The former UK chancellor George Osborne said delaying Brexit is “most likely” and that the possibility of a no-deal Brexit is playing Russian roulette with the economy.

Osborne, now the editor of London’s Evening Standard newspaper amongst nine jobs taken since leaving parliament, said in an interview at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that crashing out of the bloc without a deal in place meant “the gun is held to the British economy’s head.”

“Russian roulette is a game which you should never play because there’s a one-in-six chance that the bullet goes into your head,” he added.

Osborne was a MP for Tatton from June 2001 until he stood down and left parliament on 3 May 2017. He was Britain’s chancellor under prime minister David Cameron from 2010 to 2016, who both led the country into the referendum. Both he and Cameron were staunch supporters of remaining in the EU but had promised to allow the people to vote on whether Britain should leave the EU due to the rise in anti-EU sentiment stemming from factions of their Conservative party and voters moving to the UK Independence Party (UKIP).

Osborne has joined a chorus of politicians and independent experts that believe Brexit is likely to be delayed by extending Article 50 —the official notification that Britain would leave the EU and thereby starting a two-year process to discuss a deal — beyond 29 March 2019.

Last week, prime minister Theresa May suffered a devastating defeat to push through her Brexit deal in parliament. However, the following day, her government survived a no-confidence vote, meaning whilst no-one liked her deal, most were keen to keep her and her cabinet in power to get a deal done.

The problem is that this doesn’t resolve the political deadlock and that time is running out to amend the deal, get an agreement with the EU over a different plan, and pass it through parliament.

Over the last two days, May has tried to win over support from Tory Brexiteer politicians and Northern Ireland’s DUP, who lend support to her government to push through her proposals, by changing or amending “backstop” plans for the Irish border. That backstop plan is an “insurance policy” in the Brexit deal that is intended to confirm that there will be no return to a visible border between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic after Britain leaves the EU.