Andrea Leadsom has said Theresa May should demand the reopening of the EU withdrawal agreement when she meets Angela Merkel, an option both the prime minister and EU leaders have repeatedly ruled out.
Leadsom, the leader of the House of Commons and a leave supporter, said she believed there was still hope that the EU could be persuaded to make changes to the Irish backstop arrangement.
“What I think would be fantastic is if Angela Merkel would try to support a proper UK Brexit by agreeing to reopen the withdrawal agreement,” she told Sky News. “As the person with the responsibility to get the legislation through, if we could get the PM’s deal over the line because the EU have decided to support measures on the backstop, then that would be the best possible outcome.”
May is due to meet the German chancellor and the French president, Emmanuel Macron, on the eve of an emergency EU summit on the UK’s extension to article 50.
Before May’s visits to Paris and Berlin, Leadsom said she should use the meetings as an opportunity to ask EU leaders once again to reopen the agreement.
The chancellor, Philip Hammond, and the shadow chancellor, John McDonnell, were expected on Tuesday to join talks between Labour and the government as they attempt to thrash out a compromise that both sides can support.
McDonnell said a referendum could form part of the discussions. “What we are trying to do is ensure that we arrive at a deal which protects jobs and the economy. We don’t think Theresa May’s deal does that and we are also discussing the issue that she’s raised in cabinet about the issue of going back to the people,” he told ITV.
He said May had not moved on any of her red lines so far, “but we are trying to be as constructive as we can … We will broaden the talks out today to try and move them on.”
The justice secretary, David Gauke, denied the prime minister had suggested the possibility of a free vote on a second referendum in parliament – reportedly floated by May at a separate meeting with cabinet ministers – but said it was inevitable the issue would be brought to parliament again.
“As and when we bring a withdrawal agreement bill through the House of Commons … someone will bring an amendment on whether there should be a confirmatory referendum,” he said.
Campaigners for a second referendum are holding a rally in Westminster on Tuesday afternoon, with speakers including the Tory MP Huw Merriman, a parliamentary aide to Hammond.
Merriman has said he expects to be sacked for speaking at the People’s Vote rally. He said he had been angered by attempts to dissuade him from voting in favour of a referendum during the indicative votes process, despite having been assured it was a free vote.
He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “It would be nonsensical for me to be given a free vote, to be allowed to vote the way I wish to vote, but then to explain I would lose my position. That’s the politics of the madhouse and I am just not willing to go along with that.”
During her visits to Paris and Berlin, May is likely to make the case for a short extension to article 50, until 30 June, the day before the new EU parliament sits, which would allow the UK to withdraw from EU elections if a deal is passed before 22 May.
Gauke predicted May would tell EU leaders it was too early to predict the outcome of talks with Labour but that the two sides shared some common ground.
He refused to suggest areas where the government could cross its red lines, such as on a customs union, in order to meet Labour’s demands and stressed again that the government believed many of the benefits of a customs union were already outlined in May’s proposals.
“To reach a resolution, the likelihood is that there will need to be flexibility from all sides,” he told the Today programme. “The prime minister’s deal … has a lot of the very positive attributes that anyone would want in a relationship where we can trade freely with the EU.”
Any compromise with Labour on customs arrangements or to allow a free vote on a second referendum is likely to further enrage Tory Brexiters, though some have turned their fire on the Eurosceptics who have held out from backing the prime minister’s deal.
Daniel Kawczynski announced late on Monday night that he would quit the pro-Brexit European Research Group (ERG), suggesting MPs were risking that Brexit could be reversed by refusing to vote for May’s deal.
“From a practical perspective there are elements now within that caucus that are preventing this withdrawal agreement going through and therefore inevitably that will lead to possibly no Brexit at all, and that is not something I wish to contemplate,” he told Today. “I think we should protect Brexit.”