Isabel Hardman

Theresa May has just finished a speech in which she made clear – without using those words – that the Government is going to lose tonight’s meaningful vote and that she is now planning for the next Commons confrontation on Brexit.  She managed to get one MP, Sir Edward Leigh, to withdraw his amendment on the basis that she was happy to work with him on ‘creative solutions’ to the backstop. She also promised that ‘the government will work harder at taking Parliament with us’ on Brexit.  But this harder work doesn’t seem to include any moves towards working with Labour on some kind of national unity movement to stop a no-deal Brexit.

If you're a not particularly impressive leader of a political party preparing a response to any statement given by Theresa May, the easiest phrase that you can lazily reach for is 'nothing has changed'. You know it will apply to anything the Prime Minister says about how she has improved her Brexit deal.  All three main party leaders appeared to conform to those easy predictions this afternoon. Theresa May stood up and tried to convince MPs that she had secured important changes to the deal that meant they should support it tomorrow. Jeremy Corbyn replied that nothing had changed and that there should be a general election, while Ian Blackford argued that the voices of the people were being ignored and that May should extend Article 50.

John Bercow has been an excellent, reforming Speaker of the House of Commons. He has supercharged backbenchers with greater use of urgent questions, for instance, and has also made Parliament more family-friendly. His pomposity while chairing Prime Minister's Questions - the endless chiding about what the public might think of MPs' behaviour, often accompanied with tedious jokes about certain members needing to take 'a soothing medicament' - was something even the MPs in question could forgive, given they had a Speaker who was making the legislature bolder. But in the past few months, there has been a shift in the Parliamentary mood.

It would be tempting to dismiss the past hour and a half of points of order in the House of Commons as MPs making fools of themselves by complaining about things not going their way. Indeed, there was some evidence to support that theory, such as the final exchange of the session between the Speaker and Tory MP Adam Holloway in which the backbencher complained about a 'bollocks to Brexit' sticker in the window of a car driven by the Speaker's wife and shouted, in the manner of a lawyer in a lowbrow television drama: 'Have you driven that car?' Bercow made this seem even more ludicrous by assuring the House that 'that sticker is not mine'.

Parliament rises for Christmas recess tomorrow - unless the various grinches arguing it should carry on sitting so it can loudly fail to make any decisions on Brexit have their way. MPs are so busy accusing Theresa May of kicking the can down the road on Britain leaving the European Union that few have noticed how many other cans are also bouncing along the tarmac. We had been expecting big announcements on social care reform, domestic abuse legislation and the NHS by the end of this term in Parliament, but all appear to have been delayed. The social care green paper had been delayed repeatedly anyway, but was expected this autumn. A few leaves do still linger on the December trees, but ministers are now saying there won't be any green shoots on this matter this year.

MPs have been expressing their fury today that the vote of no confidence in Theresa May allowed two suspended Tories to rejoin the party. Andrew Griffiths and Charlie Elphicke had both had the Conservative whip removed over claims of inappropriate sexual behaviour, but were reinstated yesterday so that they could vote. Labour's Shadow Women and Equalities Minister Dawn Butler described it as a 'betrayal of women', adding 'how can Theresa May call herself a feminist when she lets an MP who was suspended back into the Conservative party to vote for her in the leadership challenge?

Speaker Bercow has told MPs that they do deserve a vote on the government’s plan to delay its Brexit deal vote. He told the Commons this afternoon that ‘any courteous, respectful and mature environment, allowing the House to have its say on the matter would be the right and obvious course to take’. We will find out more details on the procedural aspects of the government’s plan later when Andrea Leadsom gives a statement. Bercow’s statement shows why Labour were so keen to protect him as Speaker when his job was in peril over the bullying and harassment scandal. He was always likely to be an interventionist speaker over Brexit, and in this instance, he is making life as uncomfortable for the government as he possibly can.

The working assumption in Westminster at the moment is that Theresa May will lose Tuesday’s meaningful vote on her Brexit deal, and then the Labour Party will table a motion of no confidence in the government. The Tory whips certainly seem as concerned about that no confidence vote as they are about the Brexit vote, given they are resigned to losing one but have a good chance of winning the other. But I’m not sure that this is the case any more. The public language from the Opposition has changed in recent days to suggest that there will not be a separate vote after all - or at least not one tabled by the Labour Party.