The Labour leadership have now tabled an amendment calling for a parliamentary vote on exactly that.

This is the clearest indication yet that the Labour Party might formally endorse such a move.

This is vital, because without Labour support, the prospect of a second referendum would have no chance of getting through the House of Commons.

In doing this, Mr Corbyn can claim he is upholding Labour’s Brexit policy, as agreed at their party conference in Liverpool in September.

At that conference, after much internal wrangling, party delegates agreed upon a staged approach.

First they would seek a general election, through a confidence vote in the Commons, when the time was right.

Second would be an attempt to use the opportunities of a hung parliament to implement Labour’s own wished-for Brexit deal of a customs union and protection of workers’ rights.

And then (and only then) would the party look at other options, including the idea of a “people’s vote.”

The advantage of this was that everyone got something.

The Remainers and those keen on another referendum (which includes most of Mr Corbyn’s activist base) could see a path through to their preferred outcome.

And those MPs representing Leave seats and others opposed to any sort of new plebiscite could claim the party was still trying to deliver Brexit.

This fragile truce held for months.

The problem came when the party felt compelled to table a no-confidence motion in the government last week – and it failed.

They had little choice, in the wake of the worst defeat for a government in parliamentary history, but to do so.

But the cost (and the reason why Mr Corbyn had resisted tabling a motion hitherto) was that he had used up the first stage of party policy.

Those who supported a “people’s vote” told him he was now obliged to move onto the next.

This is something Mr Corbyn resisted – he and his shadow cabinet colleagues argued they had not given up hope of securing an election through future confidence votes.

However, since last week there has been some worry in Labour circles that the party was haemorrhaging Remainer support and members and that a grander gesture was required.

Hence this amendment.

But if you think this means that Labour are behind a second referendum, then think again.

It is not clear that the Labour leadership will actually whip their MPs to support it when it comes before the Commons next week.

More likely they will allow a free vote.

Without the whip, the numbers will be nowhere near that required to reach a majority (and there’s no sign of any Tory Remainer support for the amendment anyway, rendering the whole thing toothless).

Labour and Corbyn are, quite literally, going through the motions.

More significant, then, is how the party chooses to whip Yvette Cooper’s amendment.

This would ask the government to extend Article 50 if it hasn’t managed to get a Brexit deal through the Commons by the end of February.

The Labour leadership have been making positive noises, including the shadow business secretary Rebecca Long-Bailey telling Sky News that it’s “fantastic.”

If Labour chooses to whip in its favour (thereby tacitly endorsing an Article 50 extension) then it could well pass with several government ministers resigning to support it.

This is one of the reasons why I believe some of the chatter surrounding Labour MPs suddenly backing the prime minister’s deal at the 11th hour are wrong.

First of all, if Ms Cooper’s amendment is successful then the government will have been denuded of its strongest card in its task of persuading Labour parliamentarians; that the threat of a “no-deal” Brexit is imminent.

With exit day deferred, that risk will evaporate.

Even without it, the assumption held by Downing Street and many commentators that in the end, Labour MPs who dislike Mr Corbyn will come round, continues to be displaced.

It underestimates the group instincts and tribalism of Labour MPs and equally underestimates their (well justified) fears of deselection if they back a deal, save a Tory prime minister and nullify any prospect of an election until 2022.

It underestimates their antipathy towards Theresa May personally, made worse by her conduct over the last week; refusing to soften her red lines, appearing utterly intransigent and alienating her from the opposition yet further.

It also rests on a misunderstanding about Labour MPs in Leave seats.

Labour MPs’ personal electorates in these places (the 40% or so of people who actually vote Labour) are generally skewed towards Remainers.

Many of the hardest Leave voters don’t vote Labour anyway so for all but a handful of hyper-marginal seats, their position is safer than it might appear.

An exodus of Remainers, so dependent is the party on their support, could prove more dangerous.

So instead of a Damascene conversion, I suspect the vast majority of Labour MPs will stick with the leadership and continue the waiting game.

Some close to the Labour leader believe that if they wait for long enough they won’t even have to force a general election, the prime minister might give them one of her own volition.

If she brings her deal back again, and gets more Tory Brexiteer support, she might close the margin of defeat down considerably.

If so, the prospect of an election to secure those last few seats she needs would be an appealing one.

Then, the election Mr Corbyn craves could at last be tantalisingly close.

One of the things Downing Street has told itself again and again is that at some point Labour will break ranks and support the deal.

That belief has been wrong consistently, misunderstanding the psychology of Labour MPs.

It might have worked if the prime minister had reached out earlier – but she didn’t.

Mrs May needs a miracle – in my judgement she will not find it on the opposition benches but at some point soon, perhaps in mid-March, will have to look to the country in the form of an election.

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