Nigel Farage, one of the figureheads of the Brexit campaign and now a pundit on GB News, has long held outspoken views.

Today, KentOnline reporter James Pallant sat down with him at Deal Victoria & Barns Close Cricket Club to talk about the political landscape, and the impact Brexit has had on Kent...

Mr Farage, it’s been quite an eventful day in British politics?

"Another! Another, it never ends. Everyday brings fresh excitement. The latest news that Boris Johnson, photographed on a Caribbean beach yesterday - I saw the picture - is on an aeroplane on his way back to the United Kingdom and may well submit his name. It just keeps on rolling.

"On a human level, it’s quite difficult not to feel a little bit sorry for Truss. Yes, she was out of her depth. Yes, she lacked the experience, the message delivery [and] the mini-budget clearly had some flaws. But, she was trying to reverse a policy path on the economy.

"Ever since Blair the state’s got bigger, taxes have simply gone up. And it’s been great for the rich, it’s been great for those that own assets, really good for big businesses, really good for multi-nationals, but not so great for everybody else. And there was an attempt here, a philosophical attempt, and it’s gone wrong and she’s been punished for it. And on that level, I feel a bit sorry for her."

Who would you like to see step into the role?

"I don’t think there’s anybody, I think it’s over. I think you’ve seen a rout over the course of the last week, pretty much akin to a coup.

"The Conservative party never accepted Brexit, there was a minority of Conservative MPs that backed Brexit, the rest just went along with it, holding their noses.

"They did it in 2019 in the end when they were forced to for electoral benefit, because that’s just how cynical they are. And now I see the globalist, remain wing of the party has basically staged a coup.

"Hunt is the most pro-EU, the most pro-China globalist you could ever come across. Suella Braverman’s out and so I think that those Conservatives that would characterise themselves as Brexiteers, free-marketeers on the side of small business, free capitalism, I think they’ve been routed. And I think even if Boris wins, he may be a leaver, but actually the policies he’s pursued as a Prime Minister have been very much to the left of where the Conservative party really ought to be, where the voters are."

In 2015 you unsuccessfully ran to be an MP in South Thanet, would you consider running again?

"I honestly don’t know. I had nearly 21 years in the European Parliament - it’s a hell of a long time, it’s a massive chunk of my old life spent commuting back and forth between Brussels and Strasbourg, I don’t regret it, I thoroughly enjoyed it, I made the most of being an MEP, I became quite an infamous MEP over there.

"In terms of British politics, I think my view is that the Conservatives are broken. I think they’ve just made too many promises, they’ve let people down too often, too repeatedly.

"They no longer serve any purpose at all; they’re basically 'Labour-lite'. It’s difficult to see how a Starmer budget will be any different, frankly, to the ideas that are currently being put forward by Hunt. So my own view is that the Conservative party needs to be replaced; we need a new centre-right party in British politics.

"A lot of people say 'well, Nigel, are you going to step up to the plate and do it?'. Well I can’t do it on my own, we’re not a presidential system like France or American, where an individual can run and win. We haven’t got that system.

"Here you have to have a party who does it, and I led two big insurgencies, won two European elections. The thought of running in a General Election and winning lots of seats, holding the balance of power, you’d need several very big figures to do that. So the question is, are there other people in the Conservative party who will come to the same conclusion? I don’t know the answer to that, but I think it’s needed."

Kent feels the effects of Brexit more acutely than perhaps any other county in England, between the gridlock in Dover—

"Oh no, no, no, no we’ve had that for 30 years. Operation Stack’s been going for 30 years. Every time there’s a minor piece of industrial unrest in Calais, Operation Stack comes into place.

"But you’re right, Kent is on the frontline of everything, and I think the disappointment in this county is that this was overwhelmingly a Brexit county, with the exception of Tunbridge Wells - they’re very rich in Tunbridge Well, they like things to stay just as they are - and it’s a big county in terms of numbers so people, so it was very important.

"I think what’s happening across the English Channel is such a visible disappointment to Brexit voters; they are enraged they’re furious, they thought voting for Brexit we really would get back control.

