MPs have failed to break the Brexit impasse after they were unable to find a Commons majority for any Brexit plan, despite voting on eight different options.

Under the indicative vote process, MPs did not reach a consensus after they dramatically seized control of the agenda in the House of Commons from the executive.

The series of inconclusive late-night votes in the chamber followed Theresa May‘s promise to Tory MPs to resign as prime minister should her contentious Brexit deal pass its final hurdle.

The eight options put to a vote included a second referendum, a no-deal scenario, a customs union, revoking Article 50 and membership of the European Economic Area (EEA).

Of the votes, the closest was on the motion put forward by the senior Conservative Ken Clarke, demanding the government negotiate a comprehensive UK-wide customs union with the EU. This was rejected by 272-264 votes.

Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Show all 12 1 /12 Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Leicester There’s a great suspicion about homelessness in Britain: those desperately in need of social help feel the need to justify exactly why they are in their situation and exactly what they would do with your money Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Loughborough A student dressed as a horse, drunk, headless, betting on the races: a human imitating for fun the animals that race for human entertainment Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Loughborough A rock’n’roll evening where couples lead and are led. Twentieth-century American pop culture reaches far, well into this Loughborough periphery Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Derby Beauty treatment centres appear both surgical and sacrificial from the inside. The woman’s horizontal body stretching across the three windows, sawn into thirds, and the beautician studies with her eyes the eyes she’s beautifying Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Derby Two pairs of hands marked by anti-vandal paint, revealing the crime and the attempt to wipe it away, as if it never happened: the traces of a cover-up Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Boston The search for a lost cat in a pub window, translated into Russian, extending the plea to the town’s Russian reading community in an effort to widen the net and increase the chances of a happy ending Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Boston A warning to keep distance on the back of a white van, to give room, to respect personal space. A crude depiction of the female body occupies the foreground, the British flag and a church tower occupy the distance Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Derby A circus decorated with British and English flags, probably to confer a sense of style and national pride that would attract more people. It’s a timely meeting of the circus and the nation, where performance, danger, trickery, and foolishness all come together to form the spectacle Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Boston Polish football and regional graffiti is everywhere in Boston, if you’re looking for it. This vow of loyalty to Lechia Gdansk I find behind a supermarket carpark, between two trees goalpost-like, framing the inscription Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Leicester A Catholic church on the New Walk, in which a man prays on his own, watched by Christ, solitary among empty chairs, committed, purified, sanctified Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Boston Following the Rover Witham to the Marina and derelict rowing club, this anti-establishment expression catches my eye. It seeks to dehumanise authority, to make the law dirty, and connect power, not the people, to social filth. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain Before Brexit: East Midlands Grantham The back of the Isaac Newton Shopping Centre, by the Bus Station, where a sign advertises a news-seller with images of Polish newspapers, and next, across the black dividing line, a racist scribble with little meaning at all. Richard Morgan/The Independent

MPs also rejected an attempt to seek a new public vote before the ratification of any Brexit deal – by 295 votes to 268 – but campaigners said it showed growing support for the “confirmatory” process.

An attempt to express support for a no-deal scenario was rejected by one of the biggest margins, however, as MPs voted by 400-160 against the plan.

Brexit secretary Stephen Barclay, responding to the votes, said MPs should now back the prime minister’s Brexit agreement “in the national interest”.

“The results of the process this house has gone through today strengthens our view that the deal the government has negotiated is the best option,” he told MPs.

Conservative deputy chairman James Cleverly tweeted: “Really easy to agree on what you don’t want. Much harder to agree on what you do want.”

But the SNP leader Ian Blackford called for a general election to end the “impasse” in Westminster, adding: “This is a very serious moment for all of us and we have to reflect that this House of Commons has tried to find a way through the Brexit crisis over the last few months and we have failed.”

Deputy Labour leader Tom Watson, who backs the People’s Vote campaign for another referendum, said: “The majority of MPs and the British people do not want the prime minister’s broken Brexit deal.

“Nor do either the public or parliament back crashing out of the EU without a deal. Tonight has shown there is growing support for our compromise solution and that any new way forward will require enough time to be properly negotiated and scrutinised.

“When this parliament has finally made a decision on what Brexit means, I am hopeful that a majority will emerge for any final proposal to be put to a vote, not only by MPs, but also by the people.”

Sir Oliver Letwin, the architect of the plan to seize control of the Commons timetable, said it was “a very great disappointment” that no option had secured a majority but MPs would be asked to vote again on 1 April.