Nationalists hope Covid-19 will derail Brexit ... unionists shouldn’t make their job easier by opposing customs checks that hardly anyone will notice
Unless they’re careful, they could end up doing more damage to the Union by seeking to undo the protocol than could ever be done by the protocol itself, writes Eilis O’hanlon
The last thing Northern Ireland needs right now is another row about Brexit. One of the few reassuring things about Covid-19 is that it’s reminded people of what really matters. In the words of Nana Akufo-addo, president of the Republic of Ghana: “We know how to bring the economy back to life. What we do not know is how to bring people back to life.” The same goes for Brexit.
Most problems associated with leaving the EU are fixable, with good will. What we don’t know is how to put the Humpty Dumpty of normal politics in Northern Ireland together again if petty squabbles over what customs arrangements should be in place next year are allowed to drag us right back to square one.
Some unionists appear to want to risk it, anyway, after the British Government finally conceded that Northern Ireland would, in certain regards, be treated differently than the rest of the UK once the transition period ends.
TUV leader Jim Allister has described it as a “betrayal of the highest order”. Loyalist campaigner Jamie Bryson has called for a “combined political unionist strategy to impede, undermine and frustrate all efforts to implement any part of the protocol”.
Frustration is understandable. No one likes being made to feel like a fool. Boris Johnson wooed unionists with honeyed words about how they needn’t fret about new checks.
The Prime Minister must have known he was bending the truth, to say the very least. It’s not an admirable quality in him and makes you wonder what else he’s been less than truthful about.
Nonetheless, this isn’t the time for unionists to throw their toys out of the pram.
The language of betrayal, whether of the highest or even a lower order, rarely helps. It’s even less helpful at a time when unionists have lost what leverage they had over the Government at Westminster.
If they’re not careful, they could end up doing more damage to the Union by seeking to undo the controversial protocol than could ever be done by the protocol itself. Ultimately, does it really matter all that much?
Answering questions before the Oireachtas finance committee last January, the chairman of the board of the Irish Revenue Commissioners, Niall Cody, confirmed that less than 6% of imports from non-eu countries were checked as it is and less than 2% were checked physically.
The number of such checks between the UK and the Republic post-brexit were expected to be correspondingly less frequent even than that. Niall Cody’s remarks were warmly welcomed at the time in the Daily Telegraph.
“The idea that issues cannot be solved is demonstrably untrue,” it was noted. “There are no insurmountable technological problems, only, thus far, political ones.” The co-author of that piece was Sammy Wilson of the DUP.
Nothing has changed because of the new protocol. The idea that issues cannot be solved remains as demonstrably untrue as it ever was.
Even when one looks at the protocol more closely, it’s clear that there will only be some new checks on some goods, mainly agricultural produce, which was always bound to be the main sticking point for the EU.
“Some” seems shaky ground on which unionists should be making a last stand, especially when the Government is confident these can be implemented in a “pragmatic, proportionate way”.
Admittedly, there may not be much reason to believe a word that comes out of Downing Street right now, but what did pro-brexit unionists honestly expect to happen when the country left the EU?
Northern Ireland was bound to be in a uniquely vulnerable position after Brexit, as the only part of the UK with an EU land border. Imaginative ways of working around that awkward reality were always going to be needed.
❝ PM wooed unionists with honeyed words about how they needn’t fret about new checks
For the most strident critics of the protocol, such as Jim Allister, the new arrangements are effectively the same as staying inside the customs union and they’re quoting chapter and verse from detailed clauses in the documents to prove their point.
Most people in Northern Ireland, weary of Brexit and worn down further by the coronavirus battle, would, surely, still rather wait and see what happens in practice, rather than jumping the gun?
The harsh truth for opponents of the protocol is that there’s little they can do about it either way.
Jamie Bryson might loudly urge unionists to come together to “impede, undermine and frustrate” implementation of the deal, but short of street protests and blockades, which would be counterproductive politically and economically, they’re powerless to stop new checks being imposed.
Do these branches of the unionist family seriously believe, as they claim to do, that those customs checks would be better taking place at the Irish border?
That may, constitutionally speaking, be the proper etiquette, but putting up border posts again would only serve to undermine, rather than cement, Northern Ireland’s long-term place in the UK.
They’d be a constant reminder to nationalists that the only way to remove the hated infrastructure would be to vote for unity.
The pressure for a border poll would mount, destabilising Stormont, and all to get rid of a few customs checks which are done overwhelmingly online with the click of a keyboard.
An invisible border on the island helps unionism. Why take unnecessary risks with it just to avoid an equally invisible customs border in the Irish Sea? Realistic compromises are invariably better than ideological purity.
Pragmatists in the DUP appear to be aware of that and are keeping their powder dry for the time being. With an 80-seat majority, the Tory Government is going nowhere soon.
Even if they could see off Boris, his likely replacement is Chancellor Rishi Sunak, a man who was recently reported to have little enthusiasm privately for the ruinous expense of maintaining the Union, when the other members show so little gratitude for the financial benefits they derive from being tied to England.
He denied saying any such thing, but then he would, wouldn’t he?
All unionists will accomplish by stamping their feet and making a nuisance of themselves over the protocol is to increase the desire in London to be rid of their bothersome cousins on the fringes altogether, as well as alienating nationalists in Northern Ireland for whom the ability to move without impediment around the island is symbolically non-negotiable.
Nationalists are already using the current Covid-19 crisis to push for Brexit to be postponed, presumably in the hope that it can be stopped altogether.
Unionists shouldn’t be making their job easier by picking an unwinnable fight over customs checks that most of us will never even know exist anyway.
❝ An invisible border on the island helps unionism ... pragmatists in the DUP appear to be aware of that