Brexit was built on false promises – let’s walk away from this impending disaster

As a nation we face huge global and domestic challenges. To tackle these problems, we must be stronger together – but Brexit risks destroying that forever

Stronger together: this is a phrase that I really do believe in.

When we voted to leave the European Union in June 2016, I was in a state of shock and disbelief. My heart was broken. “How could we do that?” I asked myself. But back then, whatever my opinion, it was “the will of the people”. 52 per cent of the population had voted differently to me and, despite my views, I had to respect that. We all did – or so we thought.

Subsequently, all manner of new information has come to light. The funding, the strategy and the promises made all being highly questionable when scrutinising the referendum campaigns. Unfortunately, unlike with general elections, electoral law doesn’t adequately cover referendums and urgently needs updating.

However, all that aside, any deal has to have its terms and conditions. It’s all very well to want to buy a house, but you may think twice about it if you found out it was riddled with cracks after the structural survey. And what about the mortgage? You may no longer want to sign on the dotted line if you found out subsequently your repayments were going to being 20 times the cost of the actual house. If you ended up realising the house you were already in was in fact way better than the new one, maybe it would be a good idea to stop and reconsider and maybe not move at all.

It sometimes feels as though hardcore Brexiteers want to leave Europe at all costs. It seems they’d still be happy to leave if the conditions of the deal were we all had to chop an arm off. As long as we leave, that’s the main thing.

“Hurrah, we’ve left!”

“But we only have one arm!”

“But we’ve left, hurrah.”

“But we’re all bleeding to death.”

“It’s the will of the people! We’ve left!”

“Huh? This makes no sense...”

In my view, we need to leave with the right deal or not at all. We can’t accept any old deal just for the sake of it. Theresa May seems to think if she keeps putting her deal back on the table it will eventually get voted through and this will be the quick fix we all need. It won’t.

May’s deal leaves a multitude of areas unaddressed, even something as fundamental as trade, leaving us all frighteningly vulnerable. The implementation and admin of leaving will take years: writing and rewriting laws, working out legislation, and negotiating new deals – time that could be spent tackling other domestic issues that need urgent attention.

Some say we should leave to rejoin if it all goes wrong. But, in that case, it would be highly unlikely we’d get to keep the pound. We can’t assume we’d even be allowed back in, let alone with the deal we have now.

As we waste time on this debacle that we could’ve spent on domestic problems, what about the global ones? Climate change, not Brexit is the bigger cliff edge coming towards us, and this cliff edge will be way more catastrophic and we can’t deal with it alone. If you are able to, I implore you to march this weekend to encourage our prime minister to put the final deal to the people. To tackle the global problems ahead, we must be stronger together – but Brexit risks destroying that forever.

Konnie Huq is a TV presenter and writer