Last evening, as soon as Boris Johnson had made his non-announcement of a non-election that meant an election on his terms , the penny started to drop with Labour. They were about to fall into the elephant trap he’d set for them that Tony Blair warned them about.
Labour are not now expected to support the motion Johnson is expected to put to the Commons in reply to the combined opposition’s Bill committing the UK against No Deal. For the government’s motion to pass, it requires a 65% majority which cannot be reached without Labour support. 24 hours ago, that seemed quite likely. By this morning, it had become a no hoper for this week. Better for now to expose either Johnson’s commitment to No Deal or let him sweat out a frantic negotiation with the EU over the next few weeks . Then stop withdrawal if he fails by the EU Summit on 17 October. There is just time to do that by 31 October but everything would have to go very smoothly. This is a big problem as the combined opposition is seriously divided – Labour internally – beyond today’s bid to legislate against No Deal. The Lib Dems are committed to supporting a Remain vote in a second referendum.The resolve of the Tory rebels which is under test today would face the ultimate challenge of dismissing their own government. Johnson retains the initiative, if only for hitting a brick wall fastest as he watches his party split, perhaps terminally. The opposition might claim that as they’ve managed to forge unity today, they could stay united to at least he end of October.
On Labour’s skidding halt towards a snap election, from Guardian Live…
Here is more detail on what Shami Chakrabarti, the shadow attorney general, told the Today programme earlier about Labour’s stance on when it would and would not back an early general election. There has been some confusion over this because at one point yesterday Jeremy Corbyn said the party would back one under any circumstances. Then, later in the day, first the shadow Brexit minister Jenny Chapman (here), and then the shadow Northern Ireland secretary, Tony Lloyd (here), said support for an early general election was conditional.
Labour’s stance is crucial because, although No 10 is saying Boris Johnson will go for an election on 14 October if he loses the vote tonight, under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act an early election cannot happen without Labour’s support.
Chakrabarti tried to clear things up on the Today programme this morning. Some shadow ministers “freelance” when they give media interviews (ie, they push their own views as much as the official party line), but Chakrabarti had good relations with Corbyn’s office and is a reliable guide to the official line. This is what she said about when Labour would support an early election.
So to clear it up, it’s about sequencing …
What we need to ensure is that we get this legislation locked down. And that’s quite hard, because remember, we’ve got ministers who say that they’ll ignore legislation. So that’s another thing to consider. We’ve got to get a locked-in guarantee that Britain would not crash out of the EU in an election campaign period.
We’ve also got to try as best as possible to ensure that it wouldn’t be possible for the sitting, squatting, prime minister in this period to set the general election and then change the date.
Chakrabarti said Corbyn would be meeting other opposition leaders in parliament this morning to discuss the matter further. When pressed on whether she was saying the election would have to take place after 31 October for Labour to support it (which was what Lloyd implied last night), she replied:
We certainly need to make sure that Boris Johnson can’t go in for the kind of shenanigans he’s been going in for with his chums last week, where the date is perhaps moved so that you could crash out [of the EU] by default during this period of a campaign.
Chakrabarti said Labour’s priority was preventing a no-deal Brexit, But beyond that the party wanted an election because “we live and breathe for a general”.
What does this all mean? Chakrabarti seems to be setting out up to three conditions.
1) The Benn bill, designed to prevent a no-deal Brexit on 31 October, would have to pass. That is what getting the legislation “locked down” implies. But there is no chance of that bill becoming law before Wednesday, when Johnson wants to hold a vote on an early election if he loses tonight.
2) Ministers would have to promise to obey the bill. As Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, revealed in an interview on Sunday, at the moment they are not giving those assurances. And in in his statement outside No 10 yesterday, Johnson said he would never ask the EU to delay Brexit – implying he would not be bound by the law if it passed and if, under its terms, it became obligatory to seek an article 50 extension.
3) Ministers would have to give an assurance that the date of the election would not change after MPs voted for one. Lloyd implied last night that it would be best for Labour to wait until an article 50 extension had been secured, and 31 October had passed without a no-deal Brexit, before agreeing to an election. An alternative option might be to hold an election before 31 October, knowing that if Labour won, Corbyn could then request an article 50 extension (or, in extremis, revoke article 50 – although he has never said he would do that). But yesterday there were suggestions that Johnson could agree to an election on 14 October, and then change the date once parliament was dissolved to ensure it happened after a no-deal Brexit on 31 October.
There is no way the government will buy that.
Meanwhile I’m pleased to see that the FT have taken up the Faull solution to the backstop..
Former BBC journalist and manager in Belfast, Manchester and London, Editor Spolight; Political Editor BBC NI; Current Affairs Commissioning editor BBC Radio 4; Editor Political and Parliamentary Programmes, BBC Westminster; former London Editor Belfast Telegraph. Hon Senior Research Fellow, The Constitution Unit, Univ Coll. London
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