Members of the British parliament yesterday appeared set to approve a bill empowering British Prime Minister Theresa May to start Brexit negotiations, in a major step toward the nation leaving the EU.
Seven months after the historic referendum vote to leave the 28-nation bloc, the House of Commons is expected to grant its approval for May to trigger Article 50 of the EU’s Lisbon Treaty.
The bill must now still pass through the House of Lords, where there may be more opposition from unelected peers less concerned about defying the majority of voters who backed Brexit.
However, if, as expected, the bill passes its Commons stage in a vote, May would be significantly closer to her goal of starting the two-year exit talks by the end of next month.
Under pressure from lawmakers, the government was forced to concede on Tuesday that parliament would have a vote on the final Brexit deal before it is signed off.
The move helped fend off a rebellion by pro-European members of May’s Conservative Party, who had threatened to back an opposition amendment to the two-clause bill.
However, ministers said that if lawmakers rejected the final deal, the alternative was not to return to negotiations, but to leave the EU without an agreement.
“This will be a meaningful vote. It will be a choice between leaving the European Union with a negotiated deal or not,” British Minister of State for Exiting the EU David Jones said.
More than two-thirds of lawmakers campaigned against Brexit in last year’s referendum, but after 52 percent of Britons voted to leave the EU, most have reluctantly accepted that they must uphold the result.
When May introduced her Brexit bill last month, the Labour Party promised not to block it.
About 47 Labour lawmakers rebeled to vote against the legislation, backed by the Scottish National Party (SNP) and the smaller Liberal Democrats, and more could defy their party leadership yesterday.
In a symbolic move on Tuesday, the SNP-dominated Scottish Parliament voted overwhelmingly against the bill passing through Westminster. However, there are not enough critics to thwart the bill, and efforts to amend it to tie May’s hands in negotiations have so far failed.
Many lawmakers are opposed to May’s decision to prioritizing controlling EU migration into Britain in the talks, at the cost of losing membership of Europe’s single market.
Jones said the “final draft agreement” on leaving the EU would be put to lawmakers and peers before it was put to the European Parliament for ratification.
A number of lawmakers are skeptical that both the exit terms and a new trade deal can be agreed within two years of talks.
However, Jones said he was confident of getting agreement on both areas, but said that if there was no deal, Britain would fall back on WTO rules to determine its trade with the EU.
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