This isn't right (I know this because I have got this wrong in the past, too: I thought CRAG Act required an affirmative vote) The trade deal does not need to pass through Parliament, only the implementing legislation: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-55167822

CRAG (The Constitutional Reform and Governance Act) means that a treaty has to lie before Parliament for 21 sitting days and it passes *unless* Parliament rejects it. Of course, you will notice there is a problem here with "21 sitting days" and "transition ending on 31 Dec".

The 'good' news is that CRAG allows a minister to declare there are exceptional circumstances and put that requirement aside, so there is no vote to 'pass' the deal required. There is, however, the potential for votes to implement any new bodies, arbitration mechanisms, etc.

Now, 'implementing legislation' is a whole adventure in of itself, in that you can (and you can bet that if you are Downing Street you will) minimise the number of affirmative votes involved through the use of negative statutory instruments, etc. etc.

However, I think it's *unlikely* that any deal could solely be implemented without proper legislation - probably at some point MPs have to vote 'Make our new arbitration mechanism that is not, I repeat, NOT a thinly-veiled copy-paste of the European Court legally binding'.

This is why the "should Labour vote for the deal?" question is actually several. It's obviously an easier question for Labour if it is something it would keep, like the 'I can't believe it's not the European Court of Justice' arbitration mechanism.

If the actually binding vote is "Social Chapter go bye-bye", you can see how the politics of that are quite different! But the important thing is that there is no requirement for a clean "this deal y/n?" vote and indeed I cannot see why the government would do that.

I don't have a Soundcloud, but: https://www.newstatesman.com/subscribe12