The chaotic UK-EU Brexit negotiations can easily obscure some of the consistent elements: the Tories have prioritised their internal party conflict over getting a deal and the EU27 have the stronger bargaining position.

The now-forgotten debate over Britain’s £35bn-plus “divorce bill” was a harbinger of things to come: the EU will set out its position and the deal will broadly resemble the bloc’s offer. The article 50 process was designed to strengthen the hand of the remaining members in any exit negotiation. Over the past two years, it has worked as its creators intended – establishing a ticking clock towards a no-deal exit gives the EU huge leverage.

This is not to say the EU wants a no-deal outcome. Negotiators have also suggested that they will offer Theresa May a vague political declaration about the future relationship, which would sit alongside a legally binding withdrawal treaty focused on citizen rights, financial obligations and the Irish border. Of these three aspects, it is the Irish border that still threatens to lead to the breakdown of the negotiations. The EU’s “backstop for Northern Ireland”, de facto keeping the territory within the regulatory and customs orbit of the EU to maintain a checkpoint-free Irish border, is unacceptable to a government in London dependent on DUP votes.

Even if the Tories were united behind May at this crucial moment, the Irish border would still pose a huge challenge to getting a majority for a deal. This is why the Chequers proposal was a huge miscalculation. It was always going to be rejected by the EU for cherry-picking the single market, but also triggered opposition from Brexiters. If they remain true to their word and vote against May’s deal, then Britain is fast approaching a major political crisis. The barely disguised leadership ambitions on show at the Tory party conference – with hopefuls vaunting their Eurosceptic credentials to members with often ludicrous attacks on the EU – only deepens this dynamic and further erodes what is left of any goodwill Britain has in Brussels.

May can probably still negotiate a “jam tomorrow” Brexit deal in Europe, but the possibility of her getting this through parliament looks remote. If a formulation on the Irish backstop can be agreed, such a deal would also suit the EU. It knows it will have even more leverage over Britain once the country is formally outside the bloc.

How Labour responds to this situation will surely come to define Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership. May’s deal will not pass even a watered-down version of Labour’s “six tests”. The agreement will be too vague to offer any of the guarantees on workers’ rights, environmental standards and the protection of British manufacturing jobs that Labour has demanded. Labour has said it will seek a new election in this situation, but the simple majority it requires in a no-confidence vote is not in the party’s gift. What’s more, even if it won the ensuing election it would not have time to carry out its own negotiation prior to 29 March 2019 – article 50 deadline day.

The logic of the situation leads to a clear conclusion: Britain will have little choice but to unilaterally rescind its article 50 notice. As its author, Lord Kerr, has said: “The article is about voluntary withdrawal, not about expulsion: we don’t have to go if at any stage, within the two years, we decide we don’t want to.”

Many Labour strategists will be terrified of this prospect. Isn’t this a betrayal of the Brexit vote? But a pause for reflection does not have to be negative. Labour should take the opportunity to engage in a national conversation about Britain’s relationship with Europe. This could be a huge exercise in local deliberative democracy, exploring the kind of Europe the British public would like to see. A key aim would be to raise the horizons of an often parochial Brexit debate. Labour could draw in left and centre-left parties across Europe, ensuring proposals escape the “them and us” logic of the current negotiations and contribute to efforts under way to achieve EU reform.

A pause for reflection has clear merits. No one wants a rushed referendum amid a terrible political crisis. Labour strategists have sometimes suggested that the next election will be defined by who owns the “Brexit betrayal” narrative. But the recent conference showed there is a positive alternative to this: that the election can be won on the grounds of who has the best democratic offer to the British people. The outcome of a national consultation on Britain’s relationship with Europe, and the reforms the bloc needs, could then be negotiated with the EU and eventually ratified in a referendum. A reformed membership of the EU could win broader support.

As Britain stares down the barrel of a no-deal Brexit, a party often accused by its foes of offering chaos could come to the rescue of a deeply traumatised nation.

• Luke Cooper is a visiting fellow on the Europe’s Future programme at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna, a senior lecturer in international politics at Anglia Ruskin University and a convenor of the Another Europe Is Possible campaign