Nigel Farage questions Michael Gove's appearance at secret Rejoiner summit: 'What the hell was he doing there?'

Nigel Farage and Ben Habib slammed 'global Remainers' and Michael Gove after they attended a Brexit secret summit
Nigel Farage and Ben Habib slammed 'global Remainers' and Michael Gove after they attended a Brexit secret summit
GB News
Georgina Cutler

By Georgina Cutler


Published: 14/02/2023

- 16:15

Nigel Farage spoke to former MEP Ben Habib who condemned the handling of Brexit

GB News presenter Nigel Farage slammed Rejoiners and senior Tory Michael Gove after they attended a secret summit to discuss Brexit “failings”.

Sources say the Levelling Up Secretary blamed “embittered Remainers” for a hostile briefing that suggested he was having doubts.


But ex-Brexit Party Member Ben Habib claims he doesn’t “think Michael Gove is a Brexiteer”.

Farage said: “These were the chief Remainers, now Rejoiners, but what the hell was Michael Gove and a couple of other senior retired Conservatives, what in God’s name were they doing there?”

“What we’ve been told is they were trying to deal with the economic failings of Brexit [and] the need to get back into a closer relationship with the European Union.”

Nigel Farage questioned why Michael Gove had attended the meeting
Nigel Farage questioned why Michael Gove had attended the meeting
GB News

Gove allies claims that while he defends his Leave vote, he is “honest” about its flaws.

However, businessman Habib says he has been sceptical of Gove’s attitude towards Brexit since 2017.

Talking on GB News he said: “I don’t think Michael Gove is a Brexiteer. The balloon went up for me back in 2017 when he said we can’t leave the EU without a deal.

“And if you believe the United Kingdom should be an independent sovereign nation, you then don't seek a deal.

“You should be prepared to leave without a deal. Of course, a deal on the right terms is worth having, but if that is the be all and end all of leaving, you're not really a leaver.”

Gove was forced to deny claims of Brexit betrayal after the group met at Ditchley Park, a historic estate near Chipping Norton in Oxfordshire, to discuss “how can we make Brexit work better with our neighbours in Europe?”

Habib added that the people negotiating the Brexit deal were “clearly incompetent”.

Farage said: “It does seem to me that we had people negotiating a deal that had never, ever done a day's work in the private sector or put deals together.”

Habib responded: “Yeah, never. And clearly incompetent.”

Eurosceptics have raised suspicions that the conversations from the summit will be used to lobby Rishi Sunak or any future Labour administration for closer ties with Brussels.

Ben Habib said those who negotiated the Brexit deal were 'clearly incompetent'
Ben Habib said those who negotiated the Brexit deal were 'clearly incompetent'
GB News

Farage said there were some saying Britain was not currently in a strong position, with the economy “flatlining” and “business confidence at its lowest” in decades.

Habib slammed the UK Government's handling of Brexit as he said the “issue is not that Brexit failed” but the Government’s “failure to deliver Brexit.”

“It’s completely wrong. They’re conflating issues and attributing to Brexit failed Conservative Party policy for 13 years.

“The whole point about Brexit was to create an independent nimble trading nation that is the UK putting British national interests first and unhooking ourselves from the EU.”

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