Lord Sugar has resigned from the Labour Party saying he was disillusioned with its “anti-enterprise” policies.

The business tycoon, who has been associated with the party for 18 years, resigned after Labour’s general election defeat on Friday.

The peer served as Enterprise Champion under former Prime Minister Gordon Brown, announced his resignation on Monday after becoming disillusioned with the party’s “negative business policies and the general anti-enterprise concepts”.

He said: “I informed the party on Friday of my decision to resign which they accepted as they had been aware of my disillusionment for some time.

“In the past year, I found myself losing confidence in the party due to their negative business policies and the general anti-enterprise concepts – I expressed this to the most senior figures in the party several times.”

Lord Sugar said he intended to resign ahead of the election, but did not want to damage the party’s chances by attracting media attention.

He continued: “I am a loyal person. I decided as a relatively high-profile individual to keep my intentions quiet for the duration of the campaign.

“I have declined hundreds of media requests to talk about the proposed policies of the party, particularly in relation to business, and instead opted to remain quiet. I have no wish to stick the boot into the party.”

Lord Sugar said he would continue to represent business and enterprise interests as a crossbench peer.