Scrapping NI Protocol will spark wave of red tape, warn farmers
PLANS to rip up the Northern Ireland Protocol risk triggering a wave of red tape and costing the region’s unfettered access to the EU’S single market, farmers and manufacturers have warned.
The Government argues its legislation will spare businesses trading between Britain and Northern Ireland unnecessary border checks and administration.
But manufacturing chiefs and farmers have said that plans for a dual regulatory system, where Northern Irish producers choose whether to follow UK or EU standards, would increase paperwork instead.
The Bill risked new barriers to trade with neighbouring Ireland and the rest of the EU, which would affect an estimated quarter of all its trade, they added.
Stephen Kelly, chief executive of Manufacturing NI, the trade body, said it would “add significantly to the burden on businesses” in both Northern Ireland and Great Britain. “When you get into the area of dual regulatory regime we could see at best a chilling and likely a complete exclusion from markets leaving NI in a worse position than GB,” he said.
Northern Irish exports to the rest of the UK face no checks under the legislation. However, if the Bill becomes law, British goods entering Northern Ireland would still face checks if goods were at risk of entering EU territory.
Northern Ireland continues to follow some EU rules and border checks are carried out on British goods entering the province. The Protocol checks ensure goods meet Brussels’ standards and prevent a hard Irish border with EU member Ireland.
Declan Billington, chief executive of John Thompson and Sons, an animal feed manufacturer, said plans for a dual regulatory system could mean the EU introducing new certification and paperwork requirements on Northern Irish goods. “As a direct result we would have lost the unfettered access to Europe and the option of having the best of both worlds,” he said.
“For the UK to be successful in delivering on dual standards, it has to provide adequate assurance to Europe that nothing illegal will cross the border into Ireland and Europe.
“It is hard to see that goods in free circulation traded multiple times between businesses could be prevented from crossing the border if there’s a financial incentive to do so.”
An EU official said a dual regulatory regime would be “completely unworkable” and pose “significant risk” to the single market.
Mike Johnston, chief executive of the Dairy Council for Northern Ireland, said changes to the Protocol risked disrupting the country’s milk trade.
He said: “About a third of our raw milk, maybe 800m litres a year, moves into the Republic of Ireland for processing. The Protocol is enabling those trade flows to continue. It is not perfect but we don’t want any damage to what we have at the moment as it is working.”