May under pressure over Brexit delay as vote pushed back
Pressure increased on Theresa May to delay Brexit after she announced over the weekend that MPs would not get a meaningful vote on her deal until March 12, two weeks before Britain is due to leave the European Union.
On Monday the defence minister Tobias Ellwood suggested he would vote for a delay if May didn't endorse an extension to Article 50.
“I don’t support the idea that we go ahead towards no deal,” he told the BBC, adding that he would be "tempted" to vote for a cross-party amendment tabled by Conservative backbencher Oliver Letwin and Labour's Yvette Cooper that would rule out a no-deal scenario.
May is holding talks with EU leaders at a summit in Egypt, as she tried to get the EU to yield on the withdrawal agreement to help get her deal through parliament.
Ellwood also warned the members of the hard-right Tory "European Research Group" (ERG) to “fall in line".
"We would not be having this conversation about no deal if it wasn’t for the fact that, I’m afraid, there’s been a bloc voice in our party that has hindered the prime minister getting this across the line.”
The ERG wants a hard Brexit with no agreement, but Ellwood claimed their aims were divergent from the result of the 2016 referendum result.
“Does it (no-deal) responsibly answer the referendum question? No it doesn’t. Does it domestically help a divided nation on the Brexit issue? No it doesn’t. And does it help Britain’s prosperity in moving to WTO terms? No it doesn’t. This is not good for Britain. In fact it is out of character for an internationally engaged country with an aspiration to help shape the world to actually move in this direction.”