Theresa May’s decision to delay the meaningful vote on the terms of her Brexit deal to at least 12 March is the reckless act of a leader running out of ideas. We only have Mrs May’s word that “progress” is being made on changes that might make her withdrawal agreement acceptable to a parliament which last month rejected it in the largest ever defeat for a ruling party. MPs will have to decide which way to vote on one of this country’s most consequential geopolitical acts – leaving the European Union – just 17 days before it is supposed to happen. In the meantime, the country is driven closer to the cliff edge, egged on by fanatics who think Britain ought to leave the EU with no deal at all, wreaking maximum damage on the economy.

But this is the point of Mrs May’s ploy: to rachet up the tension and raise the stakes. The prime minister aims to manoeuvre MPs to a point where a bad deal is better than no deal or no Brexit at all. Mrs May is hoping that her nerve will hold while that of her opponents fails. She is attempting to assemble a coalition to leave on the terms she has negotiated. It corresponds to what her chief Brexit negotiator Olly Robbins was heard boasting about in a Brussels bar earlier this month: that MPs would end up with a last-minute choice between her deal and a lengthy delay. She would then have the option to cast anyone who voted for a delay as an opponent of Brexit and anyone who voted for her deal as a committed leaver. It’s not a bad plan; it’s just bad for Britain and for this country’s politics.

The prime minister has shown her hand, but it is far from clear that it is a winning one. Others hold their own cards. On Tuesday, Mrs May will make a statement to the Commons. She will do so to forestall a cabinet rebellion that is threatening to erupt later this week when MPs get a chance to vote, thanks to the work of Labour’s Yvette Cooper, for an extension of the article 50 process either to enable parliament to reach a consensus on a Brexit deal or because they wish to achieve a long delay and a second referendum. Yet parliament ought to back such a move. It is time for Mrs May to give up her fool’s errand of attempting to reshape her deal, which is unlikely ever to command a Commons majority. Contrary to her claims, Mrs May is not on her way to get the legally binding changes demanded by hard Brexiters to the Irish “backstop”, a mechanism that guarantees there will be no hard border in Ireland by – if required – keeping the UK in a form of customs union with the EU. For the most part EU leaders remain adamant that they cannot concede this – because it would undermine the scheme’s purpose as an insurance policy to set an end date for the backstop, or to allow Britain a unilateral right of exit from it.

For Conservatives who want to soften Brexit, Mrs May’s game plan has been to suck out the oxygen of parliamentary debate. The prime minister has used every trick in the book to block attempts to test the parliamentary appetite for alternatives – like preventing crashing out of the EU, remaining in the customs union, or a referendum on the final deal – to the Hobson’s choice of her deal or no deal. Even when votes take place, Mrs May ignores the results. This needs to end, as Britain’s government has been left fractious and dysfunctional. It is almost certainly doomed to collapse.

Mrs May puts the Tory party’s interests before the country’s. For Labour MPs she makes the opposite argument: for the sake of nation, collude with the Tory whips, risk your careers, your party’s already-stretched internal cohesion and your authority within the wider Labour movement. Mrs May dangles a slew of worker-friendly laws to entice Labour MPs. This is brinkmanship by the prime minister whose message to would-be Labour rebels is: take my deal or face the wrath of your leave-voting constituents. The prime minister is foolishly ignoring the parliamentary arithmetic and the intense pressure which any parliamentary majority for her deal would have to withstand to sustain the legislation. It stretches credulity to imagine such a coalition could continue to ensure a majority that would deliver for Mrs May in the months ahead. The pressure has already contributed to the splintering of the two main parties. It’s time to delay Brexit, not just the meaningful vote.