Thread by @Usherwood

So let's try to round up what we've actually learnt from yesterday's fun and games:

1/

Major point is that the basics of the situation remain the same:
- same lack of majority for any course of action in Parliament
- same WA remains the only text on the table
- same unwillingness of EU to renegotiate anything of substance in WA

2/

However, there have been some developments

Crucially we now have a handle on how big a rebellion May faces on the WA

3/

I'd assume everyone who voted against May last night (117) would also vote against the WA

I'd also assume a non-negligible number of those voting for her would also vote against it

4/

That puts us towards half the CONs voting against

5/

That suggests that May has to pursue radical options to get the MV won

Either changing the WA somehow to win back large numbers of her party

Or finding a way to get large opposition support

Or playing chicken on the timeline

6/

The last of these looks the more likely, because the first two are so hard to do.

May is incentivised to wait until as late as possible, to make it her deal or no-deal, and then hope a lot of other people blink first

7/

There are many problems with this, but a new one is that yesterday's vote does little to give the impression that she is in control of her party, so getting others to buy into her approach is harder

8/

Even if it works, it'll produce a situation where the WA is accepted with feelings of duress and resentment, which will make the next round of negotiations all the more painful (and likely to drag on, so meaning the backstop is more likely to be used)

9/

That's about as cheery as I can get today.

May is weak, but so are her opponents, so unless someone gives up trying, we're going to be locked in their situation for a while longer yet

/end