MPs are unlikely to have a second binding vote on Theresa May’s Brexit deal until February, Downing Street has said.
The Prime Minister's spokesman said the vote due to be held on 29 January was not “a second meaningful vote” and the government’s motion would not spell out in detail the next stage of the government's plan to get a Brexit deal through parliament.
Instead, it is likely to be a mechanism allowing proposals from backbench and opposition MPs who will attempt to amend it.
Downing Street said the PM would continue to hold talks with MPs across parties.
May is expected to tell the Commons this afternoon that she plans to return to Brussels to seek a substantive change from the EU on the Irish backstop. No 10 said she would also set out the conversations she had had so far with MPs from across the House of Commons.
“It is an ongoing process,” the spokesman said. “But it is clear already that a significant number of colleagues have expressed concerns about the backstop and that is one of the areas we are going to be looking at.
“In her statement after the results of the vote last week, she said she would be exploring the concerns of MPs and ideas they were bringing forward, and if necessary discussing those with the EU.”
It is possible No 10 may seek to use any backbench amendments to May’s motion which seek to put a time-limit on the backstop as a way to demonstrate to Brussels that such changes would allow the deal to pass.
The backstop, an insurance policy to avoid the return of a hard border between the Irish Republic and Northern Ireland, is the most controversial part of the Brexit deal for Eurosceptics who see it as locking the UK permanently into EU rules - and hence preventing the UK from striking independent trade deals with other countries around the world.
The EU has made the backstop is a red line for them, insisted it cannot be time-limited and that the UK cannot pull out of the arrangement without the agreement of the 27 member states.
But earlier today Poland’s foreign minister confirmed that he is proposing limiting the Irish backstop to five years in order to unblock the Brexit deadlock.
Jacek Czaputowicz told the Rzeczpospolita newspaper that "courageous actions" were now needed to find an agreement to avoid no deal. "If Ireland turned to the EU about changing the agreement with Britain with regard to the provisions on the backstop so that it would only apply temporarily — let’s say five years — the matter would be resolved."
He added: "It would obviously be less favourable for Ireland than an unlimited backstop, but much more favourable than a no-deal Brexit, which is inevitably approaching."
Czaputowicz said he had raised the suggestion in December with his UK and Irish counterparts, Jeremy Hunt and Simon Coveney.
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