Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland: Follow-up Report (European Affairs Committee)

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

Monday 11th September 2023 Grand Committee

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Jay, has done what he always does: he has managed to get a diverse group of members to agree something. He has a report that has probably not upset anyone at all. Of course, there is quite a lot of “On the one hand, and on the other” in it, but it is a really important, detailed analysis of some of the real problems with the Windsor Framework. I thank him and all of the committee for their work.

One thing struck me when I reread the report at the weekend: not a single person who gave evidence said that what the Prime Minister said when he launched the framework was absolutely correct. I looked up the Prime Minister’s speech when he came to Parliament. It was very clear that he was launching with great fanfare something that, when you look at it now, was not accurate. When you read it now, you wonder whether he really understood what he was saying. Two or three times, he talked about how wonderful it is that we are removing

“any sense of a border”

for goods destined for Northern Ireland. He reminded the House:

“We have achieved free-flowing trade, with a green lane for goods, no burdensome customs bureaucracy, no routine checks on trade, no paperwork whatsoever for Northern Irish goods moving into Great Britain”.—[Official Report, Commons, 27/2/23; cols. 571-76.]


Even a slight reading of the report shows that is just not accurate. So many people said how wonderful the protocol was, how we all should rigorously implement it and how we were really ridiculous even opposing it, but a year on they have all become wonderful supporters of the Windsor Framework. I suggest that, in a year’s time, we will be back discussing how this cannot work and needs to be radically changed, because the fundamentals have not been changed: Northern Ireland is being gradually moved away, drip by drip, from the rest of the United Kingdom.

I will raise three or four real-life examples on the ground in Northern Ireland, where I now live. There is a very large manufacturing company there. Three-quarters of its components come from Great Britain. Recently, the European Union withdrew the general system of preferences, so it now has to pay 4.2% duty on everything while its competitors in Great Britain do not. That is hardly a level playing field. That is a direct result of the Windsor Framework.

On horticulture, the Prime Minister said:

“The same quintessentially British products like trees, plants, and seed potatoes—will again be available in Northern Ireland’s garden centres”.


That is just not happening. Yes, there have been some changes, but the reality is that individuals who normally would have got their seeds and plants directly from a garden centre or a retailer in Great Britain are not getting them. Sometimes it is because the company has deliberately decided it cannot be bothered with the hassle, but that is not giving a level playing field for people in Northern Ireland.

On farming, and buying cattle from markets, I have a friend who came over just last week to buy some animals in a market. On the morning he was buying them, he was sent an email saying that the holding period has now gone up from 30 days to 45. Of course, that brings huge extra costs. They have to feed the animals, and store them for that time, and again, that is a direct result of the Windsor Framework. Cattle now come over to Northern Ireland with an ear tag; as I am sure noble Lords know, each calf gets a tag in each ear, plus the farm’s herd number, and once the cattle get from the mainland to Northern Ireland, the two tags which were in their ears have to be cut out and replaced with the next available number with the herd number on it. That is just another example of the extra bureaucracy that is affecting farmers, and of course we do not have any real clarity about veterinary medicine, where there is a real worry.

There is no mention of duty free in the report, which is disappointing, yet the Prime Minister said in his wonderful speech:

“When I was Chancellor, it frustrated me that when I cut VAT on solar panels … those tax cuts did not apply in Northern Ireland … That means zero rates of VAT”, —[Official Report, Commons, 27/2/23; col. 572.]


and added that the Government would now ensure that all excise duties are the same. They are not. I fly from Belfast to Faro or from Belfast to the EU, I do not get duty free, and the answer I get back over and over again is just a nonsense. No one is honest. The headline today in an article by Owen Polley in the News Letter, is “London Still Not Honest About Windsor Framework Debacle”. That is the reality.

Finally, what really made me angry is that just this week, someone travelling from Cairnryan to Larne on a boat—an ordinary person—gets an email, which includes at the bottom, under “Check-in times for the Cairnryan-Larne route”:

“Please allow plenty of time for border checks, which take place before check-in”.


With the Windsor Framework, individuals are now very affected.

