CARDIFF Central MP Jo Stevens has walked out of the shadow cabinet in protest at Jeremy Corbyn’s correct decision to issue a three-line whip for the Article 50 vote.

Stevens describes herself as a “passionate European,” noting that her constituency and her city “voted by a significant majority to remain.”

But, while accepting that the overall referendum result was to leave, she does not acknowledge that her country Wales also strongly backed that decision.

Her complaint that there are “no guarantees for the people of Wales,” together with repetition of campaign assertions about Wales being a net beneficiary of EU funding and two-thirds of Welsh exports going to the EU, reveals her as being in denial.

Areas of Wales in receipt of EU funding — in reality, redirection of UK finance paid to Brussels — were among the strongest supporters of Britain’s exit.

They didn’t vote selfishly as beneficiaries of EU largesse but chose to break the link with an undemocratic institutionally neoliberal superstate under construction.

In her resignation letter, Stevens aims a dig at Corbyn’s record of voting against the policies of a succession of right-wing Labour leaders as though her current crisis of conscience is somehow on a par.

Corbyn’s votes were cast as a backbencher. None ever destabilised Labour or was calculated to bring succour to the party’s opponents.

In contrast, Stevens was a frontbencher and she threw in the towel just four months after the second damaging anti-Corbyn challenge by Owen Smith, whom she supported, was resoundingly defeated by the party membership.

The former shadow Welsh secretary must have known that the ever-salivating mass media was waiting to sink its teeth into the next spurious “rebellion” and had already given some aspiring rebels their 15 minutes of public attention.

Yet she still opted to flounce out of the shadow cabinet, offering the media its opportunity to drum up “Labour crisis” stories and pursue further martyrs of conscience rather than publicising and fighting to win support for the seven amendments put down by Labour to the government’s Article 50 Bill.

Corbyn explained his approach of encouraging the party to unite around core issues of jobs, security, economy, rights and justice to frame the future Britain that Labour wants to see and the basis for its international links.

Stevens argued in shadow cabinet for a free vote on Article 50, but each time that Corbyn has agreed this, it has rebounded.

Free votes on opposition to bombing raids on Syria and renewal of Trident were followed by jibes that Labour doesn’t have a clear policy or that its leadership is weak.

Labour cannot be stuck in “don’t know” mode over respecting the decision by a majority of voters — over 17 million people — in a turnout of 72.2 per cent to leave the EU.

It is fundamentally a democratic principle that cannot be wished away by chatter about “advisory” referendums, what kind of Brexit, misleading campaign propaganda and such like.

Parliament voted overwhelmingly to hold a referendum — most MPs did so because they anticipated a huge majority for Remain.

They handed responsibility for deciding on Britain’s membership of the EU to the people — and the people backed withdrawal.

It’s no surprise that the Liberal Democrats display contempt for democracy, supported by SNP and Green MPs.

Labour’s future depends on its clear declaration that it embraces the people’s democratic choice, making a three-line whip non-negotiable.

Labour MPs putting their pro-EU consciences above democracy play into the hands of duplicitous anti-working-class outfits such as Ukip.