The risk of a no-deal Brexit has not been eliminated. It remains the default course in the absence of a withdrawal agreement
THE SYMBOLISM was painful. Facing the reality of another lost vote in the Commons on March 12th, Theresa May lost her voice too. The prime minister croaked that, now MPs had decisively rejected her Brexit deal for a second time, by 149 votes, they faced “unenviable choices”. But the truth is that, along with her voice, she has lost control of the Brexit process.
It was not meant to be like this. Late on March 11th Mrs May had rushed to Strasbourg to meet the European Commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker and win last-minute concessions from the EU over the Irish “backstop”, an insurance policy to avoid a hard border in Ireland by keeping the entire United Kingdom in a customs union with the EU.The fear of Tory Brexiteers and of the Northern Irish Democratic Unionist Party was of being stuck in the backstop with no escape.
What now? After passing their vote against a no-deal Brexit, MPs are expected to vote on March 14th to demand that the government go back to Brussels to ask for more time. Brexit day is March 29th, two years after Mrs May triggered Article 50 of the EU treaty. But there is provision for extending this deadline, subject to the unanimous approval of other EU governments. Mrs May is expected to take a request for such an extension to the EU summit that convenes in Brussels on March 21st.
Her answer to the second question is fuzzier. She might use the extra months simply to keep trying to get her deal through Parliament. After all, she insists it is still the only one on the table. She may even take comfort from the fact that it was defeated by “only” 149 votes this week, down from a record-breaking 230 in January. Yet the EU has made clear that it will not reopen negotiations on any other aspect of the deal.
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