DEAL

TO LOSE one Brexit Secretary may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness. The Prime Minister has agreed a Brexit deal but she has lost Dominic Raab and Esther McVey. She survives — but only just.

It’s not hard to find fault with the deal. It will give us less control over the rules that govern our economy than membership of the EU. But it will deliver the core of what people voted for: the UK’s exit from the political institutions of the EU. It will also preserve close alignment with most of the single market and the customs union — and that is what matters most for British businesses. By securing a temporary customs union for the UK, she has avoided the worst version of the Irish backstop.

As part of the common market but outside the EU, the UK can find its destiny as Europe’s greatest ally

for the UK, threatening business confidence, our NHS and the future of our young people. It’s only going to get worse, with the biggest issues unresolved while we follow rules over which we will no longer have any say — and suffer long-term damage to our economy.

I have previously vowed to not support any form of Brexit that would be detrimental to my constituents. London voted overwhelmingly to remain part of the European Union and in Lewisham West and Penge this was by a factor of two to one.

A bad deal would be devastating for London. Analysis has shown a no-deal

Brexit could see 87,000 jobs go in London alone and the capital’s economic output would be two per cent lower in 2030 than that which would be expected under a softer Brexit. This is the harsh reality we now face.

The referendum in June 2016 was one of the most important democratic exercise in our nation’s history, but the only way we can resolve the existing political deadlock of the Brexit process is to go back to the people.

In calling for a People’s Vote, I believe the electorate should again be allowed to exercise the democratic right to have their say in the make-up of our future relationship with the European Union — with an option to remain.

This vote should not be thought of as running the Brexit referendum again, but what we now face is something that wasn’t on the ballot paper in 2016.

The negotiations have been shambolic and the promises of that original campaign are a distant memory.

It is only fair that the people decide what comes next.