"And it looks and and feels like we’ve lost even more of it. I don’t view this as a failure of Brexit, I do view it as a failure of the Conservative Party implementing Brexit, and the best example of that is that we may have left the European treaties, but we still stayed in the European Convention of Human Rights and its court in Strasbourg.

"All the while that’s in place, I don’t see the cross-channel situation being solved."

Do you think there have been any benefits of Brexit?

"Well, there are some obvious ones - the vaccine roll-out, for example.

"The others were still squabbling amongst themselves and we already had an approved vaccine and we were getting on with it, that’s one example.

"That’s one very obvious thing that shows that when you’re in control, when you’re in control of your own destiny, you can make things better or worse. But you’re in control.

"That’s an example of a British government, freed from the bureaucracy of the European Parliament and the European Commission, getting on and doing things.

"I think on the world-stage, I think we’ve done quite markedly better. I think the nuclear submarine deal with Australia is again a very good example of Britain sticking out and forging new relationships.

"I think the second biggest disappoint in Kent is that we were told it was a free trade deal that we negotiated with Europe, but actually we’ve found that it’s not and there are all sorts of barriers and French obstructionism and frustrations.

"So, as the most committed Brexiteer in the county - which I think my track record shows that I am - we’ve still got a lot more still to do.

"There’s still a lot of the Brexit process to be completed, and my worry is that the change of direction in the Conservative party in the last week, they’re going to give up on that idea and possibly move us back closer to single-market rules, which is that last thing I want."

There is a brewery in Tenterden – called the Old Dairy Brewery – that was pointed to by the government as an exemplar of what could be achieved in a post-Brexit era.

However, following the Brexit referendum their international revenues have fallen from £600,000 to £2,000, with only one EU customer left. Now, they’re looking for a buyer to keep them from going out of business—

"Well, I’m not familiar with this business —"

But there are lots of these scenarios with businesses in Kent

"Well, Europe is very small, it’s important to remember that.

"It’s about 15% of the global economy now and contracting every single year.

"You think we’ve got economic problems, have a look over there, have a look at France. And that’s the point of Brexit, that there will be a change in the pattern of trade, and the hope is that we’ll do a lot more trade globally because that’s where the real grown markets of the world are.

"And I can’t comment on this firm - I don’t know it - other than to say, with every change in life there are winners and losers.

"Everything you do in life involves changes; there are upsides and downsides, there are bound to be, it’s obvious. When you move house there are bound to be downsides, but you hope for some upsides too."

Kent overwhelmingly voted to leave - what positives does Kent have to show for it?

"The fact that we’re not being dictated to by foreign bureaucrats, the fact that we’re in control of our own country; you can’t put a price on things like that.

"But, I’ll be the first to concede - deep frustration that it’s not been carried out the way that it should have been."

How do you think it should have been done?

"Properly. As I say, we should not have a court in Strasbourg making decisions at 10pm, the way they are, we shouldn’t have agreed to give the EU £40 billion quid if they’re still going to be obstructionist and difficult with goods coming in and out.

"When, after all, think of all the goods coming in from China, massive container ships coming into Southampton and Felixstowe. There aren’t petty delays there, there isn’t someone going through every container checking every good.

"All over the world there are trusted-trader schemes where people digitally report what goods and packages they’ve got. So we finished up with a deal that we paid a lot of money for - that’s brought more inconvenience than could have been envisaged. We should have negotiated far better."

How did you see Brexit going when you were campaigning for it?

"Well you can never know what’s going to happen in the future, you can’t tell if we’re going to have good economies or bad economies.

"But our presence on the world stage, I think it’s clear we’re a very different country now. Ukraine, perhaps, you could argue the same thing.

"Britain taking a lead, instead of taking part of a European foreign policy. We’re standing taller in the world, even if we’re not doing very well at home at the moment."

You think that abroad, people see Britain stronger than it was before?

"Yes, without a shadow of a doubt we are a much bigger global player than we were before. And we are signing trade deals all around the world.

"Some people said that would be difficult, but we are doing that.

"Our biggest problems are at home and our biggest problem really is our economic mode, from Blair through Cameron and onto today, has given us low growth, low productivity.

