Bath is a Great Citadel of Europe

14 May 2018

Passionate pro-Remain campaigners Wera Hobhouse MP and Lord Andrew Adonis joined forces in the centre of Bath on Saturday, engaging with local residents and Bath for Europe supporters.

Lord Adonis had just given a riveting talk at the Bath Festival. He has been on a listening tour of the UK, from the Northeast to the Welsh Valleys, in his efforts to understand residents’ concerns. The Labour peer believes there is a pro-Remain movement sweeping the country as more and more people realise that Brexit will make them poorer. “I think we can stop it,” he said.

“Bath is a great citadel of Europe,” Adonis said in his soapbox speech. “You’ve got a great university, you’ve got a great people. You realise that our future is as a European country. We can be proud to be in Bath, we can be proud to be English, we can be proud to be in Britain and we can be proud to be European. What we need to do over the next year is to make it clear that you can be all of those things. You don’t lose anything by being in Europe - you just gain.”

“Thank you so much for coming,” Wera said. “Bath is a fantastic community and I am so proud of the people of Bath who have kept this campaign going and we are growing and growing. We can win this, we must win it, we will win it...Let’s continue to fight for what we believe is the right thing to do. Thank you for coming, Andrew, you’ve given us great encouragement.”

“Keep up the good work,” Andrew concluded. “There’s six months before the House of Commons takes these key decisions, and every Member of Parliament needs to be aware that what their constituents want to do is to stop Brexit and stay in Europe. And if they all take the same principled stand that Wera is taking here in Bath, then we can stop this and have a much better future. And remember, no one, two years ago, voted to be poorer. If we leave the European Union we will be economically poorer but we will also be culturally and spiritually poorer. We will divorcing ourselves from the continent of which we are a part and the civilisation that is at the heart of being British. We need to stop Brexit and stay in Europe.”