Thread by @IanDunt

Attorney general is up parliamentlive.tv/Event/Index/b6…

A day of bellowing horror and inadequacy STARTS HERE

"Let me say frankly what these documents do not do: they are not about a situation where despite the parties properly fulfilling the duties of good faith and best endeavours, they cannot reach an agreement on a future relationship."

"Such an event in my opinion is highly unlikely to occur. Were such a situation to occur however, let me make it clear: the legal risk remains unchanged."

This is key: All that has been arranged is about bad faith. But on good faith, there is no change. Where he is wrong is in the political assessment that that situation is unlikely to occur.

Canada is incompatible with leaving the backstop. That has not changed and will not.

"There is no unilateral way out of this arrangement. The risk of that continues. But the question is whether it is a likelihood politically."

Cox now doing standard party-political knockabout. He looks like he's hated every second of this.

"The time has come now to vote for this deal." It is quite bizarre the two hats Cox is wearing right now - although he has, to his credit, been fully impartial.

Dominic Grieve: I "Commend him for standing up for his office and speaking truth to power." However wonders about paragraph 7.

He says actually the only difference is if it's in bad faith and as such it's the same as in the first deal. Cox insists it has an "accelerated pace".

Hilary Benn: To get to point where UK wanted to suspend backstop, it would have to persuade arbitration panel of its case and accept that any issue of EU law would go to ECJ. And any ruling of ECJ would be binding on the panel.

Further details on all that here politics.co.uk/blogs/2019/03/…

Cox suggests European law won't be pertinent on a bad faith dispute. Mmm. Not so sure about that, given UK complaint could surely be that EU was unfairly rejecting the imaginary tech solutions it was proposing.

But hey, what do I know.

Bill Cash, chair of the ERG's preposterously titled Star Chamber, says there is "insufficient protection for Northern Ireland to continue as part of the UK".

There are three plants to Brexiter Tory support: Cox, DUP, Star Chamber. Cox is down. Star Chamber and DUP currently not looking good.

Oop. Star Chamber is down. Says deal "does not meet the test". That's two out of three.

Vince Cable: "Can he explain to a non-lawyer how the respect for the international rule of law is enhanced by a unilateral declaration to break it?"

(Don't think that's right btw, but cute line)

Nigel Dodds. This'll be telling for DUP. "In relation to the reduction of risk of being held in backstop in event of EU acting in bad faith."

Does he agree with previous view that all EU would need to do to show good faith is consider Uk proposals even if they ultimately reject them? This could go on repeatedly.

Then: Provided there's no bad faith "Northern Ireland and rest of UK could be trapped" if EU doesn't agree to a superseding agreement.

Not exactly saying it out loud, but Dodds sounding quite a bit like he's heading for a thumbs-down. Cox says his view has changed on proving bad faith.

Says it would be amazing if EU refused every proposal put forward by the UK. This is a silly argument. They can easily say the "facilitative technological and custom measures" do not satisfy the backstop requirement of no infrastructure. On the basis that it is not possible.

Steve Baker, former no-deal minister, prominent ERG type: "Isn't it the case that if we negotiate under this agreement we will either find ourselves trapped indefinitely in the backstop or we'll find ourselves in the customs union contrary to our manifesto?"

He has such a tiny, tiny brain. Like a crumb from a sandwich. But what he just said is entirely correct.

Owen Paterson. It is so obscene that we have to pay special attention to these lunatics. He asks if the UK can walk away if at the end of 2020 there's no agreement reached in good faith.

"Can the UK just walk away".

Cox: "If in that circumstance it happens then the UK has no unilateral exit right to leave. My rt hon friend knows that."

Mogg: What penalties would fall on the country if the UK in the future just went ahead and left the backstop?

Cox: "As attorney general I simply couldn't give countenance to the idea that this country would break its international legal obnligations."

OK quite tired now. Just want it to stop. And it literally hasn't even started.

Fuck me, Desmond Swayne is an idiot.

Angry and baffled by matters beyond his range of comprehension.

Missed the beginning of May because I popped out for a vape.

