May says not enough support for third meaningful vote

The government is not planning to table a third 'meaningful vote' on its Prime Minister Theresa May's Brexit deal due to a continued lack of support.

May said that "as things stand there is still not sufficient support" to ask MPs to vote on her deal for a third time, having been defeated by a large margin earlier this month and in January.

Downing Street had been looking at holding 'MV3' on Tuesday or Wednesday, as the government needs the House of Commons to support the deal in order to get the short delay to the Brexit deadline it had requested from the European Union. Last week the EU said that if May's deal won MP's support the deadline could be extended from 29 March to 22 May to make necessary legislative preparations, but if there is no support from parliament then a shorter delay would be given, to 12 April, in order to give MPs a couple of weeks to decide an alternative way forward.

May addressed the Commons on Monday afternoon after averting a supposed leadership coup by senior Conservative party members over the weekend and following an apparently also unsuccessful chat with Northern Ireland's Democratic Unionist Party, upon which May's party relies on in order to maintain a wafer-thin parliamentary majority.

On Monday evening MPs are due to vote on an amendment proposed by senior Tory MP Oliver Lewtin, which if passed would see parliament wrest control of the process of holding indicative votes on Brexit options.

May told the Commons that the government was opposed to the amendment and went so far as to say the government would not commit to accept the result of anything decided in indicative votes.

The pound, which has been a gauge on financial markets optimism about the Brexit process, was down 0.25% at 1.3176 against the dollar just before 1700 GMT on Monday and down 0.3% versus the euro at 1.1649.

A lack of support for May's deal doesn’t come as a big surprise, said market analysts David Cheetham at XTB, who said attention now turns to Monday evening’s vote. "The government will oppose the Letwin amendment, but whether Tory MPs follow this is yet to be seen. The vote is expected to be too close to call, and while MPs putting aside party politics in the pursuit of progress would be warmly welcomed it is unlikely to provide the panacea that proponents hope."

He said a successful meaningful vote would likely cause a near-term move higher in the pound, this outcome looked the "least positive for sterling in the longer run", assuming no-deal is ruled out.