With all his guff and buffoonery, Boris knows he’s putting UK outside the Pale over Protocol
WE became bored with Brexit a long time ago. And yet, courtesy of British prime minister Boris Johnson – the living embodiment of a privileged man who expects to be able to have his cake and eat it – we keep getting dragged back into the potentially dangerous consequences for Ireland of the United Kingdom’s exit from the EU.
Back in late 2019, Johnson did a deal with Ireland (through Leo Varadkar at a meeting in England), and then the EU, on the terms of the UK’s withdrawal from the EU. Now he wants to renege on it. If only it was that simple. Johnson either didn’t understand what he agreed, signed and campaigned on as ‘an oven-ready deal’ when he fought the UK general election subsequently in December 2019, or he did. If it’s the latter – as is almost certainly the case – then he entered the agreement with Ireland and the EU in rank bad faith, planning to ditch it when it suited him to do so. This week, Johnson told an interviewer that ‘I hoped and believed our friends (the EU) would not necessarily want to apply it’.
Such glibness and disingenuous is characteristic of one of the biggest chancers to ever have taken public office in the UK. It is part of the usual distraction tactics beloved of the Tories and Johnson in particular. Instead of allowing their supporters to focus on their government’s failures and deceptions, the EU is being used yet again as a bogeyman. The EU gets the blame for apparently being ‘unreasonable’ and for trying to ‘punish’ the Brits for ‘re-establishing’ a sovereignty that had never been denied to it by membership of the EU in the first place.
What’s at issue here is straightforward. The UK’s withdrawal deal from the EU involved a measure called the Northern Ireland Protocol. This effectively allowed the six counties to remain within the single market and customs union of the EU while the rest of the UK deliberately set itself outside those entities. This meant that, in the absence of other arrangements, border checks would have to be imposed on goods and services passing between the UK and the EU. That obvious place would be on this island, which would result in long delays for people crossing what is an open, frictionless border at present. But everyone agreed an alternative had to be found to prevent a return of the former manned border on this island.
Instead, the ‘border’ for goods was placed in the Irish Sea, one that Johnson had promised previously would happen ‘over my dead body’. Everyone warned that this would create its own practical issues with the transfer of goods between Britain and the North. It would also create issues of political symbolism for Unionists. Nothing of what is happening now was unforeseen. It was spelt out in detail. But, nonetheless, Johnson pushed ahead hard for it. He created this arrangement and now he wants to walk away from it.
Well, not quite walk away it now seems. He and his ministers, such as Liz Truss and before her the risible David Frost, have engaged in sabrerattling for many months but have drawn back each time from threats to unilaterally disregard the signed agreement or to bring in legislation to override it. They know that to do that risks retaliation from the EU that would, in effect, bring about a trade war, one that a struggling UK economy does not need. Instead, they talk of changing some of the rules, even though that in itself would be provocative to the EU.
The EU’s concern should be that Johnson might actually fancy a trade war, despite the economic carnage it would inflict on the UK. The UK is already suffering significant self-inflicted economic damage because of Brexit but a trade war could provide cover for that, a rallying of patriotic spirit, even if in the most spurious of circumstances.
At present, Johnson wants to ‘re-engage in dialogue’. That’s fine in theory – if a contract is found to be unenforceable then it makes sense for the two sides to renegotiate.
However, the Protocol is actually working as anticipated and it is not doing economic damage to the North. Quite the contrary, the six counties are having a much better Brexit than Britain because of its access to the Single Market, something Johnson does not want to concede or have his voters notice.
The EU has no reason to concede ground on something it negotiated in good faith little more than two years ago – having already offered a variety of deals to the British government. And there is a serious trust issue at play here. Given that Johnson has shown himself to be so untrustworthy, how can the EU believe he and the UK would adhere to any renegotiated terms?
In some respects Johnson’s position is baffling. If he is shown to have so little regard for the biggest trade deal he has signed, with the EU on leaving the Single Market, then how can all the other countries now negotiating their own deals with the UK have any confidence in it adhering to those terms?
Everything that Johnson does seems to be tactical rather than strategic, based on short-term advantages rather than longterm consequences. He often makes it up as he goes along – just as how in 2015, when it came to making up his mind as to which side to support in the Brexit referendum, he wrote two lengthy articles, one for each side – before plumping for leave, almost certainly not out of conviction but because it suited his political ambition better. He is also reluctant to ever accept responsibility for his own actions or failings.
The DUP in the North, belatedly, is deeply suspicious of Johnson’s motives and actions but, as usual, is being played by him, seemingly believing that, this time, he will deliver on what he promises. Already, however, he is backsliding. Does the DUP ever learn?
How Johnson has gone about this all in recent weeks is shameful and not benefiting a nation that takes itself seriously. His constant citing of the need to protect the Good Friday Agreement
EU’s concern should be that he might fancy a trade war
Johnson spoke in clichés and drove Martin to distraction
is cynical gaslighting. His claim in one TV interview this week that all of the main five political parties want the Protocol changed because it is not working properly is demonstrably false. Suddenly, the position of those who are in the minority on the Protocol is being given superiority to the majority wishes, just as the fact that a majority in the North were against Brexit is overlooked conveniently by him. This is all relevant to the relationship too between the UK and Ireland. It was reported in recent days that a telephone conversation between Taoiseach Micheál Martin and Johnson last week was the most difficult between people in their positions since the days of the Falklands crisis of 1982 when Charles Haughey and Margaret Thatcher went head-to-head. Johnson, according to multiple reports, spoke in clichés and generalities and drove Martin to near distraction with his nonsense. Britain is our nearest neighbour but has not always been a good one. Over the last 30 years, relationships have been repaired through goodwill and honesty being shown by both parties. Shame on Johnson for putting this all at risk. Unfortunately, though, the bounder is shameless.