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22:30
Theresa May's speech to parliament after she lost the vote was absolutely absurd. The same kind of delusional lecturing she did after she threw her own majority away in her 2017 hubris election.
It's like she lives in an alternative universe in which the person receiving the humiliating rebuke (from the public or from parliament) is the one who gets to deliver the condescending lecture afterwards to explain how everyone else got it wrong.
She has absolutely no capability of showing humility or remorse.
22:24
Here's my latest article on why people saying they feel sorry for Theresa May are catastrophically misplacing their sympathies.
21:32
Theresa May's crocodile tears over EU citizens in the UK and UK citizens in the EU to deflect attention away from the seriousness of her defeat is absolutely despicable. Yes these people obviously deserve clarity on their futures, but she's the one who cynically decided to use the lives of millions of people as disposable political pawns in her power games in the first place, instead of unilaterally offering residence and reassurance to EU citizens in the UK as an early priority.
21:26
The anti-Corbyn neoliberalism-lite editorial line of the Guardian news section is absolutely despicable, but this opinion piece from Joseph Harker is absolutely spot on.
21:20
Dominic Grieve who was one of the leading Tory rebels (out of the 118 who defied the Tory party whip) but he's now saying that he will be supporting Theresa May in the "no confidence" vote.
There's absolutely no way to see that as anything other than a decision to put the narrow party political interests of the Tory party (staying in power a bit longer) above the interests of the nation (getting Theresa May out of the way so someone more competent can take a more cooperative approach to the process).
21:16
All indications point to the fact that the Tory "Plan B" after this defeat is simply presenting Plan A again and again until they get the result they want!
An astoundingly bold strategy from a party that is ruling out another Brexit referendum.
Hard to imagine how anyone could fail to see the hypocrisy in supporting "do it again until you give us the result we want" and opposing "the facts have changed since 2016 so maybe we should have another vote".
[Note: I don't personally support either of these positions]
21:07
I've just seen an appalling effort to deflect blame away from Theresa May and the Tories by blaming all politicians for not coming together for the good of the country.
Blaming "all politicians" is a grotesque deflection tactic.
The opposition parties tried to talk to May she ignored them.
They tried to amend her legislation, she whipped her MPs into removing the amendments.
The Scottish and Welsh parliaments tried to negotiate with May over Brexit, she outright ignored them.
Theresa May screwed it all up by trying to run the whole process as an autocrat, and it's unfair to try to cast an equal part of the blame on devolved parliaments and opposition parties.
Had she tried listening and consensus building it might have worked (or at least not failed as badly).
But we all knew exactly what her approach was going to be. From her expensive court battles to avoid parliamentary accountability, to the "crush the saboteurs" headlines in the Tory propaganda rags during her Hubris Election in 2017.
If anyone is to blame it's the 13.6 million people who saw this hubristic, mindlessly belligerent, and doomed-to-fail approach from Theresa May and the Tories but flocked to the polls to endorse them anyway.
20:56
Only three Labour MPs defied the party whip to vote in favour of Theresa May's shambles of a plan. The fact that the rabid anti-Corbyn right-wingers Ian Austin and John Mann were among them is no surprise at all.
20:45
In 1886, William Gladstone lost the vote on his Home Rule Bill by 30 votes, and felt obliged to call an election as a result. Theresa May and the Tories intend to keep clinging desperately to power despite a defeat by 230 votes.
20:36
Sorry my blog will not allow me to embed videos properly, I've wasted enough time trying to fix this issue already.
A 432-202 defeat of the government's flagship piece of legislation that's been given absolute priority over all manner of other pressing political issues for 30 months is unprecedented.— Another Angry Voice (@Angry_Voice) January 15, 2019
Theresa May and the Tories who backed her lamentable Brexit tactics need to go. pic.twitter.com/3EFIB2qBjT
20:18
I've written before about why a vote of no confidence is likely to fail. The Tories will unify to protect the interests of their own party. They'd rather have hopelessly crippled Tory leader flailing around incompetently in defiance of the national interest than ever consider letting someone else have a go at running the show.
The DUP are still likely to back Theresa May because they've got her exactly where they want her. She's entirely dependent on them for support for her political survival so she has to dance to their tune whenever they demand it.
What possible benefit would they get from releasing their political hostage with no payoff by voting to collapse her government. It simply makes no sense from a realpolitik perspective. [Article]
20:12
One thing that's absolutely vital to remember is that without Jeremy Corbyn's Labour and the other opposition parties unifying to insist on a "meaningful vote" in the first place there would have been no defeat. Had Theresa May been allowed to approach Brexit in the autocratic way she desired there would have been no meaningful vote, and she'd be dragging us towards her own rubbish interpretation of Brexit with no means of stopping her.
Brexit sceptics should be thankful that the opposition parties managed to put the brakes on Theresa May's autocratic Brexit scheming, but also the Brextremists should be thankful too. It's only thanks to Brexit sceptics that they even had the opportunity to vote down May's disgraceful shambles of a deal today.
20:06
A defeat of 230 votes is unprecedented. 118 of her own MPs voted against her! And this isn't just any old piece of legislation, it's her flagship policy that's pushed all manner of other vitally important issues into the political background for the last two and a half years. Anyone with any sense of perspective would resign immediately after such a failure.
20:00
They assured us that this would be "the easiest deal in human history" to achieve. It's fallen at the very first hurdle. A truly spectacular display of Tory incompetence.
19:55
Theresa May loses the vote by the astounding margin of 432-202. Jeremy Corbyn immediately submits a motion of no confidence in the government.
19:44
Well voting has started on Theresa May's absolutely shambolic Brexit proposals so we'll know the scale of her defeat pretty soon.
I expect things might begin to move rather quickly after the vote, so I'll do my best to cover what's going on from outside the confines of the groupthink bubble of orthodox neoliberalsim that most Westminster politicians and journalists so clearly inhabit.
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