Anything short of “ditching the backstop” won’t suffice for the hardest of hardliners – but the hope is that something will emerge that allows May to peel off just enough ERG-members to get her deal through.
Rather than send her officials back to Brussels on what is widely viewed in Westminster as a doomed mission, May announced that three members of her cabinet – the pugnacious attorney general, Geoffrey Cox, the chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, David Lidington (CDL, as he is known in Whitehall) and the Brexit secretary, Steve Barclay, will take the lead.
Downing Street suggests that is because at such a critical moment, negotiations inevitably become more political. But it may also be because senior Whitehall officials are less than enthusiastic about undertaking May’s latest kamikaze mission.
Meanwhile the prime minister repeatedly signalled on Tuesday her determination to work hard on satisfying the demands of those Labour MPs who don’t want to reverse the Brexit result; but are demanding further reassurances on the protection of workers’ rights.
Shadow minister Melanie Onn asked the prime minister to reconsider a private member’s bill enshrining EU-backed workers’ rights in law; May said she would look at it. Downing Street clearly hopes there is a large enough group of Labour MPs there for the taking to offset a few lost ERG-ers.
So there is a hard, narrow route to a sellable deal for May to tread in the risky days ahead.
But on one side, she is being watched closely by the Brexiters, whose demands their more cynical colleagues regard as insatiable.
Baker made very clear on Tuesday that his colleagues’ backing for the Brady amendment does not represent a commitment to support any compromise she can winkle out of Brussels in the next fortnight.
On the other side, the softer Brexiters, including those with a seat at the cabinet table, are clear that they have given May one last chance, to hold her fractious party together – her overriding motivation through all of this – and get a deal across the line.
But as one experienced Labour MP put it on Wednesday morning, as the dust settled: “If her deal doesn’t go through next time, it becomes open season – discipline on the Tory side just goes completely.” It’s quite some gamble.
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