In a passionate speech late last night, David Drew MP set out his reasons for voting against the Prime Minister’s deal.

Speaking at just before 11pm in the House of Commons’ marathon EU debate he said that he feared “Brexit will become the biggest domestic policy disaster this country has ever known."

He likened it to how Iraq was a "foreign policy disaster" - Mr Drew opposed the invasion in 2003, defying Tony Blair's government and voting against there being a case for war.  

He said he would reject the deal, but must also rule out ‘no deal’ and set out his views on a general election and the need to bring the country together again.

The Stroud MP opened his speech by stressing the 'difficult issue' facing MPs tonight.

“There can be few times in the history of Parliament when MPs have faced two such difficult issues as Iraq and Brexit," He said.

"There are parallels. Those of us who voted against the invasion of Iraq were continually leaned on by the Executive and told that if we knew what they knew, we would vote for the invasion.

"That turned out to be one the biggest foreign policy disasters that this country has known, and I fear that Brexit will become one of the biggest domestic policy disasters this country has known."

He goes on to suggest that people voted for Brexit because they felt 'left behind and ignored'.

"Why did people vote for Brexit? They did so because of austerity. They felt that they had been left behind and ignored," he says during the impassioned speech.

After giving examples of other European countries who he says have chosen alternative routes to avoid austerity measures he concludes with a biting analysis of the 'poisonous debate' and calls for the house to look at measures to avoid a 'race to the bottom'.

“That is why Brexit is such a poisonous debate. I believe that the Prime Minister’s deal is the wrong deal," he says.

"As I said earlier, we are being given a false prospectus. The idea that it is “my deal or no deal” is completely wrong.

"We should reject this deal and recognise that this is a race to the bottom.

" We need to look at the economic underpinning and what it would require us to do. It is not our salvation.

Finally the member of parliament for Stroud calls for other politicians to rule out a 'no deal', as well as voting against the Prime Minister's deal before calling a general election.

“That is why we must rule out no deal, but also vote against the Prime Minister’ deal and come back with something substantive, and then test it electorally.

"Personally, I want that to be via a general election, but if we are driven towards a referendum, much as I hate referendums, it is something we will have to face up to in order to bring this country back together again, because the divisions have been made so great.

"We need to recognise that our policies are wrong and do something about it.”