THE last government to be defeated by more than 100 votes was back in 1924 when MPs voted to investigate the decision of Ramsay MacDonald’s administration to drop criminal proceedings against JR Campbell, editor of the Workers Weekly communist newspaper.
Then the government lost by 364 votes to 198.
Theresa May would no doubt have loved to have lost last night’s vote by such a small margin.
Just 202 MPs backed her deal in the Commons. Of those 196 were Tories, including the majority of the Scottish Westminster party.
They were joined by three Brexiteer Labour MPs, and three independents.
Of the 432 MPs who voted against the deal the majority were Labour, 248. All 35 SNP MPs rejected the agreement, as did the 11 LibDems, the 10 from the DUP, four from Plaid Cyrmu, Green Caroline Lucas, and and five independents
Some 118 Tory MPs rebelled against the Government, roughly
a third of the parliamentary party.
Among them were Scottish Tories Ross Thomson, Douglas Ross and John Lamont.
Taking to Twitter, Thomson, the enthusiastic Brexiteer MP from Aberdeen South said the defeat had “strengthened” May’s hand and “sent the strongest possible message to the EU that their deal, particularly the Northern Irish backstop,
is unacceptable.”
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