35
votes
Theresa May loses Brexit deal vote by majority of 230
Link information
This data is scraped automatically and may be incorrect.
- Title
- May suffers heaviest parliamentary defeat of a British PM in the democratic era
- Authors
- Heather Stewart
- Published
- Jan 16 2019
- Word count
- 797 words
As a non-British person, can somebody please explain what this means? I haven't been following the Brexit stuff at all, does this mean it's effectively canceled?
It means the negotiated deal is off the table, but it doesn't revoke Article 50 (the exit process that was already triggered). Technically, if nothing else is done, the default option will be that the UK leaves in March with no deal - pretty much the worst possible scenario. The reason this bill tanked so hard is because it's a compromise position on an issue where almost everybody involved falls into one of two completely opposing camps; it's ended up pleasing nobody.
In reality, this has substantially raised the likelihood of another vote somewhere down the line (possibly even another referendum) that could end up cancelling Brexit altogether. I'm expecting a general election and then some wrangling where the new government buys themselves another year or so to negotiate further. But there's still a ticking clock, and that does mean a non-zero risk of sleepwalking into no deal.
How desperate is the party (conservative I'm assuming), who suggested leaving the EU, to keep BREXIT on the table? I was under the impression that it garnered so much support initially because its supporters promised that it would bring about a lot of positives - which have since been revealed to be false. So are the conservatives desperate to see this through at all costs because it's important to their platform? Or have they scapegoated enough where they can jump ship?
In other words: is this vote an indicator of detracting support for BREXIT as a whole? Or just backlash against a centrist compromise to a conservative policy?
The majority of MP's have always been remain. If you look at that list you'll see that Theresa May herself (at the time the Home Secretary) supported remain.
There are a number of die-hard leavers like Andrea Leadsom on the front benches but if anything I suspect support for Remain amongst MPs has grown in the two years since that list was made.
Most, however, are too concerned with self preservation than to admit that as an MP they owe their constituents (to quote David Lammy) "Not only [their] 'industry' but also [their] 'judgement'".
Better to enact the "people's will" and go through with is outcomes be damned than to be seen as anti democratic and give those that wanted to leave a "get out of jail free" card by any time anything goes wrong being able to blame it on the EU.
While I do think support for Brexit has been declining significantly (the general assumption is that a second referendum would go the other way), I wouldn't say this result specifically is because of that. To some extent, I see this more as a proxy for May's leadership, and it was a historic defeat - the largest ever, I believe. Over a third of her own party voted against the deal (even among them, the reason why is split, though).
I agree with @Senipah that a lot of the MPs were acting to preserve their own positions up until now, spurred and threatened by a minority of true believers. Now that everything's up in the air again, things are likely to shift quickly - but there's enough political complexity here that I don't think anyone really knows which direction it will go.
[Edit] My personal prediction, which I fully admit is slightly wishful thinking, is general election -> Labour minority government -> delayed deal -> Brexit cancelled after making a show of renegotiation.
The change of government and delay would allow for some face-saving regardless of a given member's voting record on the issue so far, and Corbyn's leftist Euroscepticism (another complication, and a whole different thing to that of the actual drivers of Brexit) makes a snap retraction unlikely anyway.
Failed as expected but the margin was significantly higher.
She'll probably survive the no confidence vote based on indications from Tories and DUP. However we still remain (haha) deadlocked on key points of the withdrawal agreement and I see no viable solution there.
Considering the insane internet law that the EU recently passed, the UK might be better off if it did leave.
The UK is quite capable of ruining the internet on its own.
It's not like the UK hasn't passed or lobbied for some pretty insane stuff all on its own.
Articles 11 and 13 are problematic but this mindset of calling every single thing you disagree with a reason to leave is insane. It's like every time the US fed passes a dumb law, Texas should secede or something. No, it happens. We correct it. We work on it. And it certainly doesn't justify leaving.
I don't call everything I disagree with insane or a reason to leave. Only the catastrophic things.
Are you referring to GDPR or something else?
Article 13/11.
The Copyright Directive