The Tory whips have, in their great wisdom, decided to make today’s opposition day vote on fracking a ‘confidence issue’ in Liz Truss’s government. The Labour motion this afternoon isn’t the usual non-binding partisan one, but a mechanism which would allow the opposition to introduce a bill into the Commons banning the practice. It is the same technique that saw 21 Tory MPs lose the whip during the Brexit debates.
The Labour tactic makes it much harder for the government to just ignore the motion and allow MPs to abstain
The Labour tactic makes it much harder for the government to just ignore the motion and allow MPs to abstain. Last night, Tory MPs were told they were on an extremely strict three-line whip, and today the party made clear that it would enforce that at the strictest level. ‘This is not a motion on fracking,’ reads the email from deputy chief whip Craig Whittaker.
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