John Bercow’s Brexit ruling is mistaken, but Theresa May’s deal is doomed anyway

A third vote on the deal would indeed have been a new proposition – because the alternatives to it no longer include a no-deal Brexit

The speaker has misunderstood the rules of the House of Commons, in my opinion. The rule against asking MPs to vote on the same thing twice is a convention to make it easier to run an assembly.

It is designed to stop a government wasting MPs’ time by asking them to vote on hedge-trimming regulations more than once. It was never intended to apply to huge constitutional questions such as the way in which we leave the EU.

As Rory Stewart, the prisons minister, said, “in this case”, dropping the issue is not an option, “because these votes respond to an instruction in a referendum, endorsed by parliament, which rules out dropping back to the status quo”.

Parliament asked the people if they wanted to leave the EU, promising to give effect to their wishes in a referendum. So far it has not been able to decide how to do that, and it is another ancient convention of the Commons that the speaker should try to facilitate MPs in reaching a decision.

John Bercow’s ruling today makes it harder for them to do that. Everyone knows that the only reason the Commons has rejected the prime minister’s deal is that there are two other options, each of which also commands minority support in the chamber: to leave without a deal or not to leave.

Since the deal was defeated on Tuesday, the prime minister has undertaken to rule out a no-deal Brexit, if that is what the Commons wanted. And on Wednesday, it was. That, incidentally, was a proposition that had already been approved by the Commons on 29 January, when Caroline Spelman’s amendment to reject a no-deal exit was passed by eight votes. The speaker didn’t rule against that being voted on a second time last Wednesday.

So a third vote on the deal would indeed be a new proposition, because the alternatives to it no longer include a no-deal Brexit.

In any case, the rules of the House of Commons are a matter for the House of Commons. The whole point of the Yvette Cooper-Dominic Grieve constitutional revolution – which has not yet succeeded but for which the principle has been established – is that if there is a majority in the Commons for giving a group of backbenchers temporary control of legislation, that is what can happen.

If there is a majority in the Commons for the prime minister’s deal, therefore, the Commons can decide to put aside the “rule” about not voting on things twice, and vote on it.

But that brings us to the nub of the question. The prime minister had already abandoned the idea of holding the “meaningful vote 3” on her deal tomorrow because she didn’t think she could win it.

Looking through the list of Conservative MPs who voted against it in “meaningful vote 2” last Tuesday, I don’t think she could come close. Too many of them are Brexiteers Against Brexit. They say they want to leave the EU but they are determined to vote against the one way it can happen, which is the prime minister’s deal.

Whatever the speaker had said, Theresa May was on her way to Brussels on Thursday to ask the EU27 for more time. At this rate I think we are heading for a new prime minister and never leaving the EU, but it won’t be because of John Bercow.