MPs have foiled the Prime Minister’s plot to ram his deal through the Commons in three days. Now we have time to expose its flaws.
MPs defeated the so-called programme motion by 322 votes to 308. That was a bigger majority of 14 against Boris Johnson than had been expected.
The Commons was right to say “no”. The Prime Minister was trying to bounce MPs into agreeing the nation’s future for decades to come in less time than many people take to choose a sofa.
His proposal was an abomination. The Withdrawal Agreement Bill was only published last night. When you add its 115 pages to all the other documentation, Parliament was expected to digest over a thousand pages of turgid text.
New horrors are emerging the whole time. Here are seven we unearthed this morning. That’s on top of what we knew last week – that the deal turns Northern Ireland into an EU colony and makes Great Britain poorer and less powerful than it would otherwise be.
MPs voted against the programme motion despite Johnson’s threat to pull the Bill and call an election if they did. Hats off to those brave parliamentarians that stood up to these bully-boy tactics.
In the end, it is the Prime Minister who is eating his words. After his defeat he said he would “pause” the legislation while he waited to hear how the EU responds to his request for extra time – not “pull” it. It’s not in his gift to cancel legislation, anyway. That’s up to MPs. (See section 20.22 of Erskine May, the authoritative book on parliamentary procedure).
Nor, for that matter, is it his decision whether to call an election. He needs two-thirds of MPs to agree to that – meaning that, in practice, Jeremy Corbyn has a veto. The Labour leader wisely encouraged Johnson to work with him to agree a “reasonable timetable” to review the Bill, though he doesn’t look like he’ll take up the offer.
The Prime Minister did win one vote today – the Second Reading giving thumbs up to move ahead with the legislation by 329 votes to 299. But that’s the high watermark of what he can achieve, as there are lots more hurdles to jump.
MPs are preparing to amend the Bill. What more, he knows that with every day of scrutiny lipstick will drip off his pig.
His own untruths are being exposed. We shone the light on three porkies he told on Saturday, all to do with Northern Ireland. But he spouted some new ones today – on fish and workers’ rights. We’ll write up the detail tomorrow.
Johnson is also spraying around promises like confetti. We have already pointed out a couple. But there were five more today – on the environment, consumer protection, not crashing out next year, no problems at the Channel ports and no difficulties for EU citizens. Again, we’ll spell out tomorrow why the new guarantees may well be hot air.
After all, this Prime Minister’s pledges can’t be trusted. He said he’d prefer to be “dead in a ditch” rather than ask the EU to delay Brexit, a promise he broke at the weekend. And he told the DUP no Conservative government could sign up to regulatory and customs controls between Great Britain and Northern Ireland – and yet his divorce deal does precisely that.
Johnson’s deal is on the ropes. But we can’t be complacent. Sitting prime ministers have huge power. We’ll have to strain every sinew to force him to put his deal to the people – and then win the battle to stay in the EU.