Belfast

 

Yesterday afternoon Owen Paterson MP, former Sec of State for NI, published his warnings in the paywalled DT. The title and the summary speak for themselves: “Trapping Northern Ireland in the EU’s Customs Union would catastrophically undermine the Good Friday Agreement – It would fundamentally alter Northern Ireland’s constitutional status” (paywalled link)

His arguments, based on his own experience, shed a necessary light on the pitfalls of this ‘Agreement’. He gives a brief background on that ‘Liverpool Talk’, before warning of the real danger:

“There is still, however, a danger that lurking beneath the warm words is a plan from the EU and the Republic of Ireland to keep Northern Ireland permanently in the Customs Union. There is a risk that Martin Selmayr’s view that Northern Ireland should be the price the UK pays for Brexit continues to prevail. 

In any context, this would be an intolerable situation, yoking ourselves to a failing customs union, when some 90% of global growth in the next few decades will be outside the EU. Sovereign nations simply do not cede parts of their territory to the control of foreign powers as part of trading negotiations. Such an outcome would be correctly characterised as an abject surrender. 

But in the context of Northern Ireland, it would be even worse. 85 per cent of sales by Northern Irish companies are in the UK. Just 5 per cent are with the Republic and around 3 per cent with the rest of the EU. It would be absurd to penalise Northern Ireland with EU costs and overbearing regulations for such a small proportion of trade, leaving it unable to take advantage of new UK trade deals.” (paywalled link)

Paterson emphasises the danger to the GFA in the next paragraphs. The points he raises deserve serious thought:

“It would also be a flagrant breach of the Belfast Agreement, also known as the Good Friday Agreement. Leaving the EU is not, inherently, in conflict with the Agreement, as has been tested in both UK and Irish courts. Yet Brussels and Dublin – incorrectly and self-appointed sole arbiters – have often pointed out that a “hard border” would breach it. This has been gleefully lapped up by Remainers, but such arguments were always based on a crude caricature of the situation. No one has ever been arguing in favour of a “hard” border. No one has ever explained who would build such a thing. It has certainly never been an undertaking of the British Government. It would be completely undesirable, unnecessary and practically impossible. 

It would ride roughshod over one of the core tenets of the Belfast Agreement: The Principle of Consent. The Agreement commits both the British and Irish Governments to “recognise the legitimacy of whatever choice is freely exercised by a majority of the people of Northern Ireland with regard to its status” and subsequently states that “it would be wrong to make any change in the status of Northern Ireland save with the consent of a majority of its people.” (paywalled link)

He then brings details which, as he points out, seem to have slipped from the collective Remain minds:

“When the referendum was held on the Belfast Agreement in 1998, endorsing Northern Ireland’s status as an integral part of the UK, 71 per cent of voters supported it on an 81 per cent turnout. Polling in the years since has typically shown that between 55 and 70 per cent favour remaining in the UK as the long-term policy for Northern Ireland, with support for a united Ireland typically around 20-30 per cent. 

Northern Ireland being held in the Customs Union without Great Britain is an obvious breach of this commitment. It would fundamentally alter Northern Ireland’s constitutional status. No one in Northern Ireland would be able to vote for anyone who could introduce, amend or repeal any of these laws. Northern Ireland would, in effect, be governed from Dublin and Brussels without representation.

Such an outcome would be clearly unacceptable, and would store up problems in Northern Ireland long after Brexit is resolved. 

That should be a serious wake-up call. Much lip service has been paid to the Belfast Agreement during the Brexit debate, but no one should be in any doubt that trapping Northern Ireland in the Customs Union would catastrophically undermine it.” (paywalled link)

That, right there, is where the problem is, a problem which the EU simply does not acknowledge, in spite of their pious words. Paterson concludes by asking the more general question which the EU so far hasn’t answered:

“The EU have been offered a practical basis for arrangements to ensure seamless trade across the border by a British Government committed to upholding the Belfast Agreement, to continuing co-operation with the EU and the Irish Government and to giving a proper say to the people of Northern Ireland over their future 

There ought to be no reason that the EU could not engage with such proposals constructively. If they are obstinate now, they will demonstrate that their increasingly radicalised fervour for the project of “ever closer union” overrides all other considerations. The EU needs to decide, urgently, whether it actually wants to develop “a special relationship with neighbouring countries, aiming to establish an area of prosperity and good neighbourliness” as its own Treaty demands. If it does, then a Free Trade Agreement – as the Prime Minister has suggested – is the obvious solution in the best interests of all sides.” (paywalled link)

Well, given that Ms Merkel has told Johnson what to do, given the intransigence of Barnier, and given the sadly successful attempts by the EU during those years of Brexit negotiations to ‘weaponise’ the NI question I think it’s fair to say that an answer from the EU won’t be forthcoming.

 

 

Photo by TS Drown

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