British PM’s Brexit plan loses another vote, and it could be the 3rd strike
London — Friday was meant to be the day Britain formally ceased to be a member of the European Union. But three years after the public referendum calling for the divorce, the two sides appeared no closer to agreeing on an amicable separation. Even Britain has yet to figure out what it wants.
British lawmakers have made it abundantly clear, however, what they don’t want: the hard-won draft “Brexit” plan that Prime Minister Theresa May negotiated with the EU. On Friday afternoon, Parliament rejected — for a third time — May’s withdrawal deal, or at least the most elemental part of it: the legal withdrawal agreement.The vote leaves the U.K. closer to a possible “crash out” of the European Union on April 12 with no deal in place — risking a dramatic impact on the British economy. Or Britain could seek a much longer delay to the process from the EU.
May’s government stripped out all of the “political agreement” aspect of her draft deal to bring it to a vote on Friday because she has been forbidden by the legislature from bringing the exact same deal back for a third vote.But it wasn’t just that she needed to present an altered plan for a vote; she also knew the devil was in the details. So what’s next?Nobody really knows for sure. Lawmakers will gather again on Monday to hold another series of votes on a range of alternative plans to May’s. But they tried that just days ago and not one of the eight options put forward gained majority backing from lawmakers.As CBS News correspondent Mark Phillips reported from Parliament on Friday, there is no clear path to Brexit.”I fear we are reaching the limits of this process in this house,” May herself noted immediately after losing the vote. But she vowed to “continue to press the case for an orderly Brexit.”Calls were made quickly, however, for May to step down, and the prospect of a new general election was also rising.There are still huge differences of opinion in London over key aspects of how any divorce should work, most notably how to keep goods and people flowing smoothly across the border between Northern Ireland (part of Britain) and Ireland (an independent nation and EU member). The small frontier is the only land border between the U.K. and the EU, and it has essentially been an invisible line for decades, since peace was restored after years of sectarian violence on the island; “The Troubles.”
