Sir Vince Cable – the likely next Lib Dem leader – says he is “beginning to think Brexit may never happen”.

He said “enormous” divisions in the Labour and the Tory parties and a “deteriorating” economy would make people think again.

“People will realise that we didn’t vote to be poorer, and I think the whole question of continued membership will once again arise,” he said.

He was speaking on the BBC’s Andrew Marr show.

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His comments were dismissed by leading Eurosceptic Conservative MP Owen Paterson, who said Sir Vince was just “chucking buckets of water around” and ignoring the “huge vote” in favour of leaving in the referendum and at the general election, where the two main parties backed Brexit.

“Vince Cable’s party went down in votes, as did the other little parties who want to stay in the European Union,” he told the BBC’s Sunday Politics.

He added: “I am afraid Vince is behind history. We are going to leave. We are on target.”

Sir Vince conceded that the Lib Dem policy on a second referendum on the terms of a Brexit deal “didn’t really cut through in the general election”.

But he said it could offer voters “a way out when it becomes clear the Brexit is potentially disastrous”.