Thousands to protest for a "People's Vote" on Brexit today

Thousands are expected to come out in support of a People’s Vote at 2pm at The Level in Brighton, including politicians.

Hove MP Peter Kyle and Brighton Pavilion MP Caroline Lucas will be joined by senior figures from the Labour Party as the first day of the party’s conference gets underway in the Brighton Centre.

Protesters will march from The Level to Hove Lawns for a rally at 3pm.

Green MP Ms Lucas said another vote would be the “best way to heal divides over Brexit”.

She said: “The far right of the Tory party now occupying Downing Street wants to impose a form of Brexit on the British people that is a million miles from what they once promised.

“And there are those who simply want to see Parliament overturn the result of the last referendum.

“Either course will only deepen divisions in our country. Neither can be called democratic.”

And below Mr Kyle explains why Labour would “put Brexit back to the people” so the country could “move on from the last three years”.

Peter Kyle writes:

WE ARE living through a time of national crisis.

With Parliament prorogued, our Prime Minster bungling his way around Europe and the prospect of a humiliating and damaging exit from the EU still hanging over the nation, the stakes could not be higher.

That’s why I’ll be addressing a crowd of thousands at the People’s Vote march and rally in Brighton, as we demand to be heard on the greatest issue facing our generation – Brexit.

Over the last few weeks Boris Johnson has ridden roughshod over our democracy by threatening a disastrous No Deal which no-one voted for.

Despite a vote from Parliament instructing him to rule out a No Deal and request an extension from the EU he has hinted he might break the law by refusing to request more time or by finding some procedural loophole to slide out of his commitments.

His plan for Brexit has been exposed as the empty sham it really is.

No progress is being made on the deal he pretends he wants, while all the levers of government are frantically being pulled to provide some cover for the consequences of the No Deal crash-out he is threatening to inflict on the country.

It is an approach that is all about managing the Brexit hardliners in both the Conservative Party and Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party, but it has nothing to offer to families worried about their jobs, public services and the supply of food and medicines.

The leak of the Government’s Yellowhammer No Deal planning lifted the lid on the months of food shortages, traffic jams, job losses and disorder it would inflict on the UK, as did planning documents released by Brighton and Hove Council following a Freedom of Information investigation by the People’s Vote campaign.

This identified 43 individual risks to Brighton posed by Brexit, which include significant increases in the cost of regulation to the food industry and the loss of funding to universities.

Problems with food and medicine supplies, chaos at the ports and on the roads, shortages of key workers – that’s the future Boris Johnson is happy to lead us all towards. That’s why I voted to block a No Deal in Parliament and why I won’t back a General Election until this threat is taken off the table.

What is now being planned is a million miles away from anything that was promised back in 2016. That’s why the Brexit debate has now essentially come down to one question: can Boris Johnson be allowed to get away with imposing a disastrous scorched-earth Brexit on Britain without us having any say?

In 2016 a modest majority of voters supported leaving the EU, but Leave campaigners promised it would be on the basis of a managed, negotiated deal. Our businesses, rights and place in the world would all be protected – there was literally no downside, so they told us. The prospect of crashing out without a deal was dismissed as scaremongering.

Now we hear the language of the Blitz used to describe leaving the EU and Boris Johnson is talking of ‘dying in a ditch’ rather than ask for an extension. All the promises they made to us in 2016 have been torn up.

If the people want to go down Boris Johnson’s road then that’s their right, but shouldn’t we at least be asked first?

And speaking of my own party, the vast majority of Labour members and voters back the principle of a final say referendum and they want to see our party campaigning hard to stay in the EU.

The next month is set to be crucial. I promise to spend it working with MPs from across the House of Commons to ensure that we do not crash out of the EU without a deal and that any deal we do get is put to a public vote of the British people.

In doing so I will have the interests of our community and of the whole country at heart – however people voted in 2016, I believe they have the right to the final say.

It’s time to recognise the only way to end this crisis and to establish a lasting solution to Brexit, with clarity for the future, is to put it back to the people. So join me in Brighton today. It’s time to let us be heard.

Peter Kyle MP, supporter of the People’s Vote campaign