God it sounds o lame to say you popped out for a vape. Sometimes I say I popped out for a smoke just because it sounds better. Also May's voice is dead.

She's really struggling. This is could be conference speech mark 2.

The DUP have now confirmed they're not supporting the deal, although reads like they might abstain. So that's 2.5 down out of 3.

May trying to sell her deal. "The end of free movement, delivered by the deal". Trying to do one of those lists where her side chant 'delivered by the deal'. But she can barely get the words out and no-one behind her joins in.

It's fucking grim in there. Like a morgue.

This is actually quite unpleasant to watch. She's barely making it through.

Theresa May talking about the British tradition of compromise. She really has no right to say this.

May: "You have to practice the art of the possible and I am certain we have secured the very best changes which were available."

May outlines changes. Firm legal commitment EU can;t act to keep backstop indefinitely. If it's in beach we can suspend backstop. Also "proportionate measures" to stop payments.

Here is your quick-and-dirty explainer of the new deal and why it does not do what she and others are saying it does politics.co.uk/blogs/2019/03/…

Benn: She referred to UK suspending backstop. Att gen talked about disapplying. Are suspension and disapplication the same or different? May says "not quite the same thing."

Joanna Cherry says PM said joint instrument is of comparable legal weight to withdrawal agreement. But that's not true. Withdrawal agreement is a treaty, so it is simply wrong "as point of law". May insists "the effect is the same".

Her arguments are terrible. She's lost everything. The last-gasp gambit last night. The attorney general legal advice. The DUP. The ERG. It's all gone. Her voice scraped away to nothing.

May pushing on describing the transition period as the implementation period, even after all these years, despite literally no-one else ever using it.

May says voting down this deal could lead to no-deal or a second referendum. "If any of these things were to happen, it would be no good blaming the EU. Responsibility would lie with this House. Our failure to come together in the national interest."

Desperate.

Peter Kyle, Lab, says David Davis is sat in the Commons. Time after time he promised we'd get the exact same benefits after we left as we currently enjoyed. "Does she accept that setting expectations that high set a level that she has absolutely failed to meet?"

May winding up. XShe says MPs came to parliament with different views onthe EU. "But we also came here to serve. The British people have been clear. They want us to implement the decision they made nearly three years ago. Let us demonstrate what politics is for."

"Let us prove beyond all doubt that we believe democracy comes before party, faction or personal ambition." Sweet jesus the hypocrisy, it burns.

Anyway she's done now thank fuck.

Oh crap it's Jeremy Corbyn.

Standard bit of widdle-waddle between May and Corbyn. She sounds like a rake being dragged along concrete. He sounds like a faulty motor.

Corbyn did an actual funny.

"Indeed the ERG seem slightly missing today but I'm overcome by the excitement and enthusiasm of all the members sitting behind the prime minister in this debate."

Confirmed however that ERG will be having its usual meeting tom decide how to vote later and several reports that many are getting nervous about voting against deal. This isn't quite over yet.

Don't think deal can pass, but if result was narrow she would be strongly encouraged to push ahead for a third go. Still good money is on strong defeat, as things stand.

Corbyn still talking. Impossible to pay attention. Desperately tedious.

It's over thank god.

Cash on the lawyers Star Chamber thing: "The backstop is unacceptable in its present form and we are profoundly determined to vote against this withdrawal agreement for that reason alone."

Cash on transition period: "Never before in our entire history have we ever been legislated for by other states. And indeed it'l be worse than that. It'll be done by a number of countries who themselves have no interest but to put us at the mercy of our competitors."

On this basis he would have to vote against any deal whatsoever.

Nicky Morgan, arguably the most gullible figure in the Commons, is now convinced the deal is great on the basis of "alternative arrangements" will prevent a border in Ireland.

She insists these things exist. Then she insists that economic models showing damage from all forms of Brexit do not matter

Just dreadful.

Benn. "The withdrawal agreement remains in place. The backstop remains in place. There is no unilateral exit mechanism. There is no time limit."

