Lindsay Razaq: Brexit’s coming, but May shouldn’t expect it served up on a plate

“BREXIT breakfast briefing” – try getting your tongue around that, especially first thing in the morning.

Increasingly regular since the June 23 vote, a speaker at one such event this week joked that for once Brexit really did mean breakfast.

MPs keep confusing the words – often at peak rant which can make for some funny moments.

But it’s hardly surprising when the subject is so dominant.

According to my rough calculations, I have written the words Brexit and EU in stories more than 40 times over the last four days.

The only other word that has featured almost as much is Trump.

It was to another US President, however, that the SNP’s Stephen Gethins turned for inspiration after his party’s attempt to kill off the Article 50 bill failed and the legislation subsequently cleared its first parliamentary hurdle.

The occasion would go down in “infamy,” he declared, channelling Franklin D. Roosevelt following Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor, which prompted America’s entry into the Second World War.

His hyperbole was extraordinary, but some MPs genuinely view the prospect of the UK’s exit from the EU in that league.

Forty-seven Labour members rebelled against their party’s official stance not to block the bill, including a “heavy-hearted” Ian Murray.

Liberal Democrat Alistair Carmichael also opposed the legislation, which will allow Theresa May to trigger formal withdrawal talks, meaning David Mundell was the sole Scottish MP to back it.

Cue cries of Scotland’s interests being pushed aside from the yellow benches.

The SNP has a point – Scots voted for Remain by 62% to 38%, although more than a million favoured Brexit.

On the other hand, there’s the straightforward fact that – for now – Scotland is part of the UK and this was a UK-wide vote.

It was by no means – and won’t be going forward – a clear-cut or easy question for MPs. Surely their first job is to represent their constituents, making it particularly agonising for those in heavily pro-Remain parts of the country.

Do they voice their views? Or do they accept there was a vote and argue that’s that?

Add to the mix the responsibility in a democracy to ensure the rights of minorities – in this case a large one – are not simply walked over.

Moreover, Ken Clarke, the lone Conservative to revolt, quite rightly pointed out that not even “hot tongs” would have compelled the hardline Eurosceptics to concede had the result gone the other way.

Remember too that the 114 No voters weren’t all trying to halt Brexit full stop, but rather believed the UK Government was rushing into a hard Brexit and that such a momentous transition had to be properly scrutinised.

Of course, such nuances aren’t communicated via a vote tally and the perception outside Westminster is that these MPs – some of whom backed giving the people a say in the first place – are now trampling on their very decision.

Fundamentally, Brexit has to be delivered. But that doesn’t mean the May administration should have free rein over how it is shaped and implemented, or be unanswerable to legitimate concerns surrounding the planned departure from the single market, for example.

In that context the accelerated timetable for Brexit to ensure the Government meets its end-of-March deadline is worrying.

MPs will, however, have the chance to secure concessions at committee stage next week, with pages of amendments already tabled.

And, as Shadow Brexit Secretary Sir Keir Starmer has been at pains to stress, the Withdrawal from the European Union (Article 50) Bill – once passed – will merely authorise the Prime Minister to fire the starting gun on the negotiations.

For those hoping to soften the Government’s approach, perhaps the most significant coup would be to obtain a commitment to a meaningful parliamentary vote on the final deal.

That is to say one in advance of approval in the European Parliament, required for the settlement to be agreed.

Far from a fait accompli, MPs could then swing a giant wrecking ball at the arrangement, putting considerable political pressure on their MEP colleagues.