Key Jeremy Corbyn ally says Labour ready to form minority government 'on Wednesday morning'
2 min read
Labour is ready to form a minority government this week should Theresa May’s Brexit deal be voted down by MPs, a party frontbencher has said.
Jon Trickett said the opposition would be prepared to “reset” the direction of negotiations on leaving the EU should the Prime Minister fail to win the backing of the Commons at Tuesday’s meaningful vote.
It comes as the Mrs May faces an uphill struggle to get her agreement signed off, with scores of Tories and almost all opposition MPs against it.
The Shadow Cabinet Office Minister told Sky’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday that while Labour was pushing for a fresh election, a forming a new administration in the next few days could prove “necessary”.
“An election allows us to refresh the mandate, have a conversation with the wider population and come back to parliament, probably with some new MPs and different points of view and take the argument at that stage, so our preferred option very, very strongly is to refresh the parliament,” he said.
But he added: "Though we are ready to form a minority government should that be necessary and it could happen on Wednesday morning and to begin to reset the negotiation and take the country forward in a much better direction."
Mr Trickett said it was not possible to “guess in advance” what would happen following the vote, but he acknowledged that the Prime Minister was still best placed to shape the direction.
“Mrs May still holds most of the cards as to what happens after the vote.
"Though I think time really is running out for her and if you can tell me whether she’ll still be Prime Minister by Tuesday evening then I can say what exactly we’ll do next, so there are a number of scenarios,” he added.
Elsewhere Mr Trickett warned that a second EU referendum – which the party voted at its conference to maintain as an option – would not necessarily end the parliamentary “gridlock”.
Watch the exchange below:
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