One of the key ’architects’ of the Brexit Leave campaign has told Business News he believes the island should be given a full say in the coming two years.

Former Cabinet member Michael Gove MP also said he was impressed with the transparency displayed by the island in business.

Mr Gove said that it was ’vitally important’ that the voice of the island is heard in the important Brexit select committee at Westminster, which he is a member of.

In a wide-ranging interview with Business News Mr Gove :

l Said he admired the Isle of Man’s sense of community and the way it conducts politics and business.

lTalked about the snap general election called by Prime Minister Theresa May. But he says there can be no complacency over the result.

lThe former Education Secretary and Chief Whip said ’probably what was best for me and certainly what’s best for the country is that I lost’ [the election to be Conservative party leader last year. ]

l Agreed Brexit has ’divided opinions’ in the British Isles.

l The Times columnist also talked about the Amerian president Donald Trump with whom he secured the first interview with a British newspaper

l Described fellow Brexiteer Boris Johnson as a ’generous hearted soul.’

Scots-born Mr Gove, on his first visit to the island, said: ’I think we gain an enormous amount from the CrownDependencies. They provide a fantastic base for people in professional and financial services. The good thing is the UK, the British constitution and the British way of working is pragmatic and flexible.

’And so the relationship the Crown Dependencies have with HMG is a model of how flexible approaches and pragmatic ways of working can be to everybody’s benefit.

’And I think it is right that the Isle of Man retains its historic autonomy to shape policy in the interests of people who live and work here, but also that Britain can benefit from the close economic and constitutional ties that define the relationship.’

On Brexit and the Isle of Man’s place in that, the former Justice Secretary said : ’One of the things I will reflect upon if I am re-elected back to Westminster, is the position of the Crown Dependencies.

’I serve on the Brexit select committee and we heard evidence from the First Ministerof Gibraltar a while back. And one of the things I will suggest is that we do get representatives from the Crown Dependencies along in order to give some evidence in order to make sure we can make recommendations to the government.’

Asked if he would welcome a visit from Chief Minister Howard Quayle he replied: ’Oh definitely. I have to be careful because it is the chairman who issues the invitation . . . but I would suggest absolutely that we invite the Chief Minister. [before the committee]

’And I would also suggest that separately at the same time we also invite representatives from the Channel Islands and I will stress the vital importance of making sure that we gain evidence and provide people with the platform to do it.’

Mr Gove said there is a long standing level of autonomy and independence that the Crown Dependencies have.

’It is clear to me that the Isle of Man and other Crown dependencies have the very, very highest standards of compliance in international and other regulation in order to ensure that they are places where business people can operate in an atmosphere of total trust and reassurance.’

Mr Gove said the island was in an ’admirably strong position.

’When I was Lord Chancellor I had responsibiity for Crown Dependencies. It devolved on to a really able minister called Lord Edward Faulks [Justice Minister]. One of the good things that Edward always assured me was that he was impressed with the governance of the Crown Dependencies.

’He thought they set a very high standard.’

Mr Gove said that while the island is diverse in business ’one of the nice things is that it still has a very strong community feeling to it.

’Therefore there is a sense that the chief minister, members of the House of Keys are answerable and accountable.

’They are the people that you might see in Marks and Spencer or chat to in the street in order to get your point of view across.’

approachable

Mr Gove said: ’The principle that politicians should be as approachable and accountable as possible, I completely agree with.

’Talking to friends who have lived here it’s one of the charms of the island.’

Mr Gove said that while it was his first visit to the island he now would love to return with his wife and children.

He said it was only because of a firm commitment in his UK constituency [he has been Conservative MP in Surrey Heath since 2005] that he could not stay for longer.

Mr Gove was in the island as the guest of the Isle of Man Sporting and Dining Club at a black tie dinner at the Palace Hotel and Casino.

He spoke to Business News earlier in the afternoon from the offices of international law firm Cains after flying in from London City airport.

He had just been speaking over the phone with one of the editors of The Times discussing his weekly column which he had filed a short time earlier for publication in Friday’s paper.

Mr Gove contested the Tory leadership contest last year following David Cameron’s resignation after the Brexit result. Asked if he would ever consider standing again to be leader in the future he said: ’No. I’ve been there, done that, so [the answer is] no.

’None of us know what the future will hold.’

minister

He said he enjoyed being a minister but most people who entered parliament knew the chances of being a minister are slim.

’I’m very lucky, I get to write in the newspapers, to be on a fascinating committee and get to champion some of the causes I believe in, so it’s a great privilege.

’From my point of view being a minister was an amazing privilege but it was a bonus on top of being an MP.’

