Boris ‘could axe Northern Ireland deal as early as next week’
BORIS Johnson is preparing to face down Brussels and tear up parts of the post-Brexit deal on Northern Ireland as early as next week.
After months of failed negotiations, the Prime Minister is set to override the hated Protocol as ministers seek to resolve the Stormont crisis.
Sources confirmed that the Government has drawn up legislation to unilaterally suspend all border checks on goods flowing from Great Britain to Northern Ireland.
They said Mr Johnson could rip up parts of the agreement next week – but insisted no final decisions have been taken.
The new bill, if passed, would also allow businesses in Northern Ireland to disregard EU rules and regulations. Ministers are under fresh pressure to resolve issues with the Protocol following last week’s historic elections in which Sinn Fein became Stormont’s largest party.
The republican party can now nominate a First Minister – but the rival DUP must nominate a deputy to serve alongside in the joint office. However, the unionist party has vowed to continue its boycott of the executive until ‘decisive action’ is taken on the Protocol by the UK Government. The Protocol was negotiated to avoid a hard border with Ireland, by effectively keeping Northern Ireland in the EU’s single market for goods.
But unionists have been pushing for it to be scrapped because of the trade barriers it has created on products crossing the Irish Sea from Great Britain.
DUP leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson yesterday urged Mr Johnson to ‘act to safeguard the political institutions in Northern Ireland’ and to ‘safeguard the political process’.
The PM acknowledged that the situation with the Protocol is ‘now very serious’. He told his Irish counterpart Micheal Martin that the elections have ‘further demonstrated’ that the agreement is not ‘sustainable in its current form’ and is undermining Belfast’s peace deal.
Downing Street said Mr Johnson told the Irish premier that the ‘European Commission had not taken the steps necessary to help address the economic and political disruption on the ground’. But Brussels last night insisted it would not renegotiate the agreement. European Commission vice president Maros Sefcovic said solutions ‘can be found without changing the Protocol’, adding: ‘The Protocol, as a cornerstone of the Withdrawal Agreement, is an international agreement. Its renegotiation is not an option.’
Irish deputy premier Leo Varadkar warned Mr Johnson against taking unilateral action on the Protocol, saying the UK has to ‘honour’ its obligations.
‘The people of Northern Ireland voted and they did not vote for a majority of MLAs [Members of the Legislative Assembly] who want the protocol to be scrapped. So the British Government has to have regard to that,’ he said.
Sinn Fein vice president Michelle O’Neill accused the Government of ‘pandering’ to the DUP, who she claimed are using people in Northern Ireland ‘as a pawn in their power play with the European Union’.
She said: ‘Honesty needs to be brought to the conversation: the Protocol is here to stay. Are there ways to smooth its implementation? Yes there are. Are we up for that? Yes.’ And former prime minister Theresa May also warned the PM against taking unilateral action.
She said the Government ‘needs to consider not just some immediate issues, but also the wider sense of what such a move would say about the UK and its willingness to abide by treaties which it has signed’.
But a Government source said: ‘Our focus has been, and will always be, preserving peace and stability in Northern Ireland. No decisions have yet been taken on the way forward, however the situation is now very serious.’
Meanwhile, Liz Truss attacked EU plans to address Protocol issues, which she said in some cases would ‘take us backwards’. The Foreign Secretary warned that its plans from October would worsen trading arrangements and lead to essentials disappearing from shelves.
Yesterday’s Queen’s Speech stopped short of pledging to take action on the Protocol, but contained a commitment to ‘take all steps necessary’ to protect Northern Ireland’s place in the UK internal market.
‘Agreement is not sustainable’