Brexit: is it FINALLY crunch time?

Once more we find ourselves at the moment where it all could be decided. Deal, no-deal or a second referendum all seem in themselves quite unlikely… yet all remain possible.

The government has been back and forth to Brussels many times to try and get more reassurances on the backstop arrangement. Last night, Theresa May said they had made no further progress (and that it was the fault of the EU, surprise surprise) and once more argued for the UK to adopt the deal in its current form.

Tomorrow MPs have been promised a vote on Theresa May’s deal. The process looks something like this:

As you can see, if they accept the deal, the UK goes forward with a deal on 29 March.

If they reject the deal tomorrow, the Government will put forward a vote on no deal. If the Parliament passes that motion, the UK will move toward crashing out of the EU on 29 March.

If that vote fails, the following day, the Government put forward a vote on extending article 50. If this passes, the government will ask the EU for an extension.

If this fails, it is rather unclear what happens next. While the legal outcome would still have the UK err toward no-deal, the government will likely be obligated to put forward emergency legislation to prevent this.

The outcome with the greatest likelihood is for Parliament to reject the PM’s deal and no deal and opt to extend article to. In this instance, the government will go back to Brussels and ask them to extend the negotiating period. However, this then has to be accepted by all 27 other EU member states… While the EU states will probably do what their negotiators advise, many won’t be happy. Indeed, French President Emanuel Macron said he would only give his permission for an extension if there was a clear way out of the deadlock.

As you may remember, Labour was also going to move to supporting a second referendum if their Brexit plan could not be realised. Last week, they seemed to move more decisively towards this, but have since backtracked somewhat from their proposal of tagging an amendment to the Withdrawal Agreement vote that would force a second referendum.

In saying all this, there has been some chatter under the wire suggesting that the Government may change the vote on the Withdrawal Agreement to a non-legally binding vote in order to escape the consequences of the inevitable defeat. This would cause considerable uproar but, given that it’s what the government has done so far, hoofing the ball into the not-so-long grass is probably what they'll do once more.

So is it crunch time?! Probably not.