Talking about Brexit the long-standing Eurosceptic said that overall he regretted nothing.

Mr Gove said he ’was as surprised as anyone’ when the Prime Minister Mrs May announced the general election last week.

tube

’I was travelling on the Tube when I heard there was going to be a press conference. My wife [Daily Mail columnist Sarah Vine] rang me and asked: ’’what’s going on?’’

’So I then arrived at the House of Commons and I was at my desk watching the television when the formal announcement was made.’

Asked if he wished it might have been him standing there in Downing Street he said: ’I think probably what is best for me and certainly what is best for the country is that I lost.

’I think so because I decided to run on the basis that I thought there should be someone who had argued for and believed in leaving [the EU] as prime minister.

’David Cameron himself had resigned on the basis that he had argued for remaining and he felt we needed some one else to take us in this different direction.

’But actually I think it has been a good thing that Theresa has been someone who understood the Remain position, endorsed it, but also wants as a public servant to respect the Brexit vote.’

right person

He believes that Theresa May was the right person for the role of prime minister.

Mr Gove said we know broadly what the shape of Brexit will be and he discounted the idea of it being ’hard’ or ’soft’.

’I can understand why people use the phrase hard or soft. but I prefer to use the phrase ’’clean’’ [Brexit].

’The Prime Minister wants a clean and orderly Brexit and this is what an election victory would give her, the time and the space to do that.’

Mr Gove said he was pleased with the recent economic news which, he said, was reassuring and went against the fears of the Remainers that the economic future would be ’bleak.’

He felt that in the interests of democracy : ’we have done the right thing.’

Mr Gove was asked by Business News about the argument among many that the Brexit issue has caused divisive splits and that there will less time to work on other issues that concern Britain.

Mr Gove replied that by saying that leaving Europe we will in due course be reducing the amount of time spent in dealing with bureaucracy and European law.

’Secondly, you are absolutely right, this has divided opinions.

’But I get the sense, and this is a point Theresa made herself, that in the country more and more people, Remainers and Leavers together, [feel]let’s get on with it.

’And in the Conservative Party people are thinking : ’’Let’s make a success of it, let’s get behind the approach Theresa is taking.’

divisions

Mr Gove agreed the referendum campaign did lead to ’some stresses and divisions in communities across the country. [But] I think now we are moving into a new phase.’

He described Theresa May as a ’sensible prime minister.’

But he stressed that in general elections - the UK goes to the polls on June 8 - nobody should ever be complacent about what the result might be.

Business News asked about UKIP’s Nigel Farage, who had also been one of the main campaigners for Brexit.

’I haven’t spoken to him for a while now actually.

’We disagree about a fair amount but I have got respect for him.

’He’s in a different party but I think it’s best to be warm and respectful, if you can, towards people in other parties.’

Asked if he is on talking terms with Boris Johnson he said he had enjoyed a ’few words of gentle banter’ with Mr Johnson in the House of Commons only the day before during the vote on holding the general election.

Last year Mr Gove had decided to stand for PM after previously apparently backing Mr Johnson’s bid to be leader. He faced criticism for this action.

Mr Gove agreed it had been a ’difficult, highly charged’ period last year.

Of Boris Johnson, who is now the foreign secretary he said: ’He’s a generous hearted soul.’

Mr Gove revealed that on the night of the referendum he had ’gone to bed at 10.30pm thinking we had lost’ only to be woken up at 4.30 am by a phone call from someone saying they had won.

’I could not quite believe it,’ he admitted.

trump

Mr Gove secured a scoop when he was the first person representing an English newspaper, The Times, to gain an interview with Donald Trump after winning the presidential election.

Mr Trump has been in power for 100 days this week.

’I think he has been more conventional in republican terms than people might have imagined.

’So whether we think it is a bad thing or a good thing for him to have done what he did over Syria, nevertheless it’s more inthe mould of what you would have thought a Reagan or an Eisenhower might have done in a similar situation.’

Mr Gove said ’there are bad guys out there’ . . . ’people who have contempt for their own people and who are ruthless dictators, so whoever is American president, you are also the leader of the free world by default, [who] has to deal with those problems, and of course it is worrying whenyou have countries using chemical weapons and seeking to develop nuclear missiles.

’The thing that I find reassuring is that some of the people Trump has chosen to advise him are military men.

’It is a mistake to think military men are automatically warlike.

’The whole point of serving in the military is you realise how horrific conflict can be.

’But they are able to bring to bear authority and knowledge to work out what the best ways are of dealing with these threats.’

He had not seen Mr Trump again since the interview.

Michael Gove is standing for re-election in the forthcoming UK election