Brexit: Irish Border

Debate between Lord Trimble and Lord Callanan

Tuesday 5th December 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan]

As the noble Lord is aware, we are leaving the customs union and the single market. Northern Ireland will be leaving them with us.

[Lord Trimble (Con)]

Will the Minister agree that a lot of the problems yesterday stemmed from the fact that people were leaking inaccurate accounts of what was in the Government’s paper, and were not making it clear that the proposal for some form of regulatory alignment was heavily conditioned and of very limited application? If that information had been put into the public domain earlier in the day, would not things have gone much more smoothly?

[Lord Callanan]

My noble friend speaks with great authority on this subject, having been one of the architects of the Good Friday agreement. We all know the political sacrifices he made to bring that about. I pay tribute to him for that. I do not think it would be helpful for me to go into a blow-by-blow account of whataboutery on the negotiations. We are only half way through the negotiations. We will come back and make a Statement when we have agreement, but at the moment this is an ongoing, delicate situation.