MPs may have to wait until March 12 for a meaningful vote on Theresa May’s Brexit deal just 17 days before the UK is due to leave, the Prime Minister revealed today.
Her first plan was crushed by a record 230 votes in January, forcing her to rethink.
She will update the Commons this Tuesday before her latest test on Wednesday, when MPs will try and force her to take a no-deal departure off the table.
But finally confirming what was widely thought in Westminster, she admitted MPs will not get a full, second meaningful vote on a revised Brexit deal this Wednesday.
Instead she will kick the can down the road yet again for up to another fortnight while officials negotiate with the EU.
My team will be back in Brussels again this coming week, she said.
As a result, we won’t bring a meaningful vote to Parliament this week, but we will ensure that that happens by March 12.
Mrs May has kept the option of No Deal open as negotiations with Brussels over the Irish backstop – a clause that could trap the UK under EU customs rules – continue.
But the amendment would force her to delay Brexit beyond March 29 rather than quit without a deal.
Hitting back at calls to extend Article 50 the mechanism for leaving the EU – she said: “People talk about extending Article 50 as if that will solve the issue.
Of course it won’t, it defers the point of decision. There comes a point where we need to make that decision.
Yet the PM signalled the three Cabinet Ministers will not be sacked for speaking out and planning to rebel.
Speaking as she flew to the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh for an EU-Arab League summit, Mrs May insisted collective responsibility has not broken down.
But she refused to say whether the trio were unsackable.