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In December, the UK signed a free trade agreement with Australia, while earlier that year it secured a deal in principle with New Zealand. The Government has estimated that over a 15 year period such deals will increase the size of the UK economy by between £200million and £500million. The UK is also in negotiations with India, Mexico, Canada and the Gulf to ensure further agreements are put in place, while the Government is pressing for accession to the CPTPP trade bloc in the Pacific.

A spokesperson for the UK trade department said they expected 2022 to be a “five-star year” for the country’s trade push.

They said: “We have secured over £760billion worth of trade deals with 70 countries plus the EU, and in the year ahead our independent trade strategy continues to attract valuable financial investment that boosts our world-class exports and brings prosperity to every part of the UK, helping to level up our country.”

Dr Bull, who is Deputy Leader of Reform UK, previously known as the Brexit Party, campaigned and voted for the UK to leave the European Union.

He insisted that the UK should secure a trade deal with developing economies like India, which he believed made more sense than bending over backwards to make a deal with “declining” European nations.

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Dr Bull told Express.co.uk: “I’m a big fan of the Commonwealth. I think the [trade deals] with Australia and New Zealand are particularly pertinent.  

“And then of course by 2022 if we can secure them with India particularly, from my perspective.  

“India currently makes a third of the world’s medicines. By 2050 India will make half of the world’s medicines.

“So why on earth would we be doing deals with declining European countries whereas I would much rather be doing deals with places such as India. 

“Mexico’s another very interesting country, and then in terms of the Commonwealth Canada, and of course, the United States is a very important market.”

Praising the Government’s work so far, Dr Bull added: “If we are an independent sovereign nation and are [to pursue] all of those things about taking back control, clearly what we need to do is look at Britain’s place in the world.

“The fact is that actually trade with Europe was declining to the United Kingdom, and yet we were hamstrung by their rules and the regulations and so on. 

“And the UK Government has begun to strike trade deals ‒ I think it’s something in the region of about £760billion of trade deals.”

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The total value of the UK’s trade with countries it was involved with in 2020 is £766billion, though many of these deals were in place before Brexit and have been rolled over. 

In October last year, the BBC reported that the UK had negotiated rollover deals with 63 non-EU countries.

Though Dr Bull does not regret voting for Brexit, he insisted that Boris Johnson and his Government were not reaping the rewards of a “historic” referendum result.

He stressed that the “benchmark” for Brexit’s success is securing a trade deal with the United States. 

Dr Bull said: “Where is the deal with the United States?  

“That for me is the real benchmark, because if we can come up with an agreement with the United States that would be absolutely game changing.”

He also raged about what he thought were broken tax promises and said that the cost of living must be addressed as a priority.  

Dr Bull added: “I think the current Government has just doubled down on where the European Union is.

“We’re now a high tax, high regulation, low growth economy and you can see that with the fact we’ve got inflation rising, National Insurance [rise] coming in, our tax bills coming up.  

“This isn’t what people voted for.”

When asked what Reform UK may have done differently Dr Bull said: “What we should have done is to say, ‘Right this is where the future begins, we’re now going to slash tax, we’re going to get a flat tax across the board for example. We’re going to slash VAT, we’re doing these trade deals, we’re going to bring in the brightest talent.’”

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