Thread by @uk_domain_names

It's possible to plot precisely when Labour dropped the Brexit ball. It was during the vote on Joanna Cherry's amendment to do away with no deal. It failed by 102 votes. 104 Labour MPs abstained (under Jeremy Corbyn's orders).
commonsvotes.digiminster.com/Divisions/Deta…

Had the amendment passed, it would have taken no deal off the table or made it nigh on impossible. But JC gave the orders, and although 121 Labour MPs defined the instruction to abstain, it wasn't enough.

And the date for this catastrophe? 1 April 2019.

You couldn't make it up!

And of course it was reported in the pro Brexit press as MPs turning away from the chance to block no deal (and by implication accepting the prospect of no deal).

It's the purest of "You had ONE job" moments. And Jeremy Corbyn decided to sit on the fence because there was still plenty of time. How is that working out?

But of course this was an encore performance. On 27 March 2019, Labour had already failed through abstentions to pass a motion that would have forced Article 50 to be revoked if MPs voted down no deal the day before Brexit. Another Joanna Cherry special.
commonsvotes.digiminster.com/Divisions/Deta…

So if anyone says "Labour has done everything to stop no deal", point them at this thread. They had two real chances. The arithmetic was there (the vote counts prove it) but dropped the ball both times by abstaining.

I suppose you could also argue that Labour stuffed Cooper-Letwin on 3 April 2019 (though it's less clear cut) by not sufficiently punishing MPs that had ignored the whip in previous votes. 9 Labour MPs voted against it. If even one had changed their vote, it would have passed.

That was the vote that the Speaker was obliged to break the tie on, by convention, in favour of "no". It broke the sequence of indicative votes and brought Brexit opposition to a near standstill.

In short, Jeremy Corbyn delivered a flurry of Brexit penalty kicks. Most were wide of the mark. One bounced off the crossbar. And he missed the two where the goalkeeper had gone off early for his tea.

Even more damningly, the Caroline Spelman amendment (which basically said "we don't want no deal", but had no legal force) *passed* by 312–308 votes on 13 March. So JC was clearly able to muster the votes against no deal, but only when they didn't count for anything.

But not enough people look at this things in aggregate. Which is why so many people leapt out of the woodwork when I said Jeremy Corbyn hadn't done enough. Thing is, the facts don't lie.

(Sorry, can't see straight. Cooper Letwin passed. I got the wrong bill name, but the right purpose. The one that tied was the Hilary Benn amendment that would have kept indicative votes going.)