Benn makes the killer point. UK will make objection on the bad faith provision. "EU would say it's not a lack of bad faith, we just don't think your alternative arrangements work because we think they would undermine the integrity of the single market and customs union."

"The moment they say that it engages questions of applications of EU law. At which point the panel has to refer the matter to the ECJ."

"Last week I met a group of parliamentarians from north Macedonia. They said 75% of the people there are really keen to join the EU. I asked why. They replied with three word: Stability, opportunity, progress."

"And whatever else can be said about this debate, you cannot apply those words to our country in its present condition."

Brilliant, relentlessly logical and highly literate speech from Benn.

TIME FOR THE GRIEVING

Grieve: "It's very unusual for members of parliament on a fundamental issue to vote against their own opinion."

And yet the evidence has been overwhelming in the last two and a half years that there is a very substantial majority in this House who consider that there is no form of Brexit better than remaining in the EU."

"That includes many colleagues on this side of the House who have decided for matters of judgement or loyalty, it doesn't really matter which, decided that they will support the govt this evening."

He argues that if there was unanimity of purpose he might go along, even though he thought it a serious mistake. "But this is simply not the case... What are we going to do with Brexit when we have it?"

"Far from bringing closure we simply initiate another round of very sterile debate against a background where our economy will be damaged, our national security will be impaired and we'll find ourselves consistently at a disadvantage."

"I'm afraid I can't vote for this. We will have to take the consequences of the further difficulties which follow."

"I don't look on those with any cheerfulness at all. But i would be utterly going against my instincts and my judgement if I was to facilitate a process of further self-mutilation for our country."

Commons looks knackered and frankly bored. The same speeches by the same people.

We've done this every two weeks or so for about two months. I have honestly lost track of all them. It is is like some terrible purgatory.

If the punishment of the afterlife was watching this shit for years, I would behave like a fucking saint.

Wouldn't even fucking swear.

Andrea Jenkyns has been reading a speech from a sheet of paper. I tried to pay attention but my brain refused to do it.

Wasn't having it.

Soubry: "What we do know is that this deal as it stands would actually make my constituents less well off. And I didn't come into this place to vote for something in the full knowledge it would make people less well off."

To Brexiters on Tory benches: "They should speak to people as I do - my own constituents - whose skin is brown, who find themselves being told to go home, who are spat at and abused, and that did not happen before this appalling referendum."

Owen Paterson. Like an angry human cobweb.

"To the horror of the political establishment, the commercial establishment, the media establishment, the people have gone against the will of the establishment."

Paterson had his first front bench role 16 years ago.

Paterson has just found out that FTAs require control of your tariff regime.

Article 24 of GATT.

DRINK.

Project fear.

DRINK.

He's like an algorithm built from the tweets of Brexit trolls.

Liz Saville Roberts, elegantly gives him a minor stabbing: "It is the for sake of courtesy that I'll say it's a pleasure to follow the rt hon member."

Sam Gyimah, Tory: "There is a difference between where we all were during the referendum and where we are now. That is that today we all now know what is negotiable."

"I could vote for this deal if there was a vision for the future of this country at the heart of it. What I find depressing reading the newspapers as how many commentators say: 'MPs must hold their nose and vote for this'."

"We are being encouraged to recommend for our constituents something that we know is not in the interests of the country. If there hadn't been a referendum none of us would recommend this to our constituents."

Sarah Woolaston intervenes. "Would he also agree that if our constituents had seen the actual Brexit deal they too would have rejected it?"

Quite.

The parliament website has launched a protest about the standard of debate and crashed.

For me anyway. Might be a bespoke protest.

Retiring violet Boris Johnson up. Says he'd hoped he'd be able to vote for deal. Democratic right, foreign state, warble warble. Chuntering vacuity.

And there we are. "Whatever the govt tried to do, it did not, I'm afraid, succeed."

Remember when Johnson had to win London and had completely different politics? Yeah, that was a better version.

I mean ideally he could have values and stuff, but if not, at least pretend to have better ones.

"This deal has now reached the end of the road. I hope if it is rejected tonight it will be put to bed."

