For a very long time, I considered a second referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU to be a complete impossibility. Neither major party has ever endorsed the idea, which is pretty fatal as these things go. However, I think it is starting to look ever more likely to happen due to a strange, in most cases unconscious, alliance that is converging.
May’s battle to get a deal with the European Commission could rage on for some time yet. The deadline keeps getting pushed back, now to mid-November – and that could easily slide further. Imagine that an agreement isn’t reached until February. This gives May very little time to get her deal through the Commons.
What is clear now is that there is a hardcore rump of Tory Brexiteers who will not vote for any deal whatsoever. This group mostly thinks that coming to the end of the Article 50 process without a deal will “call the Commission’s bluff” and the wondrous deal of dreams will then be forthcoming. May knows this group of her own backbenchers is unreachable, she must. This bunch cannot be appeased by anything she would even consider.
This means that she needs Labour MPs to vote for her deal in order for it to pass. The way I see it, the thing that Remainer Labour MPs from the Chuka Umunna grouping will ask for in return for voting for the deal is an amendment on a second referendum, one that has two choices: May’s deal or Remain. The prime minister will hate this – but given the only other option would be to face ignominious defeat in the Commons on the deal she has worked her entire premiership to achieve, I think she would, very, very begrudgingly, go for it. Yes, it would almost certainly finish her as PM, but that’s on the cards anyhow; at least she would get to go out with her deal having passed the House, even if it was subject to ratification via referendum.
To deal with one objection here and now: if the House of Commons voted to hold a referendum that either meant a deal the Commission had already agreed to, at least in principle, or Britain remaining in the EU, extending Article 50 would be easy.
If this scenario were to unfold, it would really be because of the obstinance of the hardcore Brexiteers. If they vote for Mrs May’s deal, Brexit definitely happens, even if it is initially in a form they don’t approve of; the second referendum opens up the real possibility of Remain. And still, it seems like this is what they will do, if this situation arises, which is fairly likely.
I don’t know what would happen if a second referendum were to be staged; in fact, I really don’t care to speculate about it at this time. Whatever the result, there would be some fairly bad blood. I think all this talk of rioting is a bit much, but there is no doubt it would poison British politics even further. If such a thing can be imagined.
But, the very split-second she accepted that amendment, wouldn’t she lose a no-confidence vote, be put out of office, and a Conservative leadership election be kicked off?
That would stop parliamentary business dead — yes technically she’d still be Prime Minister, but she’d have no authority because she by definition wouldn’t have the confidence of a majority of the House of Commons (hm — what actually would happen if the Opposition forced a FTPA no-confidence motion while the government was in the middle of a leadership election? Did anybody think of the when rushing that stupid piece of ad hoc legislation through?).
“To deal with one objection here and now: if the House of Commons voted to hold a referendum that either meant a deal the Commission had already agreed to, at least in principle, or Britain remaining in the EU, extending Article 50 would be easy.”
I think the assumption that if the UK wanted to stay in the EU, then it would all be easy to arrange, is very naive.
The question is on what terms we’d be allowed to remain if we did change our minds. Would there be any chance at all of keeping the favourable terms we negotiated before? Given that every single other member state would be capable of vetoing an extension of the deadline?
Now imagine going into a second referendum in the “Remain” camp, and arguing for that option, with a strong presumption that if we remained we could expect no special treatment at all …
Chris –
“The question is on what terms we’d be allowed to remain if we did change our minds. Would there be any chance at all of keeping the favourable terms we negotiated before? Given that every single other member state would be capable of vetoing an extension of the deadline?”
That is an important consideration. Are we really to believe that the UK budget rebate would continue or the various opt-outs maintained? I woud not assume so.
Nick –
There are several practical considerations concerning a second European Union referendum. It was reported a few days ago in the press that the Constitution Unit had concluded that the legislative process for a second referendum would need to start in early October, and straight after the Conservative party conference, simply in order to hold a referendum on *the day before* we are due to leave the EU – Friday 29 March 2019. So any delay would, most likely, require an extension of the Article 50 period and all that entails.
Second, European Parliament elections are scheduled for the end of May 2019. I think the EU would be entitled to ask whether or not we intended to participate. Saying “Can you hang on while we hold another referendum and make up our minds” would look, well, a bit indecisive and discourteous. But perhaps we can live with that.
But on a more substantive point, any referendum before 30 March 2019 would mean that we would not be voting on the ‘final deal’ because there wouldn’t be a completed ‘final deal’ to vote on. Only half of the deal, so to speak, would be available, that is, the withdrawal agreement and a political declaration on the framework for the future relationship (plans for which are becoming sketchier by the week). The agreement on the future relationship cannot be negotiated in detail until *after* we have left the EU. So how on earth can we have a ‘meaningful’ referendum on the ‘final deal’ when the plan for the future – surely the most important aspect – is reduced to a dozen pages of pious hopes and good intentions?
And this is before considering the consequences for the credibility of the UK’s political system and political class in asking the electorate, sotto voce, to vote again to produce the ‘right’ answer.