Stop thinking like the EU, Lord Frost tells ‘indoctrinated’ UK officials

British officials remain indoctrinated with "EU ways of thinking" that must be eradicated to make Brexit Britain more competitive, Lord Frost said on Monday as he called for a bonfire of Brussels red tape.

He told MPs on the European Scrutiny Committee that a revolution was needed to "normalise" EU law still on Britain’s rulebook and return them to UK common law traditions, which are "lighter touch" and less risk averse.

Lord Frost said: "Lots of our bureaucracy and our regulatory systems have had to operate within a prescriptive EU law framework."

"We have internalised principles of EU law and EU ways of thinking about things for the last 50 years, which is harder to eradicate because it's quite subtle," the Cabinet minister and former Brexit negotiator said.

Lord Frost said he was recruiting for a task force that would focus on how to diverge from EU rules to give Brexit Britain a global competitive edge over European businesses in areas such as financial services.

"I have a role in making sure that what we put before Parliament is genuinely reforming, genuinely consistent with deregulation and the spirit of Brexit and and goes forward on that basis," he told MPs in comments that will fuel Brussels’ anxiety about Britain’s plans to diverge from EU rules.

The Brexit trade deal has level playing field provisions and an enforcement system that can allow either side to hit the other with tariffs if divergence is too dramatic.

Lord Frost added: "I personally profoundly believe that it's a huge advantage to a country to have the control over its own laws and the ability to design arrangements that suit its own traditions and ways of doing things."

He said that Britain could become a global leader in setting standards and rules, alongside the US, China and the EU.

"I don't think we should accept that we're in the EU's regulatory orbit," he said.

Lord Frost also doubled down on comments over the weekend that the EU’s "purist" interpretation of the Northern Ireland Protocol was putting the peace process at risk.

Britain infuriated Brussels by unilaterally extending grace periods in the Protocol over customs checks for some UK goods going to Northern Ireland.

"If the way the Protocol is operating is undermining the Good Friday Agreement rather than supporting it then we obviously have a problem. That wasn't what the Protocol was meant to do and if it is doing it then it's not working right," Lord Frost said.

A European Commission spokesman said: "We will continue with this engagement in order to find solutions. The various unhelpful comments in the press will not prevent us from doing so.

"We need solutions – not soundbites – if we are to make the Protocol work for the benefit of everyone in Northern Ireland."

EU officials said it was "irresponsible" to set July 12, the start of the marching season, as a deadline for the solution of the issues with the new customs arrangements for Northern Ireland.

"I would like to say that we are making progress with the EU before that date," Lord Frost said. He added there was no formal deadline but that summers in Northern Ireland could be "turbulent" and both sides would need to take that into account.

"The politics over the weekend has riled up the unionists, no end. Deadlines don’t really work in Brexit. I am not sure it was the best idea by the British Government to pick the orange order day as a new deadline," the EU official said.

The EU was "absolutely aware of Unionist anger" towards the Protocol, but was not being "computer says no" over the Protocol, the source added.

Britain has told Brussels it is prepared to introduce new customs checks on UK food products crossing the Irish Sea to Northern Ireland in four stages from October.

The BBC reported details of a UK roadmap for the introduction of checks sent to Brussels at the end of March. Both sides are now working on a different joint text with EU sources describing progress as "good".

Lord Frost also told MPs the UK did not "choose gunboat diplomacy" in a row over fishing rights which prompted two Royal Navy vessels to be sent to Jersey to face demonstrating French fishermen.