The Government has been forced to listen to you and thousands of others and pull back from the brink of No Deal disaster. But let’s make no mistake, Johnson’s choice of Brexit is a bad deal for Britain.

Our President, Lord Heseltine is right to say that this Brexit deal has no upsides to justify the fanfare with which it has been received.

This bad deal for Britain leaves us in a worse position than we held as a member of the EU. Now that more detail is available we already know that:

• This is a bad deal for our economy. It largely ignores the service industry. This means that we are still in the dark about the long-term implications of Brexit for the service sector that makes up 80% of our economy. One thing is for certain, we have less market access for services.
• This is a bad deal for UK businesses that trade in goods, which will now face more red tape, more bureaucracy and more blockages at our borders.
• This is a bad deal for British food and farming, with customs checks creating extra hoops for our British farmers to jump through, just to make ends meet.
• This is a bad deal for British people. We have lost access to programmes ranging from Erasmus to development funding. We can no longer travel freely in Europe and we have been denied a voice in European bodies that will make decisions that affect our daily lives.

Boris Johnson has chosen to begin the next phase of the UK’s relationship with the EU as a weaker, poorer nation. This is the first trade deal in modern history to implement more barriers to trade.

But far from being defeated by the Government’s disastrous deal, we need to pull together and fight for our future relationship with the EU. There is so much still to fight for, so much to do to protect our future. But right now, nothing is more important than standing up and saying loud and clear: Johnson’s Brexit deal is a bad deal for Britain!

Anna Bird, CEO of the European Movement

Please take just two minutes to make your voice heard and add your name to our urgent statement.