John Major has launched a devastating attack on Brexit, branding it an “act of collective folly.”
The former Tory prime minister said Britain’s “enemies celebrated and our friends despaired” at the decision to leave the European Union in 2016.
Speaking at the London School of Economics this week, Major accused senior Tory Brexiteers like Boris Johnson and Michael Gove of spreading “misinformation” to vouch for Brexit.
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He said: “It left our country poorer, weaker and divorced from the richest free trade market that history has ever seen,” Major said.
“National interest was brushed aside by false hopes and promises. False hopes and promises that even a cabinet dominated by frontline Brexit enthusiasts was unable to deliver.”
Major said the damage of Brexit has “become only too apparent,” and that the Remain campaign which was branded ‘Project Fear’ by its opponents has now “become Project Reality.”
“It’s no consolation that the majority of the public now overwhelmingly recognises that it was misled in their moments of triumph,” he continued.
“Brexiteers predicted other countries would follow their lead and leave the European Union. None have. All saw only too clearly that Brexit was packed with disadvantages.
“Far from others leaving the European Union, as we meet, nine further nations now wish to join the European Union, which is an apt comment on how the world saw Britain’s decision.”
Major added: “The United Kingdom once revelled, within the memory of everyone present in this room, in being a leading member of the European Union, with half a billion citizens and the undoubted first ally of the United States, the world’s most eminent superpower.
“Today, we know we are neither, and so does the world.”
With every passing day, week, month and year the damage of Brexit reveals itself even more. This was most recently highlighted by a report from the National Bureau for Economic Research (NBER) which found that leaving the EU had reduced the UK’s GDP by 8%.
The report also found that employment and productivity have also been severely hampered, with each data set estimated to have been reduced by 3-4% from previous projections within the last decade or so.