New Brexit crisis as Speaker rules May’s vote can’t take place
‘The Speaker did not warn us’ ‘We could have done without this’
BRITAIN has been plunged into a ‘constitutional crisis’ over a ruling that forbids Theresa May to seek House of Commons approval for her Brexit deal.
The ruling comes as Taoiseach Leo Varadkar meets with European Council president, Donald Tusk in Dublin today to discuss the latest Brexit crisis.
Speaker of the House John Bercow yesterday reached back 414 years to a ruling stating that unchanged or substantially unchanged motions cannot repeatedly be put to MPs.
That means Mrs May cannot bring her EU Withdrawal Agreement back before MPs unless it is substantially different from the package which was decisively defeated last week.
The speaker’s ruling, announced in an unexpected statement to the Commons, is seen as piling pressure on Mrs May by suggesting that only a substantially altered withdrawal deal could be tabled. It also scuppered any chance of another Commons vote on Mrs May’s Brexit deal before Thursday’s EU summit.
Mrs May now must scramble to get a deal agreed by the scheduled date of Brexit on March 29.
Downing Street has agreed that it will not table another motion on the deal unless there is a realistic prospect of securing majority support in the Commons.
If there is no vote over the coming days, Mrs May is expected to ask the leaders of the remaining 27 EU members for a lengthy extension to the two-year Article 50 negotiation process, delaying Brexit for months or even years.
The PM had been expected to then make a last-ditch attempt to get her deal through the Commons next week, effectively presenting MPs with a choice between the Withdrawal Agreement which they have already rejected twice, or a long wait for Brexit.
But Mr Bercow’s ruling could make that plan impossible, unless Mrs May is able to negotiate some change to her deal before presenting it once more to MPs. His ruling took the government totally by surprise.
The prime minister’s official spokesman said: ‘The Speaker did not warn us of the contents of the statement or, indeed, the fact that he was making one.’
Solicitor general Robert Buckland said the British government was facing a ‘major constitutional crisis’ and that Mr Bercow’s intervention would have ‘huge reverberations’ for the Brexit process.
He suggested ministers may need to prorogue – or discontinue – parliament and call a new session in order to get around the ruling. ‘There are ways around this,’ he told BBC News. ‘Frankly we could have done without this. Now we have this ruling to deal with, it is clearly going to require a lot of very fast, but very deep, thought in the hours ahead.’
The Speaker cited a Commons ruling from 1604 that a defeated motion cannot be brought back in the same form during the course of a parliamentary session.
‘If the government wishes to bring forward a new proposition that is neither the same nor substantially the same as that disposed of by the House on March 12, this would be entirely in order,’ said Mr Bercow.
‘What the government cannot legitimately do is resubmit to the House the same proposition – or substantially the same proposition – as that of last week, which was rejected by 149 votes.
‘This ruling should not be regarded as my last word on the subject.
‘It is simply meant to indicate the test which the government must meet in order for me to rule that a third meaningful vote can legitimately be held in this parliamentary session.’
Mr Bercow was asked by Commons Brexit committee chairman Hilary Benn whether there would have to be ‘new political agreement’ for the government to bring its deal back before MPs. He replied that ‘in all likelihood’ this would be needed.
The change must be ‘not different in terms of wording but different in terms of substance’ and ‘this is in the context of a negotiation with others outside the UK’, he told MPs.
Under House of Commons rules, the government must table a motion by the close of business on Tuesday if a vote is to be held before the prime minister goes to the summit in Brussels.
Leading Tory eurosceptic Jacob Rees-Mogg said he would wait to see what the DUP decided before finally making up his mind which way to vote.
He warned that if a third meaningful vote was lost, it might mean the UK never leaves the EU.
‘If it is thwarted now, no one is ever going to allow us another chance to have a vote,’ Mr ReesMogg told LBC radio.
‘The whole weight of British establishment opinion will prevent that ever happening again,’ he said.