Good Friday Agreement: Impact of Brexit

Baroness Harris of Richmond Excerpts

Thursday 11th October 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Harris of Richmond (LD)]

My Lords, I too thank the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, for securing this debate on perhaps one of the most important consequences of Brexit. When we reflect now on the arguments that were made and the issues that were raised in the run-up to the referendum in 2016, it is astonishing how little attention was paid in the rest of the UK to the consequences for Northern Ireland.

I do not need to tell any of the noble Lords taking part in today’s debate about Northern Ireland’s history, nor about the sacrifices and compromises that were made in Northern Ireland, not just by politicians but by ordinary people, in order to secure the Good Friday agreement. That agreement largely brought to an end the full-scale sectarian violence that had blighted Northern Ireland for over 30 years. However, the aspirations that we had for Northern Ireland in 1998 are far from being achieved. Northern Ireland is still a deeply divided society. It is still a contested space, with different people having different constitutional aspirations. Notwithstanding all of the progress in the peace process, Northern Ireland continues to have a major fault line.

The agreement provided a balanced settlement with full recognition of the principle of consent for Northern Ireland’s constitutional status alongside partnership government and a complex set of interlocking relationships across these islands. This provided people with the ability to lead their lives and do business as they chose on a north-south and/or east-west basis. Combined with a commitment to human rights and equality alongside power sharing, this balance of relationships essentially took the heat out of the constitutional clash. While in a strict sense the Good Friday agreement was not dependent upon the continued membership of the UK or the Republic of Ireland of the European Union, it was the joint UK and Irish membership of the EU, in particular of the customs union and the single market, that facilitated the freedoms across the islands that people quickly took for granted.

Northern Ireland works only on the basis of sharing and interdependence, yet Brexit, in particular a hard Brexit, entails new divisions, barriers and friction. Brexit has placed the constitutional question back on the table, in contrast to a situation in which it had been largely parked between 1998 and 2016. Brexit itself, and any potential mitigation of it for Northern Ireland, has become largely polarised along identity lines and there is little space for pragmatic, consensual solutions to emerge. This is of course not helped by the collapse of the Northern Ireland Executive last year, as we have heard, along with the dependence of the Conservative Government on DUP votes in the Commons. It is worth noting that Northern Ireland’s economy has been held back by the legacy of division and violence. It significantly underperforms relative to other regions of the UK and the Republic of Ireland. A hard Brexit would compound this further.

However, the emergence of new border arrangements needs to be understood in more than just economic terms: borders are emotional and psychological. Any border down the Irish Sea would be seen by many as a fragmentation of the UK. In turn, as we have heard, any new border across the island of Ireland would be seen as a reversal of the gains of peace under the Good Friday agreement. Many people would see any checks, no matter how efficient or unobtrusive, as a step backwards. It is the symbolism of the checks themselves that is the issue. Brexit is an existential threat to the entire concept of a shared Northern Ireland. If a consensual approach cannot be found, we will return to the zero-sum approach to Northern Ireland that hampered the peace process for years. It is not hard to imagine the increasing frustration and alienation of the nationalist population, and indeed many others, in a hard Brexit UK, along with the return of siege-mentality unionist politics.

Finally, Brexit or a hard border will present challenges for all of our security agencies. They will be required to police a hard border along a 320-mile land border. Since 1998, the border has all but disappeared, with free, unfettered movement along with increased and positive interactivity between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. Brexit challenges that progress. The Chief Constable of the PSNI has already made the case for an additional 490 officers to fulfil the requirements associated with a hard border. They are needed in support of other agencies, including the NCA, Border Force and HM Customs and Excise. The PSNI is already 500 below the minimum the Chief Constable says he requires, so in effect the PSNI has a requirement for more than 900 additional officers. So far, there is little indication that the Government are preparing to give the PSNI the budget it needs to expand to a realistic level.

It is also worth bearing in mind that, during the Troubles, the police and the Army were unable to secure the border with a total complement of 29,000. Nowadays, there is no military availability and the police service, even at its full complement of almost 8,000, is a long way from the point where it had to deal with a determined terrorist onslaught. The Government must act with some alacrity to address the shortfall. We do not want a hard border, but if there are to be border controls, we must ensure that the PSNI is properly resourced.

The consequences of Brexit for Northern Ireland are much more fundamental than any economic considerations. This is about the future cohesion of society. That is the real threat of Brexit to the Good Friday agreement.