Boris Johnson and Michael Gove should be imprisoned for "lies" they told during the Brexit referendum campaign, Alan Sugar has said.

The businessman and host of The Apprentice said the leading Brexiteers should face criminal action for claiming there would be £350m more to spend on the NHS after Brexit.

He suggested the result of the Brexit referendum should be declared "void" because the public had been "totally misled" by anti-EU campaigners.

Speaking during a House of Lords debate on a second Brexit referendum, Lord Sugar, who sits as a crossbench peer after quitting the Labour Party, initially said a fresh vote would be a "complete farce".

But referring to the 2016 poll, he added: "However, there is a very good argument to void that vote if it can be concluded that the public were totally misled and it is my belief that a large section of the British public were misled, informing their decision to vote to leave."

Describing the business world "where all comments and forecasts ... had to be scrutinised line by line by auditors and lawyers in a very tough due diligence and verification process", he said similar standards should be applied to politicians.

Dominic Raab raises fears of no-deal Brexit, blaming EU's negotiating stance

He said: "No such process exists for claims politicians make.

"In some cases misleading shareholders had resulted in prosecution, imprisonment.

"Applying the public company principle, it should follow that those people who will be responsible for putting this country into five to 10 years of post-Brexit turmoil based on lies should be in prison or at least prosecuted.

"Such as Boris Johnson and Michael Gove for the £350m lie they put on the red bus."

During the campaign, the Vote Leave group toured the country in a bus emblazoned with the words: "We send the EU £350m a week. Let's fund our NHS instead."

Britain before Brexit: East of England Show all 13 1 /13 Britain before Brexit: East of England Britain before Brexit: East of England Norwich A couple and their dog relax by the Cathedral’s Labyrinth. I am charmed by the arrangement of their bodies and the shapes in which they are bonding. I realise the contemporary significance of the scene: the labyrinth - a complicated, irregular network of passages in which it is difficult to find one’s way - alongside the simplicity and closeness of human togetherness. In any complicated maze-like structure - Brexit included - it is important to remember that people and love and relationships are a vital part of the picture. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Luton A construction worker assembles metal barriers for an art event. He looks towards an off-licence boasting to be pure 100% Moldovan. The lady inside isn’t returning the gaze, but stares inwards, onto the surface of her selfie, her narcissism being by far the most interesting thing in the shop window. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Luton Walking back into town from Leagrave High Street I notice two graffitied propaganda messages: ‘Free Gaza’ and ‘Beverly is a black cow’. Here are but two voices, I think, in the crazy cacophony of contemporary British discourse, of the British tongue, fractured as it is into accents, splintered by slangs, torn, in this case, into the libertarian and abusive, one dehumanising, one for freedom. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Cambridge University students hold a flash protest against the low pay of McDonald’s employees. They receive tuts, cheers, insults, whoops, raised eyebrows. People enter the restaurant in any case, unaware or uncaring that they have crossed a picket line. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Norwich I went to look inside the Catholic Cathedral during Mass. I wanted to see the ritual and the practices, the people and their poses. There is a rich spectrum of visual dimensions to Catholic prayer that I first noticed when photographing in Poland. I’m attracted to its ambivalence: solemn and joyous; lonely in dialogue; desperate but determined; solitary yet complete. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Great Yarmouth Posters from the town’s glory days surround the Winter Gardens as it rusts and becomes overgrown. It seems like an intentional act to rekindle nostalgia in the face of disrepair, to balance the present with representations of the past. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Norwich At the back of the central market hang three representations of conflict, side-by-side, connected, making sense in relation to one another. Only one message can be worn at any one time, but together they narrate a powerful image of modern Britain: a unified group, a club, an undefeated nation facing an existential threat from its enemies. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Luton People set up posts outside the train station, asking the town’s new arrivals for various things: religious missionaries seek attention and commitment; a person sleeping rough asks for food and spare change. I’m interested in how this affects the visual experience of arriving in Luton and what the religious and the homeless look like when viewed in the same frame. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Cambridge A concoction of interests outside King’s College: a tourist desperately hailing lost members of the group; a shopper takes a break from the high street; a man sits to read; a woman meditates with her identity concealed. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Luton A family emerges from the colours of Leagrave High Street. Twins sit and stare, identically, scrutinising me, like their father, perhaps. They are framed by rails of clothes. Mannequins exaggerate their life. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Luton A pop-up employment workshop opens for business in the town centre. The sign is heavily loaded with the values of modern Britain: one must aspire to achieve, earn, and live; acquiring skills is akin to personal development; the prioritisation of the ‘local’. A lady carrying water on a scooter - unconventionally, comically, skilfully - appears as a strange detail of everyday life passing such lofty visions. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Great Yarmouth The Britannia Monument celebrates Horatio Nelson’s life. An acrobat fell from the top and died in 1863. It remains a mystery, a travesty for some, that Britannia - the monument’s embodiment of the nation - has her back to the sea. These days she turns her back on a single one-man tent too, a home, a shelter erected on the shore. Richard Morgan/The Independent Britain before Brexit: East of England Great Yarmouth This was the last scene I saw in the town. I was leaving. I thought of how child’s play, in its innocence and vitality, continues amidst our hunched, phone-tapping adolescence and adulthood. Richard Morgan/The Independent

The figure has been comprehensively debunked, including by the UK's statistics watchdog.

Lord Sugar also revealed he had turned down an invitation from then prime minister David Cameron to argue for the Remain side in a televised debate prior to the referendum – a decision he said he continues to "kick" himself for rejecting.

During the Lords debate, peers from across the House spoke out in support for a Final Say referendum on whatever deal Theresa May negotiates with Brussels.

Tory peer Baroness Wheatcroft said another public vote was needed.