PM’s Ulster allies issue customs union threat

DEMOCRATIC Unionists will bring down the Government if Northern Ireland is forced to stay in a customs union after Brexit, the party warned last night.

Theresa May’s governing partners said that leaving the customs union with the rest of the UK was an ‘absolute red line’.

Nigel Dodds, leader of the DUP in Westminster, said his party could never accept a deal that led to Northern Ireland being treated differently from the rest of Britain.

He told the Conservative Home website: ‘If, as a result of the Brexit negotiations, there was to be any suggestion that Northern Ireland would be treated differently – in a way for instance that we were part of a customs union and a single market and the rest of the UK wasn’t – for us that would be a red line, which we would vote against the Government, because you might as well have a Corbyn government pursuing openly its anti-Unionist policies as have a Conservative government doing it by a different means.’

Mr Dodds said there were forces in Dublin, Brussels and Westminster trying to exploit the Irish border issue to ‘thwart Brexit’.

His intervention came as diehard Conservative Remainers prepared to use a Commons vote today to try to bounce the Government into keeping Britain in the customs union.

At least ten Tory MPs are expected to back a motion calling on the Government to make staying in a customs union with the EU ‘an objective in negotiations’ with Brussels. But the Prime Min- ister yesterday faced a series of calls from senior Tories to stick to her pledge to take the UK out of the customs union.

Commons leader Andrea Leadsom said it would be ‘ludicrous to be in a customs union’ after Brexit because it would rob Britain of the ability to strike new trade deals.