Boris Johnson has been left rudderless on his Brexit policy after his chief negotiator walked out of cabinet pouring scorn on the Prime Minister’s covid restrictions and tax policies.
Lord Frost, who negotiated Britain’s departure from the EU and was tasked with ironing out the final details of the future relationship, said he resigned over the “political direction” of Johnson ’s government.
Frost, a brutish diplomat who was ennobled and taken into the cabinet to take a hard line against the EU over Northern Ireland customs arrangements, did not mention the floundering talks in his shock resignation letter.
Instead, the unelected politician fired a broadside against further covid measures and spoke of his desire for a “low-tax” economy.
In his resignation letter Frost, who attended cabinet, wrote: “I hope we will move as fast as possible to where we need to get to: a lightly regulated, low-tax, entrepreneurial economy, at the cutting edge of modern science and economic change.”
In a gift to anti-lockdown Tory backbenchers Frost added his regret that measures to reopen the economy in July “did not prove to be irreversible”.
He wrote: “I hope we can get back on track soon and not be tempted by the kind of coercive measures we have seen elsewhere.”
The resignation came at the end of a torrid week for the Prime Minister that was close on 100 Tory MPs rebel in the Commons and the party lose a rock-solid by-election to the Lib Dems.
Frost’s departure leaves the tangled talks with the EU on the future of customs arrangements in Northern Ireland still unresolved.
Northern Ireland deputy First Minister Michelle O’Neill said that whoever replaces Lord Frost as Brexit minister will “need to find solutions” to make the Northern Ireland Protocol work.
O’Neill told the BBC Sunday Politics programme: “This is the same David Frost who negotiated Brexit and he has worked to undermine it every day since.”
“David Frost will be replaced by another minister and whoever that minister is, they need to find solutions, work with the EU, make the protocol work and provide that certainty and stability that is desperately required.”
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