Labour refuses to support Brexit deal changes after May's Strasbourg dash

Theresa May is facing the threat of another humiliating Commons defeat on Brexit despite an 11th-hour dash to Strasbourg in a bid to win an improved deal.

After lengthy talks with European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, the prime minister claimed she had secured legal changes to the contentious issue of the Irish backstop.

Announcing her new deal in Strasbourg, Mrs May said: "MPs were clear that legal changes were needed to the backstop. Today we have secured legal changes.

"Now is the time to come together to back this improved Brexit deal and deliver on the instruction of the British people."

The PM, who will open the latest Brexit debate, said: "What we have secured is very clearly that the backstop cannot be indefinite.

"It cannot become permanent. It is only temporary. If it is the case that we were ever to get into the backstop."

She added: "The legal instrument that we have agreed is an addition to the Withdrawal Agreement. It has the same legal status as the Withdrawal Agreement. It is legally binding.

"That is what parliament asked us to secure and that is what we have secured."

And, sounding as though he has lost patience with the UK's continuing Brexit demands, Mr Juncker declared: "There will be no new negotiations. It is this. In politics, sometimes you get a second chance.

"It is what we do with the second chance that counts. Because there will be no third chance."

Back at Westminster, when the deal was announced to MPs by the cabinet office minister David Lidington, it was attacked by Tory Brexiteers and Remainers as well as by Opposition MPs.

Whether the prime minister wins or loses her latest commons Brexit showdown will depend on the response of the Democratic Unionist Party's 10 MPs and the hardline Tory Brexiteers of the European Research Group (ERG).

Responding to the new proposals in a holding statement, the DUP said: "We note the prime minister's latest statement and update on our EU exit negotiations. These publications need careful analysis.

"We will be taking appropriate advice, scrutinising the text line by line and forming our own judgement."

And Deputy Leader Nigel Dodds told MPs: "All of this will need to be taken together and analysed very carefully."

Many ERG Tories said that if the deal was good enough for the DUP they would also support it. However some were critical of the PM's deal than others.

Deputy chairman of the group Steve Baker told Sky News: "My reaction is somewhat stoical. I'm not very optimistic at the moment I'm afraid."

But chairman Jacob Rees-Mogg said: "It's too early to tell definitively, but it's clearly a step in the right direction. It's important to see the details, but the DUP's support would be a very important and significant factor."

But many Conservative MPs, both pro-Remain as well as Brexiteers, were alarmed by the wording of the Government motion which will be debated ahead of the vote.

Referring to a "legally binding joint instrument", it says it "reduces the risk the UK could be deliberately held in the Northern Ireland backstop indefinitely".

Many MPs claim the document should eliminate the risk not merely reduce it. Jeremy Corbyn confirmed that Labour would vote against the new deal, declaring: "The prime minister's negotiations have failed.

"This agreement with the European Commission does not contain anything approaching the changes Theresa May promised parliament, and whipped her MPs to vote for.

"Since her Brexit deal was so overwhelmingly rejected, the prime minister has recklessly run down the clock, failed to effectively negotiate with the EU and refused to find common ground for a deal parliament could support.

"That's why MPs must reject this deal."

Sky News