Bercow’s glorious revolution scuppers May – and edges us ever closer to a Final Say referendum

Whether he sought it or not, the speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow, has secured his place in history. In asserting the powers of the House of Commons as against the authority of the Crown – in today’s terms the authority of the prime minister – he has recalled some of the great parliamentary struggles for supremacy from the past. He has also very likely changed the course of Brexit, and for the good. It is something of a glorious revolution.

Speaker Bercow was right to rule as he has – that the government cannot keep bringing back the same “meaningful vote” proposition and receiving the same answer. There are two powerful reasons for this.

First, it is simply absurd. The "meaningful” votes are becoming “meaningless”. As a substitute for argument and persuasion, Theresa May tries to “bounce” the Commons, including her own party, into a decision it doesn’t wish to take. Behind this lies the reality that the traditional parliamentary way of determining matters, through binary votes on amendable motions, is unsuitable for working out the way forward on Brexit – demonstrably so. Apart from rejecting the no-deal option overwhelmingly (as does the EU), the Commons has been unable to formulate its will. This is because it has never been allowed the chance to do so. For too long the Commons was sidelined by ministers, and not allowed to vote on, for example, the prime minister's “red lines" – among other vital matters. Had the Commons been able to set out its parameters, through preferential voting on indicative proposals, the prime minister and her team would have had a far superior mandate with which to go to Brussels. Instead, No 10 tried to do everything itself – and failed.

Second, Mr Bercow could call on a long line of precedent dating back to 1604. Successive speakers across the ages have ruled against governments attempting to put the same, or substantially the same, proposition before parliament in the same session. It may be true that most of those issues were far smaller than that of Brexit, but the wider point remains – it is a waste of everyone’s time to keep messing around, and distracts from the more urgent task of making some progress.

But progress is eminently possible, were the Commons to exert itself a little more, as it almost succeeded to do last week. It needs to take control of the Brexit agenda and decide what the options are.

Options are opening up. If we still wish to resolve matters relatively swiftly, the Commons could choose now to pass Ms May’s deal with the addition of it being approved by a Final Say referendum – the current Kyle-Wilson amendment. This would probably be ruled in order by the speaker as a substantially different proposal – a second referendum – to prior “meaningful votes”.

The principal problem with this is the confusion of the Labour Party, which seems to want to put its own version of Brexit – agreed by precisely nobody – on the ballot paper. This may prove an insuperable barrier.

Shortly, the EU will offer the UK a long extension of the Article 50 process, perhaps up to 21 months. This will allow the talks to proceed on a more rational basis. The Commons can decide what it wants and set the negotiating remit; the government can secure the best deal they can; we can make a judgement on a withdrawal agreement and a draft UK-EU trade and security treaty (which doesn't even exist today); and we can put it to the electorate for their ratification, with Remain as a fallback option.

Even Brexiteers concede that the Irish backstop and the wider issues of smooth UK-EU trade will take much more time to settle, either through legal or technological devices. That time will be well spent, despite the uncertainties if we prevent Brexit being a disaster. So far, that is exactly what it has proved to be. No one in 2016, it is fair to say, voted for where we are now, a week before the putative Brexit day.