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The pro European Tory votes against the deal together with opposition votes were enough to sink it. Even if the entire ERG had voted for it.
by tomatocracy 7y ago
The pro European Tory votes against the deal together with opposition votes were enough to sink it. Even if the entire ERG had voted for it.
- disgruntledphd2 7y agoSorry, which pro-European tories voted against Theresa May's deal? Can you supply a list? Like, the first vote definitely wouldn't have passed with them, but the third definitely would have. Now personally, I think the Opposition should have voted for the deal, but the primary respionsibility falls on the government.
- tomatocracy 7y agoAt least Guto Bebb, Phillip Lee, Dominic Grieve, Sam Gyimah, Jo Johnson, and Justine Greening (there may be others I’ve missed). May’s majority including the DUP at the time was 7 (I think - this was after the defections to the Independent Group) so those 6 would have tipped it into a loss on their own.
- disgruntledphd2 7y agoCool, fair point. I didn't think that they'd rebelled till later. I still stand by my contention that the withdrawal bill would have passed were it not for the trenchant opposition from the ERG and DUP, but accept that the numbers don't entirely suport my story.
- tomatocracy 7y agoI think to be fair, if the DUP had supported it then there’s a very good argument that that would have changed minds sufficiently elsewhere that it could have passed. Playing counter factuals on this type of thing is very difficult though because, for example, some MPs likely took a view that they wanted to be on the winning/losing side for reasons mostly unrelated to the contents of the deal itself.