THE hope of all those who care about our parliamentary sovereignty must be that the Supreme Court will decide this week that Parliament must actually give its assent to the triggering of Article 50.

If it does so, then Liberal Democrats – with the support of others – will put down a series of amendments to the government bill which will follow, which will be aimed at trying to prevent the immense damage which a ‘ hard Brexit’ will inflict on the British economy.

Such a Brexit will have a seriously damaging effect on the 44 per cent of our exports which currently go to our EU partners: not to mention the legal and environmental (including animal) agreements, and crucial employee rights, which are guaranteed by the EU itself.

We are anxious to protect the thousands of jobs, some of them in Dorset, which would be lost as a result of leaving the single market; and we fear that prices in the shops would rise as a result of the imposition of WTO tariffs: for example 10 per cent on cars and 12 per cent on clothing.

Unlike a senior Dorset member of UKIP who told me on the night of the General Election that – if UKIP ‘lost’ the referendum – they would campaign to hold another one, the Liberal Democrats completely accept the democratic verdict of the referendum held on 23 June.

However, we maintain that the vote was for ‘departure’ not for ‘destination’ – and we are anxious to ensure that the destination arrived at will cause the least possible damage to the economy, and people, of our great country.

HUGO MIEVILLE

Liberal Democrat PPC, North Dorset

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