The Tories’ ‘Hard Brexit’ will risk thousands of local jobs

• Around 69,568 jobs in Sussex are thought to be dependent on EU trade. Losing access to the single market would make many firms reconsider their position, and affect our many language schools and agricultural industry.
• European visitors to Sussex for travel and tourism may fall.
• UK-based airlines currently enjoy EU ‘open skies’, which will be lost if we fall back on WTO rules. Budget airlines like EasyJet and Ryanair have described this as ‘disastrous’.

In Brexit negotiations the Labour party will seek continued tariff-free trade between the UK and the EU, no new non-tariff burdens for business, regulatory alignment and continued competitiveness for goods and services.

We would retain the benefits of the Single Market and the Customs Union, and make sure Britain stays an open, outward-looking country.

 Under the Tories Sussex will lose access to millions of pounds of vital EU funding

•  The Coast to Capital Local Enterprise area has been allocated £67 million in European Regional Development and European Social Funds.
• Southern Water received a £100 million low interest EIB loan to improve water supply and waste water treatment across Sussex, Kent and Hampshire.
• The Erasmus scheme has benefited students at the Universities of Sussex and Chichester to study abroad.

A Labour Government will seek to remain part of the Erasmus scheme, and maintain the UK’s leading research role by staying part of Horizon 2020 and its successor programmes, and by welcoming research staff from the EU.

Labour’s Brexit will protect workers, consumers and citizens alike

• Workers and consumers in Sussex benefit from EU safety and commercial standards, health and safety, working hours and protections for disabled or LGBQTI+ people.
• The number of people able to find full-time work is falling and now more than a third of Sussex employees are part-time. EU rules ensure part-time workers cannot be discriminated against in relation to full-time workers.

Sussex’s beautiful environment will remain protected

• The EU’s Natura 2000 is stricter than existing British protection schemes and currently protects the Pevensey levels which spread across Sussex and are home to many rare plants, fauna and insects.

We will drop the Tories’ ‘Great Repeal Bill’ that threatens to scrap workers’ rights, basic health and safety regulations and environmental protections, and instead introduce an EU Rights and Protections Bill. This will fully protect all EU-derived laws – including workplace laws, consumer rights and environmental protections –without qualification or limitation. We will work with trade unions, businesses and stakeholders to ensure there is a consensus on this vital issue.

Labour’s Brexit plans will not threaten our peace and security

• The EU’s formation ushered in an unprecedented era of peace and security.
• Including security and justice issues in any Brexit agreement makes it much more complicated, as regional governments in EU countries would have to ratify the agreement as well as all the EU countries’ governments in the European Council.
• The European Arrest Warrant has been used to track down Sussex criminals like schoolteacher Jeremy Forrest who ran off to France with a 15-year-old pupil, or convicted paedophile Roderick Macdonald, who was arrested in Malta on a European Arrest Warrant for assaulting two young girls in Shoreham.

We will seek to maintain membership of or equivalent relations with European organisations which offer benefits to the UK, such as Euratom, the European Medicines Agency, Europol and Eurojust.

Unlike Theresa May, we will work with Parliament, not against it. Negotiations will include regular progress reports to Parliament and work with the devolved administrations to reflect specific and particular concerns.

And we will seek reciprocal measures for UK citizens in the EU.

So vote Labour for a Brexit that rebuilds relations with the EU and ensures that jobs, the economy and rights come first.