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Reasons the UK should not leave the EU - 'Trainspotting' speech by Hannah Bardell MP during Brexit debate

02 February 2017, 17:14 CET
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Hannah Bardell MP speech during the UK Parliament debate on whether to launch Article 50 and begin the Brexit process - mimicking Ewan McGregor's 'choose life' monologue from the original 1996 'Trainspotting' film.

"Choose Brexit. Choose making up numbers from thin air about the NHS and plastering them on the side of buses. Choose racist and xenophobic sentiments seeping out from some corners of the Leave campaign.

"Choose hate crime rising by over 40% and LGBT hate crime by 150% in England and Wales following the Brexit vote. Choose taking the people of our nations to the polls on one of the most important issues of a generation with nothing written down and no plan.

"Choose taking the people of our nations to the polls on one of the most important issues of a generation with nothing written down and no plan.

"Choose ignoring the people of Scotland and my constituents in Livingston, despite the fact we voted overwhelmingly to remain in the EU. Choose leaving the single market, risking 80,000 Scottish jobs over a decade and costing the people of Scotland an average of £2,000 a year in wages.

"Choose lowering Scotland's GDP by more than 10 billion pounds and Scotland's exports by more than £5bn. Choose vital EU workers' status being under threat with widespread uncertainty to families, business and the economy.

"Choose risking our international standing in the academic research and innovation communities as we lose access to funding, expertise and people from the EU.

"Choose working away from the European medicines association without any detail or thought of the impact.

"Choose returning to the Thatcher era of poverty and austerity. Choose the UK turning its back on Europe.

"Choose the great British power grab taking back control of straight bananas. Choose returning to the Thatcher era of poverty and austerity. Choose the UK turning its back on Europe.

"These, Mr Speaker, are not the choices that the Scottish people made.

"Scotland chose differently, Scotland chose to look outward, to face the world, to embrace the EU and all of the protections and advantages it brings.

"Scotland chooses life in the European union, not a hard Tory Brexit. This Tory government must respect that."

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