Lord Rose: My pro-EU crusade was a train crash

( Luckily he can console himself ) with lover 32 years his junior

EVER since his rather disastrous crusade to keep Britain in the European Union, former Marks & Spencer boss Stuart Rose has been skulking in the shadows.

But now, for the first time since the referendum result in June, the businessman has emerged on the social scene — and he cuts a much chastened figure.

‘The whole thing was all a disaster. It was a train crash,’ Lord Rose tells me. ‘It was a train crash politically, it was a train crash personally — it was a train crash in every sense.

‘But what can you do? It was a hard summer, but it just shows that businessmen should never mix with politicians and vice versa.’

The 67-year-old, who was executive chairman of M& S for two years before stepping down in 2010, made his first foray back into society at the Fortnum’s X Frank private view at Fortnum & Mason in Piccadilly.

‘Things are going to get tougher because people didn’t really think through the consequences of what they’ve done,’ he adds.

‘But you know, it’s democracy, it’s what the country voted for and the Government now is in charge of getting done what they said they’d do.’

Rose’s stint leading the Britain Stronger In Europe campaign was not a smooth ride, following a series of poor media performances.

After forgetting the name of his own campaign group four times, he scored an own goal when he claimed, to the delight of Brexiteers, that wages would go up if Britain left the EU.

But the failings to which he now frankly admits have not been suffered alone, for he has been seeking solace in the arms of his latest girlfriend, 35-year- old investment banker Anna Hartropp, who remained by his side throughout the evening.

The couple, who have been dating for at least a year, met while she was at M&S as investor relations manager for nine months in 2010 — the same year he got divorced from his wife of 37 years, Jennifer Cook, with whom he has a son and a daughter.

And it would appear he has a soft spot for sprightly blondes — he earlier had an on- off affair with Tatler magazine editor Kate Reardon while he was estranged from his then-wife.