Why the Unite to Remain alliance is our best bet at taking down no-deal Brexit

We have fantastic EU students, superb technicians working in our factories, teachers, nurses and doctors all toiling away side by side with British citizens to help keep the UK motor ticking over. But we could lose it all if we leave

This month, we saw the happy arrival of Unite to Remain. Something I feel the country has been crying out for.

Unite to Remain is a new organisation dedicated to ensuring that the majority of Britons who now want to remain in the EU can cast their votes in the next general election in the most effective way to deliver that outcome.

It’s not a political party and I am proud to back it. It is a body that will work with the Liberal Democrats, the Greens and Plaid Cymru in Wales, along with any independent remainer MPs, to optimise the growing Remain vote in this country using the current winner-takes-all voting system.

Unite to Remain will need to analyse all the parliamentary seats in England and Wales to identify those with the potential to be won so all Remain voters can swallow their differences on various policies and back a single candidate. Brecon needs to be won, and won well – we want to blow the bloody doors off – and then burn those doors as a Brecon Beacon that lights the way to the future. If we win Brecon, then I and many other supporters will be very happy to throw more weight behind this amazing initiative.

Because, let us not forget, Brexit means less money for hospitals, less money for schools, every household set to lose £2900 every year and house prices crashing. These are the questions I ask myself every night:

How could we be “Great Britain” if we lose Scotland (or Scotland loses England!)?

Why would we walk into years of recession when we had a choice?

Why wouldn’t we choose to rise to the top of the G7 in growth?

Why wouldn’t we choose to be at the top table of Europe?

Why wouldn’t we choose to be the envy of the world?

We are the country most admired for our flexibility in embracing new economic models. Let’s take this chance and join together to end it now and look forward, not backwards. The clear majority of voters want to remain – let Farage and Johnson split the negative vote while we join together and have one positive voice for the biggest decision of ours and our children’s lifetimes.

We need to rejoice in the fact that we are both British and European, learn to love the fusion, the fun, the finer things in life that come from being part of an international-minded country with welcoming arms. We have fantastic EU students studying with us, superb technicians working in our factories and laboratories, and teachers, nurses and doctors all toiling away side by side with our British citizens to help keep the UK motor ticking over.

The alternative we, the British people, face, is an unhealthy coalition between the Conservative and Brexit Parties, with Boris Johnson being probably our last prime minister of the United Kingdom.

We all come from different political traditions, for me that was once Labour, and we don’t necessarily agree about absolutely everything. But on this topic, I know we can stand shoulder to shoulder, and see eye to eye. Brexit must not happen.

That is why I urge all parties that want to keep us in the EU, to Unite to Remain. We hope you will too.

Julian Dunkerton is the co-founder of Superdry