Northern Ireland Protocol

Baroness Winterton of Doncaster Excerpts

Thursday 15th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sir Bernard Jenkin]

I thank my right hon. Friend for her strong speech. This has been a thoughtful and meaningful debate. I am particularly pleased that the Opposition Front Bench has given its support to the motion that has been tabled. That will strengthen the Government’s negotiating position considerably.

I will pick up one or two points. My hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare) talked about the need for flexibility, but then seemed to say that that could be achieved without any change to the protocol. That is just not realistic. The idea that the President of the Commission cannot change his mind because member states would have to agree may be a problem for the European Union, but it cannot be a problem for the paralysis of the British Government—the British Government will have to take action.

I invite all those who have almost signed up to what I call the Macron doctrine, after he said at the G7 summit that nothing was negotiable and everything was applicable—this attitude of “You’ve signed it, so you’re stuck with it,” whether or not that is good for the British people or the Northern Ireland peace process—to consider that that is a kind of blindness that we really have to drop. What we are looking for is flexibility, as my hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset, the Chair of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee, asked for—real flexibility. The EU will not win respect around the world for adopting a head in the sand approach to this, and we will not shoehorn the whole of the United Kingdom back into the single market to resolve these problems, because that is not what the British people voted for.

I leave my right hon. Friend the Minister with this fundamental thought. She talked about working hard and in good faith, and courage and determination, but I am afraid that we are reaching the point very quickly where the Government will have to take action, and it will be a question of letting the European Union know that its failure to respond in reasonable good faith to the entreaties with which the Government have been presenting it will lead to consequences. That needs to happen soon, because the longer this situation persists, the more economic disruption is caused in Northern Ireland and the more the faith and trust in the Good Friday agreement are ebbing away. Everyone has to accept that the protocol is bad for the peace process in Northern Ireland, and it must change or be changed.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

This House supports the primary aims of the Northern Ireland Protocol of the EU Withdrawal Agreement, which are to uphold the Belfast (Good Friday) Agreement in all its dimensions and to respect the integrity of the EU and UK internal markets; recognises that new infrastructure and controls at the border between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic must be avoided to maintain the peace in Northern Ireland and to encourage stability and trade; notes that the volume of trade between Great Britain and Northern Ireland far exceeds the trade between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland; further notes that significant provisions of the Protocol remain subject to grace periods and have not yet been applied to trade from Great Britain to Northern Ireland and that there is no evidence that this has presented any significant risk to the EU internal market; regards flexibility in the application of the Protocol as being in the mutual interests of the EU and UK, given the unique constitutional and political circumstances of Northern Ireland; regrets EU threats of legal action; notes the EU and UK have made a mutual commitment to adopt measures with a view to avoiding controls at the ports and airports of Northern Ireland to the extent possible; is conscious of the need to avoid separating the Unionist community from the rest of the UK, consistent with the Belfast (Good Friday) Agreement; and also recognises that Article 13(8) of the Protocol provides for potentially superior arrangements to those currently in place.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I am suspending the House for a few minutes to make the necessary arrangements for the next business.