Post-Brexit Hangover? Pro-Brexit Trade Secretary Says Country Has Become 'Too Fat And Too Lazy'

Liam Fox is the British trade secretary tasked with promoting British businesses on the international stage. However, a recent comment he made has caused quite a controversy, especially given his pro-Brexit stance.

According to the Financial Times, Fox said that Britain, especially the country's business leaders, has grown "too fat and too lazy" to seek out new export markets.

"This country is not the free-trading nation it once was," he told supporters of the Conservative Way Forward, a campaigning group designed to adapt Margaret Thatcher's principles to the current government. "We have become too lazy and too fat on our successes in previous generations.

Fox added that business owners need to spend more time finding new export markets and less time playing golf.

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Specifically, he said that business owners "have got to stop thinking about exporting as an opportunity and start thinking about it as a duty."

Fox's comments were made at a Westminster drinks party and even prompted an official response from the Prime Minister's office, which stated that his views do not express those of the government.

His remarks naturally irked members of the business community. Richard Reed, founder of Innocent Smoothies and a strong supporter of the Remain campaign, lashed out at Fox who he says has "never done a day's work in business in his life."

"How dare he talk down a country that he has damaged?" Reed was quoted by the Financial Time as telling the BBC.

He added that Fox's comments were "disgusting," and the country is now in a difficult position of seeing "a lot less" exporting activity because of Brexit.

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