Nigel Farage has accused British political leaders of failing to understand the “forgotten places” across the country which had wanted a “fairer deal” for the UK when they voted for Brexit. The Reform UK leader is seen as the protagonist of Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union and was speaking on the 10th anniversary of the seismic referendum result.

The decision to leave the union has split the UK ever since, with many of the supporters of the decision, praising the former member of the European Parliament, for helping the country reclaim its “sovereignty.” Some have even called for the controversial politician to be knighted for his efforts in the UK’s withdrawal. Others, however, hold him responsible for the ills of the British economy throughout the 2020s, with the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) estimating that Brexit will ultimately leave UK trade about 15% lower and the economy around 4% smaller than it would have been inside the EU. So what do you think? Vote in our poll and join the debate in the comments section. Can’t see the poll below?

Writing on his Substack, Mr Farage accused the political establishment of being unable to accept the result, which he believes ignited the collapse of the traditional two party system.

He wrote: “Ten years ago, today, the British people triggered an earthquake that caught the Westminster class completely off guard. We’re still feeling the aftershocks today.

“Everything that’s happened since 23rd June 2016, has to be seen through that lens. When the result was announced, the landscape of British politics shifted permanently.

“The two-party system proved unable to process this, unable and unwilling to accept the vote to leave, or to implement it in the way the voters wanted.

“And as a direct result of this betrayal, the voting blocs that sustained the uniparty consensus collapsed.”

Andy Burnham, the man who many see as a prime minister-in-waiting after his Makerfield by-election win and Sir Keir Starmer’s resignation as party leader, has pledged not to “re-run” old Brexit arguments.

He has sought to play down the prospect of reversing the 2016 referendum but has said he would like to see the UK back in the EU within his lifetime.

EU relations minister Mr Thomas-Symonds, who is speaking at an event held by the UK in a Changing Europe think tank on Tuesday, will argue that a hard-headed relationship with Europe is needed to protect British homes in a turbulent world.

He launched an attack on Mr Farage over the Reform leader’s previous remarks about Ukraine, accusing him of having “consistently supported Russia, and tried to pretend that our interests could ever align with a dictator’s”.

Writing in the Telegraph ahead of the event, he said: “From declaring in 2014 that ‘I think the European Union, frankly, does have blood on its hands in the Ukraine’, and that he didn’t want a ‘European foreign policy’, to suggesting in 2024 that Nato and the EU’s ‘eastward expansion’ gave a reason for Putin to ‘go to war’.

“His rationale for doing so, it seems, has been to ultimately undermine the favourability of the European Union. So consumed with being anti-Europe, engrossed by an ideological necessity for separation, he has chosen to fall on one side of a worldview. The wrong side.”

He added: “Allowing a worldview sympathetic to Putin to hold the balance of power would be an unprecedented threat to national security.”