Labour Against Brexit: We appeal to MPs to stand up for our party’s basic principles and oppose the article 50 bill

This is the full statement published by Jonathon Proctor, chair of Labour Against Brexit, after Jeremy Corbyn imposed a three-line whip on the vote on article 50 tomorrow.

We are dismayed to see Labour’s leadership impose another three-line whip on its MPs. This directly contradicts Jeremy Corbyn’s repeated assurances that Labour would reserve the right to oppose this bill at third reading if its amendments to include vital safeguards for Parliament and the British people were not accepted. 

The amendments included vital protections of employment and consumer rights, as well as environmental protections – all basic red lines for our party. It’s now becoming clear these amendments won’t go through, putting the rights of hardworking people in this country at serious risk from a hard and damaging Tory Brexit. Voters will view our party as complicit in this disaster for years to come, even though Labour campaigned for Remain and the vast majority of MPs still support Remain.

We urge all Labour MPs to defend the nation’s interests and speak up for the majority who did not vote to leave the single market, customs union, or to accept the hardest Brexit possible.

Labour Against Brexit is directly appealing to all Labour MPs to stand up for Labour’s basic principles by opposing this bill at third reading. Not to do so is a betrayal of our socialist values and hurts the most vulnerable people in our society.

At last week’s second reading, 47 Labour MPs voted against the triggering of article 50 as they saw the dangers of a hard Brexit. They stood up for our country, which is something that neither our prime minister nor the leader of the opposition are doing. 

Labour Against Brexit warmly congratulates those 47 Labour MPs who decided to put our nation’s interests first. We’re calling on all Labour MPs, along with MPs from all parties, to do the same in the final vote on Wednesday before this bill goes to the House of Lords.

At the last Labour Party conference in September, delegates passed motions that we were proud of Europe and we would be the party that defends membership of the European Union. It is now time that our leader listens.