Local government is the bedrock of our communities. It is central to people living happy, healthy and productive lives, and if properly funded, has the potential to solve some of the biggest problems in our society.

Local government is the bedrock of our communities.

Local government faces many challenges.

Within hours of Theresa May speaking to Parliament about the deal she negotiated, hundreds of Lib Dems gathered on Parliament Square to make clear they opposed it.

For over two years now Liberal Democrats have led the fight to give people the final say on the Brexit deal in a People's Vote, with the option to remain in the EU. And Thursday was a big day. It was the day that turned a People's Vote from a possibility into a probability.

For over two years now Liberal Democrats have led the fight to give the people the final say on the deal with the option to remain in the EU.

Parliament has seen the deal that Theresa May has cobbled together. We have a real chance to derail the Conservatives' damaging and chaotic Brexit.

So this Autumn, I'm are asking you to do three simple things:

It's taken us two years of negotiations with the EU to get a deal.

But what we now have in front of us is a very bad deal for the United Kingdom. We are left rule takers not rule makers.

The Liberal Democrats won't stand idly by and watch a Tory Brexit wreck our NHS, endanger our security and damage our economy

"A People's Vote is now the only way to escape from this mess" - Vince Cable

Any Brexit deal will leave the UK weakened and the public poorer.

"And before the ink is dry, the Conservative Party will tear into what little Theresa May has been able to agree. The Prime Minister now faces a defeat in Parliament, as a majority will be hard or impossible to secure for what she has come up with."

This week is Transgender Awareness week, and if you haven't had a chance to read my blog on the importance of supporting and standing alongside our transgender friends and colleagues, you can read it here: libdems.org.uk/trans-rights-are-human-rights.

Transgender and intersex communities are too often marginalised, and many forget that in the fight for equality, trans rights are human rights. We must, and we are, endeavouring to ensure that a vulnerable group of people are able to live as they are entitled to under our laws.

Across the Atlantic, Trump and his cronies are doing their very best to rewrite the definition of transgender out of existence. An agenda of social cleansing that feeds into his administration's insular and antagonistic narrative. We may like to think that Trump's views are in isolation, that his fear of difference does not seep to our shores, but it does.

Jeremy Corbyn was asked "If you could stop Brexit, would you?"
His response?
"We can't stop it. The referendum took place. Article 50 has been triggered."

But Brexit can be stopped through a People's Vote

Vince Cable

This demonstrates, if proof were needed, that Jeremy Corbyn is working hand in glove with the Conservatives to deliver their ideological Brexit.

Today, Jo Johnson quit as a Conservative government minister over the Brexit deal Theresa May is putting together - a deal which gives people the worst of both worlds.

The choice being presented to the British people is no choice at all.

Jo Johnson MP

In his resignation statement, Johnson said that the deal being concocted will inflict "serious economic and political harm on the country". He said what is happening is not what anyone wants and the 2016 referendum did not provide any mandate for it.

20 years ago today the Human Rights Act became law, incorporating the European Convention on Human Rights into UK law.

The Liberal Democrats had been campaigning for the Human Rights Act ever since we were founded, but our fight to protect people's rights and freedoms didn't end when it passed...

Conservative and Labour MPs consistently vote for illiberal new laws that curtail civil liberties.