Jeremy Corbyn could find himself with an open goal if he decides to back a second referendum

In a few weeks’ time, Brexit and thus the future prosperity of Britain for decades to come will be in the hands of Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party. This is because the government has no majority – and certainly not for a Brexit plan, which is barely alive anyway.

What will he do?

Corbyn is a man of consistency, let’s give him that. He has always said that he would respect the will of the British people as expressed in the 2016 EU referendum. He wants Brexit. He’s specified six tests for an acceptable deal, and his shadow ministers have created some wacky ideas about “a” customs union and a “jobs first” Brexit. He seems sincere about it. It’s his own version of the Chequers plan. It has even less chance of acceptance by the EU. Everyone knows it, though Labour can’t admit it.

But the Commons will not be asked to vote on Labour’s policy – they’ll vote on the government’s one. Labour will vote down the Chequers plan or any likely variant of it. Corbyn will demand an election so he can sweep in to Downing Street and then Brussels and clear everything up. Won’t happen.

Then what?

He has a democratic dilemma. He can stick with his mandate from the 2016 referendum, which looks increasingly dodgy. Soon though he may face a moral and political obligation to follow the mandate set for him by the Labour Party conference. In Corbyn’s vision the party’s members frame policy through conference. It is sovereign. Ignoring it is what Labour leaders and MPs did in the bad old days. That was betrayal. Corbyn will follow the democratic decisions reached by the Labour movement. Again he has been consistent on that principle.

What, then, if conference demands a Final Say referendum? Much depends on the wording, which will be a product of Labour’s arcane process of compositing different motions and accepting or referring back amendments. It may be quite fudgy. Yet the democratic will of the party is clear and one of the few things members, MPs and unions agree on – they think May’s Brexit is a disaster and they want a final say on Brexit. Most wish to dump Brexit.

So will Corbyn stick to following the 2016 referendum mandate or the 2018 Labour conference mandate?

They are reconcilable, luckily, because a Final Say puts the terms of Brexit back to the British people, and does not in itself mean staying in – that is up to the voters, who will now be free to vote for “no deal” or whatever the government gets back from Brussels.

There is some irony that the referendum on Europe as a device to give a sovereign say to the British people was devised by Corbyn’s long-time mentor, Tony Benn, who – like Corbyn – was a determined anti-European for much of his life.

It also in Benn’s day united a badly divided Labour movement. The change of mood from the 1970s to now is that the Labour Party – trots, social democrats, Blairites, Momentum, ex-Bennites, Chuka, Keir, Diane, Len, virtually everyone – actually want a Final Say.

Labour voters who voted Leave and now worry for their jobs want a Final Say. If Corbyn backed his own party he would win new support from surprising quarters. He’d end up with a bigger tent than Tony Blair. A policy on Brexit for the many, not the few.

It is not an exaggeration to think that even from opposition he can change the course of history, and for the good of the people Labour seeks to protect.

From a referendum triumph much else could follow. Having lost such a referendum a Tory government might well then fall, and an election and Labour government would follow. What an open goal! The ball is at his feet. It’s up to Jeremy now.