Lord David Frost labelled ‘fully delusional’ for claiming Brexit has been a success

“Its like saying the Titanic maiden voyage was a success because it made it over halfway to New York.”

David Frost, the UK’s former chief negotiator for exiting the European Union under Boris Johnson, has come under criticism for claiming Brexit has been a success.

In a recent article in the Telegraph, Lord Frost’s headline claimed: “Brexit has been a success. Labour are slowly killing it.”

He argued that years of EU membership left the UK’s political establishment incapable of governing effectively, asserting: “During long years of EU membership, our political establishment forgot how to run the country.”

Frost acknowledged that Brexit may have preceded some of the UK’s current challenges but insisted it was not their cause. He referenced a recent poll which avoided mentioning Brexit or the EU to prevent what he called “team-based” responses. Instead, the survey asked voters whether decisions across 20 policy areas, previously under EU control, should be made by the UK government, international institutions, or a mix.

According to Frost, the results demonstrate ongoing public support for the repatriation of powers secured through Brexit.

“The message of this week’s poll is that Labour are walking on thin ice. Whatever the current political vibes, the majority of the British people are not up for signing away the powers Boris Johnson and I painfully won back in 2020. That’s why we are right to keep trying to stop them,” he argued.

In a rallying cry to the right, Lord Frost added: “You don’t stop fighting the war until you have won it. There is a political market to reverse the reset and to finish the job that was largely, but not entirely, done in 2020: in short, to make the UK including Northern Ireland a fully self-governing state once again, under our own parliament, setting our own laws. This week’s poll shows the British people want our government in charge and actually exercising the powers they now have. The party that understands why that is important and necessary, unites behind it, and campaigns for it, is the one that will succeed.”

However, Frost’s op-ed flies in the face of mounting public disillusionment with Brexit. Numerous polls have consistently shown that a majority of Britons believe leaving the EU has harmed the country. A recent poll by the More in Common think-tank commissioned for the Sunday Times found that less than a third of Britons would vote to leave the EU if the Brexit referendum was repeated.

Responding to the findings in the Guardian, Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey argued the poll reflects widespread dissatisfaction with the Brexit deal negotiated by the Conservatives. “It shows that people are feeling the terrible damage caused by the deal forced upon us by Boris Johnson, Kemi Badenoch and the rest of the Conservative party,” he wrote, “and want something different.”

Davey challenged Keir Starmer to change course on Brexit, suggesting there are major political and economic gains to be made by doing so. “Giving our economy the boost it desperately needs, pulling it out of the cycle of low growth and high debt that the Conservatives plunged us into,” Davey wrote.  

With poll after poll confirming that most Britons now view Brexit as a disaster, it was hardly surprising that the former chief Brexit negotiator’s claim that it has been a success was met with ridicule. In a bid to support his argument, Frost pointed to a selectively framed poll that deliberately avoided using the terms ‘Brexit’ or ‘EU’, supposedly to steer clear of “polarising” language, as tenuous proof that the British public is not convinced Brexit has failed.

“David Frost now fully delusional,” wrote campaign group Oxford for Europe.

“His definition of success and mine are way apart. Its like saying the titanic maiden voyage was a success because it made it over halfway to New York,” wrote another reader.

“WTF is this idiot talking about. There has NOT been a single advantage to leaving the EU…. NOT ONE,” another commented.