Jeremy Lefroy - Giving MPs a say on the final Brexit deal is a victory for parliamentary democracy

The Stafford MP said giving Parliament a say on the final Brexit deal was in the spirit of the EU referendum message of 'taking back control', but he insisted the defeat in the Commons was not a disaster for Theresa May.

It comes after Labour and 11 Tory rebels, led by former Attorney General Dominic Grieve, backed an amendment giving MPs a legal guarantee of a vote on the final Brexit deal struck with Brussels.

Pro-Remain MP Mr Lefroy had initially supported the amendment – which was passed last night by 309-305 – but he ended up voting with government.

He said he changed his mind after Brexit Secretary David Davis submitted a written statement to the Commons promising lawmakers a vote on the deal, which Mr Lefroy said meant 'consensus had been reached'.

He told the Express & Star: "The Government had indicated that they would have a vote, but it wasn't anywhere in legislation.

"So in the end I intervened on the minister and asked if he was going to bring forward an amendment so that it will be on the bill. He said he would, so that was fine.

"Basically I thought that was enough.

"As far as I was concerned the parliamentary decision making had been upheld by the Government's written statement and by what the minister said to me when they eventually responded to my intervention.

"I felt it was a reasonable place to be. You can't always have everything you want, so you try to reach a compromise, and as far as I am concerned this was a good one."

Mr Lefroy denied the defeat represented a disaster for Mrs May, insisting that the difference between the Government's proposals and the amendment 'was not great'.

"The Government had accepted that parliament should have the final say on the agreement," he said.

"Whether that is by bill or by a vote in parliament is still perhaps an issue of contention.

"I can't see it is a major difference at all. At the end of the day...consensus had been reached on it because we had got pretty much where we had wanted to be.

"The referendum was about taking back control so parliament is having its say.

"Every other parliament in Europe would have a say on an agreement, and our parliament is having a say on the agreement.

"What the Government has done is a victory for parliamentary democracy. Clearly the Government would have preferred not to have been defeated on it, and I would have preferred to see agreement rather than division.

"But we have to remember this a a vote on an amendment in a bill where the government and what the amendment says are not very far apart, so to blow it up into a kind of disaster is completely over the top."