An historic lace manufacturer has said it faces being “killed off by our own side” thanks to levies brought about by Brexit.

In a letter published in the Financial Times that has since gone viral, Chris Mason, managing director of Derbyshire-based The Cluny Lace Company, says the taxman has imposed an 8% duty on the return of all the lace it has sent to France for dyeing.

He adds the levy has been backdated to when Brexit came into force two years ago.

In the letter, he writes: “We have spent more than 200 years building our business, fought for 30 years against the global textile trend of moving to the Far East and have now been killed off by our own side in a couple of years. We all lose.”

It was quickly seized upon on social media.

Dragons’ Den entrepreneur Deborah Meaden wrote: “Absolutely devastating…a pin sharp arrow to the futility and harm of leaving the EU…for so many businesses.”

Earlier this month, the government set out plans for how post-Brexit border checks on goods coming into the UK from the EU will work.

Ministers published a draft border operating model, designed to bring in the checks the UK is required to make under its Brexit trade agreement with the EU.

Ministers have delayed implementing the checks on several occasions since the UK officially withdrew from the trade bloc on January 31, 2020.