Mixed metaphors out the way he does his Churchill impression. "Timorous... humiliation... EU protectorate." The full dimwitted shitshow. Like a drunk Santa.

Parliamentary website protest again. Fucking not having it.

Today has now lasted approximately 279 hours.

Important development. I am going to have my first ever Gregg's vegan stage sausage roll.

Fucking hell.

It's the dog's bollocks.

You literally wouldn't even know. What kind of sorcery is this?

It's a miracle of science.

Nick Herbert, Tory, deal-supporter, has a jaw which so tense I find it quite hard to watch him speak. The man'll do himself an injury.

"We should stop talking as thoug it;s certain we will get into the backstop."

Just to be clear, unless a host of new technologies are discovered, developed and implemented by the British state by 2022, then yeah we're hitting the backstop.

I'm not looking at his jaw, it's stressing me out.

He's finished thank fuck.

Right I'm off to do Channel 5 News. On about 6:30ish.

Right where were we. Ah yes. The yawning chasm of despair.

Grieve asks Brexit secretary if Article 62 allows you to void the entire treaty, rather than just suspending the backstop.

"Rather like economists, lawyers can always find issues on which to disagree," comes Barclay's non-answer.

If you buy a pound-shop secretary of state, you get a pound-shop secretary of state.

"We face a fork in the road. It is time to choose." Christ. It's not exactly Braveheart.

Division, mate.

No amendments. Straight vote on her deal. My sense is that got will consider any negative majority in double-digits a victory. Gives her hope she can get it through on a third heave.

But my guesstimate is about 150 negative majority.

Then big question is will May stand up right after and maybe announce an extension of Article 50. This would give two advantages.

1) She takes control of what is near-inevitable and stops parliament wrestling it from her.

2) She can try to prevent European elections, get through to mid-May, hold another vote where no more A50 extensions possible, and have a shot at winning it.

Downside: If she leads on extension, rather than being forced into it, the ERG lot will hate more than they do already.

Love the football style commentary on BBC parliament. They should have it all the time.

Also, the photos by MPs from the lobbies are now becoming so regular they should accept it as a good thing, bit of light transparency, and change the rules to formally allow it.

OK, here it comes.

May deal defeated 391 to 242.

Out by one baby.

May up. Literally sounds half dead. Can barely speak.

"I stand by commitments in full". Motion on no-deal tomorrow. May confirms it's a free vote.

She says she has struggled with this. I'm sure she has, although suspect it might be rather more about her position.

She'll do anything. Literally anything to stay.

Motion will read that House declines to leave without a deal and that deal remains the 'default' for UK and EU. Odd choice of words. It is not, legally speaking.

After that, if House rejects no-deal, House will vote on extending Article 50 on Thursday.

She lists choices - second referendum etc. "Thanks to the decision the House has made this evening, they are choices which must now be faced."

Corbyn now up. Says deal is dead. Says Labour has put a proposal which can be negotiated. (This is it: politics.co.uk/blogs/2019/02/…)

He thinks there might a majority for them. "The prim e minister has run down the clock and the clock has been run down on her." He then mentions a general election. He does not mention a second referendum.

Corbyn was utterly dreadful. Pointless. A waste of space. Just consider for a moment the magnitude of the moment. And then consider his statement.

An intellectual vortex in clothing.

Cooper: "We urgently need some clarification on what will happen in just over two weeks time."

PM's motion on no-deal sounded unclear to her. Quite right. It needed to be plain and simple. She therefore wants clarification that it can be amended to make it simpler.

Cooper brilliant.

Bercow confirms cut off time of 10:30am tomorrow for amendments.

Benn asks about amendments for Thursday vote on extending A50.

Bercow says he'll apply same logic.

Btw I misheard on no-deal motion wording. It noted that laving without a deal *was* still the default.

OK, full piece coming up in a moment.

Lost, broken, ruined: May humiliated once again by Commons politics.co.uk/blogs/2019/03/…

My take on today's events: This cannot become the new normal. May cannot be allowed to try again. There was nowhere near enough to movement to justify that.