Should MPs hold ‘indicative votes’ on Brexit?

Senior figures in Theresa May’s cabinet have recently started promoting the idea of holding “indicative votes” in the House of Commons to try to resolve the impasse over Brexit.

According to one report, at least four ministers — Amber Rudd, Greg Clark, Philip Hammond and David Gauke — privately urged the idea on the prime minister yesterday as a way to break the deadlock. On the BBC, Mr Clark was very open about the idea.

Downing Street has made clear it has no intention of holding such an exercise and Mrs May effectively ruled it out in the Commons yesterday.

But with the PM’s Brexit deal in trouble, the idea is likely to continue being raised by ministers in the weeks ahead.

At present, the next clear fixture in the Commons timetable is the meaningful vote on Mrs May’s deal. It will be held in the week beginning Monday January 14.

We know that, barring an unexpected turn of events, the deal will be rejected by MPs. What happens then?

One way to try to chart a way forward would be for MPs to table amendments to Mrs May’s deal as it is presented for a vote in the Commons.

But tabling amendments will be complicated and much depends on the order in which they are voted on.

“If one amendment wins early on then others might not be tabled and you could end up not having a proper airing of the House’s views,” says Maddy Thimont Jack, a researcher at the Institute for Government think-tank.

A better approach could be for the government to test the view of the House by offering MPs a series of indicative votes in one day’s sitting on all options.

All MPs would be asked to line up and vote on a second referendum, a managed no-deal, a Norway-style deal or Labour’s idea of Mrs May’s deal plus a customs union.

The votes would be free votes in which MPs could cast their ballots as they saw fit. MPs could also vote for as many of the options as they wished.

The votes would not be binding on the government but, it is argued, they would give the Commons an opportunity to indicate its collective will and shape policy.

Would this be effective? There is one well-known example of indicative voting of this type. In 2003, Tony Blair’s government tried to build a consensus among MPs on the major constitutional issue of House of Lords reform by putting a range of options to a free vote.

The government asked MPs to vote on total abolition of the upper house; a 100 per cent elected house; 80 per cent elected; 60 per cent elected; and 40 per cent elected. 

Each of those options was rejected and Lords reform has been stalled ever since.

“The risk with indicative voting is that you might end up with nothing being accepted,” says Ms Thimont Jack. “Or alternatively, two or more options might get Commons approval. The system is by no means guaranteed to produce a clear result.”

Still, the idea of indicative votes is likely to develop. If Mrs May’s deal is rejected by the Commons in January, this could be the only way forward.

And, of course, if the Commons were to reject all the options, it might suit Mrs May very well. She would be in a position to put her own deal to the House one more time, saying it is the only possible Brexit.

Further reading

No-deal dreamers could force a Brexit rethink

“The real appeal of the indicative vote idea is that it keeps Mrs May’s deal alive while also being a way to ease her from her own fixed position. Once the parliamentary maths is clear, one faction will have to change tactics.” (Robert Shrimsley in the FT)

A patronising and divisive second referendum would threaten the very fabric of our democracy

“The result could be inconclusive. There could be claims against its legality. There could be a mass boycott of the poll from Leave voters — who would rightly feel ignored.” (Stephen Barclay, Brexit secretary, in The Times — paywall)

Organising the ‘second’ referendum

“Economists have long understood that the way to make optimal decisions in such circumstances is through a process known as ‘backward induction’. You start with what will be the last step of the actual process.” (Professor Alan Winters of the UK Trade Policy Observatory)

Hard numbers

The debate about immigration in the UK has been heightened ever since the Brexit referendum, with British citizens and politicians alike discussing the relative merits and problems associated with high levels of migrant inflows.

This year, in the second quarter, net migration from the EU to the UK turned negative for the first time in almost 10 years, according to the Office for National Statistics, as about 3,000 more EU citizens left the UK than arrived. (FT)