This has turned into a non-violent civil war

Tim Martin

Mr Martin, an outspoken Brexiteer who has campaigned alongside the likes of former UKIP leader, Nigel Farage and ERG chairman Jacob Rees-Mogg, is a strong advocate of leaving the EU on WTO terms – the so-called no deal option. He told Express.co.uk: “As a businessman, I have to deal with uncertainty – but the bigger risk is this issue runs on forever. “This has turned into a non-violent civil war which is preoccupying everybody the whole time.

“The whole country is just getting totally dragged down by it. 

“We have to leave or it becomes a tremendous constitutional problem.

“If we’re going to stay in a customs union, there will be years of wrangling ahead.”

Mr Martin said Prime Minister Theresa May’s negotiating team of “Remoaners” had proved themselves completely unable to match the EU’s officials, resulting in her unpopular withdrawal agreement failing to attract enough votes to get through the Commons.

He added: “Project Fear has also dramatically exaggerated the risks of leaving without a deal.

“We just need to put this all behind us now so the country can move on – for everyone’s sake.”

Mr Martin said he had never donated any money to a political party, nor was he a member of one.

He said: “The thing is this completely cuts across party boundaries, it goes beyond parties.”

As such, despite his lack of faith in Mrs May, he was sceptical about whether there was any point in replacing her with a new Prime Minister given the current deadlock.

He explained: “Whoever comes into power has to deal with the same problems, has to deal with reality.”

Nevertheless, he advocated “natural winner” Boris Johnson, who like him backs leaving without a deal in place, as somebody who could deliver the Brexit he believes 17.4 million people voted for three years ago.

Mr Martin yesterday explained his reasoning in an article circulated to media outlets in which he criticised CBI chief Carolyn Fairborn over her ongoing Brexit warnings.

He wrote: “Organisations like the CBI, the Food and Drink Federation (FDF) and the British Retail Consortium (BRC), representing businesses which are too lazy to think for themselves, have repeatedly made false claims about the imaginary dangers of leaving the EU without a deal, and of trading on World Trade Organisation (WTO) terms.

“The CBI has been the main promoter of rule from Brussels, helping to convince the government in the 1990s to join the disastrous exchange rate mechanism, which brought the country to the verge of economic collapse.

“It then urged us to join the euro and its current chief, Carolyn Fairbairn, relentlessly issued apocalyptic warnings about voting leave and, more recently, about the need for a deal at any cost – an economically illiterate concept.

“The UK public is extremely tolerant of debate – and understands that people have diverging views on many issues. However, Project Fear is a propaganda campaign, which has falsely claimed, over a number of years that prices will axiomatically rise in the event of no deal. 

“This proposition is, quite simply, untrue, since no deal allows the UK government to scrap thousands of import tariffs on non-EU imports, which will reduce prices; to save £39billion; to regain control of fishing and to increase the level of democracy in the country.”

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