Labour amendment defeat paves way for party supporting second referendum
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Your support makes all the difference.MPs have emphatically rejected Jeremy Corbyn's Brexit vision, placing huge pressure on the Labour leader to row in behind a second referendum.
Mr Corbyn told Labour MPs earlier this week that he was ready to back a Final Say vote "to prevent a damaging Tory Brexit being forced on the country" if his plan was defeated.
The move came during a series of Commons votes, which saw a surprise Brexiteer rebellion on a bid by Labour's Yvette Cooper to cement the prime minister's promise to allow MPs to rule out a no-deal exit.
Ms May tried to take the heat out of the clash by allowing MPs to vote on delaying the UK's EU withdrawal beyond March 29 amid threats of a ministerial resignations.
Meanwhile, Labour was embroiled in fresh controversy after Derby North MP Chris Williamson was suspended for saying the party had been "too apologetic" over antisemitism.
As it happened...
38 Labour MPs have written to Jennie Formby, Labour's general secretary, to demand Chris Williamson is suspended from the party
BREAKING: Labour has suspended Derby North MP Chris Williamson.
A Labour Party spokesperson said: "Chris Williamson is suspended from the Party, and therefore the whip, pending investigation."
Mr Williamson had been issued with a "notice of investigation for a pattern of behaviour", but a decision was later taken by the party's general secretary Jennie Formby to suspend him.
Some swift reaction from Labour people and unions to Chris Williamson's suspension.
While Chris Williamson is dominating the headlines, the Brexit debate is still rumbling on in the Commons.
Labour MP Yvette Cooper has said she will table her amendment (F), which will seek to lock in place the PM's promises of votes on her deal, no-deal and an extension to negotiations.
Ms Cooper said she was satisfied by Ms May's commitment to give MPs a vote on delaying Brexit and appealed to ministers to consider the Corbyn amendment as a way of reaching consensus on a Brexit deal.
She said: "We hope that with these assurances we do not need to press amendment C (Spelman) today but I do hope to press amendment F, I do hope we can have that confirmation and clarity of what the Prime Minister has said as part of the motion.
"...Many of the points in amendment A (Corbyn) if in fact were put to a free vote across this House I suspect they would get a majority and I suspect that would be a consensus way forward."
The Home Affairs select committee chairwoman added she believed her actions were "hugely patriotic" and not those of "mutinous plotters, saboteurs and blackmailers" as some Brexiteer MPs have alleged.
Chris Williamson has been found by Sky News drinking outside the Red Lion pub in Westminster. He said his suspension was "within the party process" and that he would be "working to clear my name".
Very interesting thread here from an old Labour press officer, who describes the day ex-London mayor Ken Livingstone famously gave an interview allegedly calling Hitler a Zionist.
Back in the Commons, Tory MP Jeremy Lefroy said he was "absolutely against this business of leaving no-deal on the table".
He said: "The negotiations have gone far beyond that, this is not some game of chicken, this has got to be a mature, grown up relationship between parties who are going to remain close, even if we are a bit more separate than we have been in the past.
"So let's do this in a mature way."
Tory MP Alberto Costa welcomed the fact the government had accepted his amendment on EU citizens' rights, but said the fact it needed to be laid down is a "very sad state of affairs".
The South Leicestershire MP, who was forced to resign as a government aide after tabling the amendment, said he was a "very loyal Conservative member" who has "never rebelled" and "scarcely spoken out of turn".
He said his bid had a "broad consensus" of MPs behind it, including opposition leaders "importantly for me the support of honourable members across the Brexit debate on my side of the House, a sensible government must accept a reasonable amendment".
He said: "My amendment does not deal in goods or services, backstops or borders, but people, living and breathing, skin and bone."
Adding that "such an amendment is needed is in itself a very sad state of affairs", Mr Costa said the rights of EU nationals living in the EU and British citizens living on the continent "should never have been used as a bargaining chip".
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