So what happened in
parliament on Tuesday night?
It's complicated.
MPs voted in a
series of amendments
to declare that they will
not support a no-deal Brexit.
Unfortunately, they also
voted to deny themselves
the tools to stop it happening.
Then they also voted to
support Theresa May's deal,
but only if she can deliver
changes to the treaty
that she has utterly failed to
secure in the last two years
in the next eight weeks.
The ayes to the right, 317.
The noes to the left, 301.
So where does this
actually leave us?
The simple answer is it
leaves us probably doing this
all again in a fortnight.
Essentially, the
British parliament
is engaged in a massive
game of chicken.
But it's not just a game
of chicken with the EU.
We have more or less conceded
almost all those points
already, which is probably just
as well, because it was rather
like having Theresa
May on a bicycle
cycling ferociously towards
the European Union in a Hummer.
The problem is that
at the same time,
there's multiple players
of this game of chicken,
and they're all going
in different directions
and all converging
in the middle.
And some of them
are actually quite
happy to have the smash as well.
At the moment, Mrs May has sided
with her own Brexit hardliners
in going for one more attempt
to face down the European
Union over the issue
of the backstop which
prevents a hard border
in Northern Ireland.
You can't blame a
political leader
for placing a high
premium on party unity,
but it's a little
trickier to justify
when the whole of the
nation's interests
are at stake at the same time.
Does this mean we're heading
towards a no-deal outcome?
Not necessarily.
The important thing to remember
about Theresa May's strategy
is that she believes running
down the clock helps.
So although it's a white-knuckle
ride for everybody else,
the prime minister thinks
that the closer she takes us
to the edge, the more chance
she has of getting a deal.
But she knows that if
too much time elapses,
she's going to have to get a
deal through with the support
of Labour and other
opposition party votes,
a deal much less to her liking
and much less to the liking
of her party, but one that
at least spares the country
the risk of the cliff edge.
And even if her
hardliners don't think it,
Mrs May certainly believes
that if the Conservatives take
the country over an
economic cliff edge,
they will be out of
power for a generation
because the voters
will not forgive them
for the economic
chaos that follows.
