Parliament has descended into farce. The government has come up with a version of brexit that no one likes, neither those that voted to leave nor (obviously) those that voted to stay within the EU. Rather than put their proposal to a vote and lose, the government after four days of debate, decided to pull the vote, offending everyone and try to re-open discussions with the EU. We’re supposed to be leaving in March.

Not surprisingly, her own party called for a vote of no confidence in the Prime Minister, Theresa May, which she then won by around 2:1. Not exactly a ringing endorsement, but considerably more than the margin in the referendum.

So here we are. The PM is set to attend an EU meeting today that may generate some kind of non-legally binding letter that states the intent of the EU is not to hold the UK forever hostage in a customs union (the great fear of the most strident leave campaigning MPs). Even if she manages to achieve this, it is unlikely to placate her own MPs who are so far to the extreme and lack such trust in the process that nothing will satisfy them. 

Perhaps more importantly it will also likely fail to please the DUP, a small political party currently propping up her minority government, who quite rightly point out that legally it is entirely clear that the customs union will last forever (whatever intentions might be) for N Ireland unless the EU agrees otherwise, thus creating a border between N Ireland and the rest of the UK, taking one step too far towards a re-united Ireland.

So there will be some face saving letter written that will fail to please most of the MPs currently objecting to the government proposal which is now scheduled to be put before parliament after the Christmas break at the end of January. 

I’m assuming that the PM is hoping that given a choice between a bad deal (her proposal) and no deal at all, most MPs will vote for her deal which is somewhat ironic given the much quoted “No deal is better than a bad deal” parroted for the first year of brexit by her government.

But with that legislation is an amendment put forward by one of the MPs that removes the automatic process whereby we would leave the EU with no deal whatsoever. This would then leave responsibility for directing the brexit negotiations back to parliament where there seems to be no consensus as yet, as to the best way forward. Unless…

The loyal opposition party, Labour are biding their time and hoping MPs will become so disgusted with the way things are going that they can call a vote of no confidence in the entire government and thus force a general election where they themselves might win.

This strategy has a couple of obvious flaws. Whatever their faults and internal arguments or ambitions, the members of the Conservative party will never vote down their own government. The DUP have stated that they will also not vote to overthrow the Tories so there just aren’t enough votes available now we have a fixed term parliament to force a general election.

It’s also worth noting that the country is sick of brexit and want the whole thing over with, or at least progressing. They don’t yet realise that we’re just at the start of the process, that the trade deal as such is going to take many more years to negotiate. Any attempt to derail the process or unseat the government at the moment may well be very unpopular with the electorate and lead to a defeat in a general election.

Most likely the proposal from the government will remain deeply unpopular and be voted down. The Grieve amendment taking “no deal” off the table will be popular and will pass.

Labour may call for a vote of no confidence in the government, but it will fail.

So what happens next? The quick answer is that no one knows.

The government could throw its hands in the air, decide that the whole process was unworkable and undesirable and unilaterally revoke the whole Art50 process. A recent ECJ ruling has confirmed that the UK could do this and remain within the EU on the terms it currently enjoys.  but this seems a very unlikely outcome. As things stands it would run counter to the referendum result, undermining faith in government and parliament.

It is possible for the UK to apply to the EU for an extension to Art50, the process we are currently within that requires us to leave  at the end of March 2019 but it would need the approval of each of the other 27 EU states. Permission would only be given if there was a clear reason such as the need to call a general election or to call for another referendum if the decision on next steps was given to the electorate.

And as we creep closer and closer to the March deadline, unless there emerges a clear consensus within parliament as to the best way forward, a second referendum seems more likely, tinged with the spectre of leaving with no deal at all and the chaos that would cause.

We are edging ever closer to the edge of the waterfall.