Given the Government's last ferry contracts ended in a court battle, many will rightly question whether this is the best way to ensure vital medical supplies and other critical goods can be smoothly delivered to the UK after the transition period ends.

New report assesses the domestic impact of Britain leaving the Brexit transition period without a UK-EU trade deal at the end of this year. Without a deal, businesses are staring down the barrel at a 'perfect storm' of Brexit and COVID this Christmas.

The Government's ill-thought through Internal Market Bill has already embarrassed Britain on the international stage, but now it's clear that it threatens to blow up the chances of a trade deal too.

This is another example of the damage caused by failing to agree a comprehensive trade agreement. The UK car industry will be left behind in the slow lane as a result of this negotiating failure.

These new figures mean one thing for struggling Britons: hunger. This disaster is unfolding on Boris Johnson’s watch, and his bluster and blather will not stop families starving. The time to agree a deal is now, or on his conscience be it.

The Government says it wants businesses to prepare themselves, while failing to articulate the trading terms they are expected to prepare for. Even worse, it is desperately looking for ways to paper over the cracks of its failings and has earmarked a Covid testing centre to make room for a giant lorry park.

The Government says business preparations for the end of the transition period must not be left to the last minute, yet its failure to set up support schemes is badly failing those businesses.

The immediate impact of a failure to secure a comprehensive trade deal may be overshadowed by COVID, but taken together these two factors will create a toxic mix for recovering businesses in the New Year.

The UK Government can continue to stick its fingers in its ears over the ill-advised Internal Market Bill, but sooner or later the consequences of acting like a rogue state will come back to haunt us."

Bad relations with the EU makes no sense for either side and most people will think it’s inconceivable that the Government would take such a gamble at such a critical time in the country’s history.

47 per cent of voters say planning to break the law is unacceptable, and only 25 per cent believe it can be acceptable. Boris Johnson has completely lost non-Tory voters on this issue, doesn’t have the backing of a huge number of his own voters.

Any trust the EU may have had in the U.K. government appears to have evaporated. With so much at stake – not least peace in Northern Ireland – it is imperative that the Prime Minister moves immediately to restore some international faith in the trustworthiness of our country.

Double whammy of coronavirus and a No Deal divorce from Europe will be bad news for every person in the country, and could prove catastrophic for many in particularly vulnerable areas such as North-West England and the Midlands. Responsibility will rest on Johnson’s shoulders, but it is the rest of us who will feel the pain.

The Make UK-Santander report makes alarming reading, as it is based on cold, hard facts. If the Government doesn’t get serious about delivering the trade deals the British public were told would be so easy, the UK is soon going to learn tub-thumping and tantrums are no substitute for grown-up, mutually beneficial trade deals with our biggest allies.

As things stand, when Britain separates from the EU on January 1st, there is now a substantial risk that, overnight, we will go from being senior partners in the most successful trading bloc in the world to junior players in the mother of all trade wars.

Boris Johnson has helped turn the Conservative Party from being the party of law and order into the party that breaks the law. Through his U-turns and vacillations about an EU trade deal, he has also turned it from being the party that backs business to the party that breaks business.

We were promised an oven-ready agreement – instead, we are being threatened with a national suicide note that cripples our competitiveness and utterly destroys Britain’s already battered reputation.

Raab’s assertion that fishing and state aid are the ‘only’ issues holding us back is no more reason to celebrate than being told a broken engine and lack of brakes are the only issues affecting your car.

It is clear that a deal is essential, a comprehensive deal that benefits both the UK and EU. It is equally clear that there must now be movement from politicians on the so-called red-line issues that have stalled talks completely over the summer. Otherwise, both sides will lose out.

It beggars belief that Britain is leaving it until the last minute to put proper consultation in place – you can be sure that those we negotiate with will not be making the same mistake.