"The rich have got richer and the people in the middle feel a bit poorer than they did 10 years ago, 20 years ago.

"I mean, wages have gone up, and wages were going up and that was a good thing. There’s no doubt that post-Brexit Britain did see wage rises, but of course inflation has eaten into that too."

How long will the people of Kent have to wait until the benefits of Brexit can be realised?

"Well that’s in our hands - there isn’t just a magic formula. You don’t just vote for Brexit and suddenly everything becomes great.

"You vote for Brexit to give yourself the tools, the handle; you’re in charge of the levers.

"It’s up to British governments as to what they do. As I say, I’m very disappointed with Johnson. He could have done a lot more. I know he had the pandemic to deal, with but there’s a lot more that could have been done. "Don’t even ask Kent’s fisherman about the deal, because they’ve seen no benefits at all. So there are frustrations, disappointments and much more we have to do."

What would you say to the fisherman, to the business owners struggling with export paperwork, struggling to hire enough staff?

"Oh, I was in Australia last week. They’ve got massive staff shortages there too.

"Inflation, staff shortages, are problems all over the world. And actually, the numbers coming into Britain - legal migration - last year was the highest ever.

"So there are still huge numbers of workers coming in, but the more workers that come in the more shortages there seem to be.

"So that is not linked in anyway to Brexit. There are still huge numbers of people coming in, it’s just that there are more people coming in from the sub-continent than are coming in from central and Eastern-Europe, but the number of people coming in is still enormous, absolutely enormous.

"And to the fisherman, very, very difficult - I mean, I want to say ‘hang on in there’, but it’s very very difficult for them and frankly the quota deal was dreadful.

"There are more French boats fishing on our six-mile line than there ever were before Brexit. You know, under international law, 12 miles around Kent should be ours and ours only.

"We could allow other boats in, under licence, but really beyond six miles, we haven’t really taken back any control at all, and that’s disappointing, very, very disappointing, for me particularly. As I say, there’s more to be done."

Another impact of Brexit has been a decline in the number of tourists. Kent has always attracted a lot of tourists and —

"Oh, I think you’ll find that’s changing a lot this year. London in particular is really busy with Americans, really busy with Americans.

" And actually, actually, if it’s with American tourists, Britain is doing amazing. If it’s European tourists it’s not, and that’s because Europe is in more financial trouble than anywhere.

" If you look at growth rates since, if you look at since the vote in 2016, our GDP growth rate is still way higher than France, Germany or Italy.

"So comparative to the others, we’ve done fine, it just doesn’t feel like at the moment."

So looking back over the past few years, all of the political turmoil, the suffering that has come as a result of Brexit, would you do it all again?

"Oh, I think freedom is worth fighting for. I think independence, freedom, having a democratic system where you can actually vote for the people who make your laws and sack them if you want to, as opposed to just accepting EU law and not being able to do anything about it [is worth it]. Yes, I think that’s the way to go.

"I also think Britain’s role in the future, we’ve got to reach out much more broadly. Europe is the small thinking, there’s much more out there, there’s a huge English-speaking world, there’s a huge Commonwealth.

"So no, from a historical perspective we’ve done absolutely the right thing."

I’ve noticed you coming back to the European Court of Human Rights still having power—

"I know, it’s incredible, the plane was on the runway, about to go to Rwanda, and a temporary judgement in Strasbourg stopped it."

Do you not think there are benefits to the legislation itself? Surely there are some things in the European Declaration on Human Rights that you agree with?

"Well I don’t think we need it.

"Why does the country of magna carta need it? We’re not like other European countries that have fallen for all sorts of extremes of left and right in the first half of the 20th century - that never happened here.

"And actually, you can criticise it, but actually I think our judicial system is still the best in the world.

"So when it comes to liberty and freedom, I don’t think we need lessons form anyone, least of all from a very political court in Strasbourg. I mean, you can agree with their aims, I mean - ‘right to life’ - fine, that’s very nice of you, thank you. You can agree with motherhood and apple pie but it is a very political court and we don’t need it."