Former Liberal Democrat leader and deputy prime minister Nick Clegg admitted he lost his seat in yesterday’s general election because many voters disagreed with his anti-Brexit stance.

Speaking to Radio 4′s Today programme, Mr Clegg pointed to a near-doubling of the Conservative party’s vote share in Sheffield Hallam, and said “maybe I lost my seat because of my rather stubborn life-long belief we should be part of Europe”.

Despite suffering one of the highest-profile losses of the night, however, Mr Clegg stressed that his position on Brexit was “a view I’m not going to resign from” and warned that the UK was now in an even worse position for negotiating its exit with the EU.

Mr Clegg said MPs will either need to “find a cross-party consensus on a more moderate workable approach to Brexit or we will have to go back to the country maybe once or twice” until one party wins a majority, which would “devour” much of the two-year negotiating window.

He added:

It is impossible to exaggerate this morning how self-absorbed and adrift the UK looks to the rest of Europe… I can’t think of any example of a modern mature democracy putting itself in such a vulnerable position.

Photo: PA

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