I will simply say that people in Northern Ireland are confused, frustrated and angry, but, most of all, they are very sad that their Government seem to be neglecting them.

Electoral Commission: Data Breaches

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

Monday 4th September 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

Preventing interference in future UK elections is an absolute priority for the Government—we have to protect our democratic processes. The Government have set up a Defending Democracy Taskforce to drive forward work to protect UK democratic processes, which I hope will be of some comfort to the noble Lord. The taskforce works across government and with Parliament, the intelligence communities, the devolved Administrations, local authorities, the private sector and civil society—a whole of society approach. It has recently set up a new enduring election security capability: the joint election security and preparedness unit. This will make sure that we are fully prepared for the next general election and that there are not attacks on the integrity of our systems.

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, data breaches in public life are hugely worrying, particularly if people’s lives are at risk. It might be slightly outside the Minister’s recall but is she aware, and have the Government taken an interest in the fact, that there was a huge data breach in Northern Ireland which actually put the lives of police officers at risk? We have just heard that the chief constable has resigned as a result of that. Would the Minister please ask the Home Secretary to look very seriously at this and at some of the other issues that are now coming out about the impartiality of the Police Service of Northern Ireland?

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness for raising that point, not least since I raised it myself about 10 minutes ago when I was being briefed for this Question. There was some comfort to know, for today’s purposes, that it was not a cyber incident, but it was a very unfortunate security breach, linked, as she will know, to an FoI process error. We must learn from this. As I said in answer to the previous question, there is a combination of things that we must do to try to prevent this kind of thing ever happening again and to ensure that the impact is minimised, if and when there are breaches of the system. Obviously, that is what they are trying to do in relation to Northern Ireland.

Strike Action

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

Wednesday 7th December 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

The Government have done a great deal to try to move things forward. On rail, which the noble Lord referenced, a new and improved deal, backdated, at 4% this year and 4% next year, has been offered. But although we want pay deals to be fair and affordable, and want independent pay review bodies to help with that process, our number one priority must be tackling inflation, which currently stands at 11%.

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, does the Minister understand that Royal Mail is being destroyed by the current management, and that although it would be very disappointing that the strike may stop some Christmas cards getting through, the vast majority of the public, particularly in rural areas, realise that the working conditions of ordinary post men and women across the country are being changed deliberately? This is not a dispute about pay; it is about how the Royal Mail wants to destroy letter posts throughout the country.

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

I have a great deal of admiration for Royal Mail. The way that it kept going and delivered all our mail through Covid, and has changed its operating model to do parcels and compete with others, is amazing. We are in touch with Royal Mail. It has well-developed contingency plans for strikes and will continue to do what it can to keep services running through December. We continue to monitor the dispute closely, and obviously urge people to post early for Christmas. There is a wider process of change within Royal Mail, and the noble Baroness makes some important points.

Older Persons Commissioner for England

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

Wednesday 19th October 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

Now the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, has an agent for the job. I take my noble friend’s point.

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

Is the Minister concerned about the way many older people these days are being forced to open a bank account, following the ending of the Post Office card? It is so difficult for someone living on only a very small pension. Would she look into this? It might be something an older persons’ commissioner would do if we had one.

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

I thank the noble Baroness for her question. I am going to be absolutely straight; my knowledge about the change to bank accounts and the Post Office card is not as sharp as it should be. I thought we had put different things in place so that people did not suffer as a result. I will go back to the department, find out the exact position, come back to the noble Baroness in writing and place a copy in the Library.

Ireland/Northern Ireland: Solid Fuels

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

Thursday 18th November 2021 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Hoey]

To ask the Minister of State at the Cabinet Office (Lord Frost) what discussions Her Majesty’s Government have had with the government of Ireland about that government’s plans to introduce physical checks on solid fuels entering the Republic of Ireland from Northern Ireland.

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord Frost) (Con)]

My Lords, we are aware of the Irish Government’s plans to introduce new standards for domestic solid fuels under their forthcoming clean air strategy. Of course, the implementation of this policy is for the Irish Government. Our understanding is that they plan to introduce it in 2022. We hope to have technical discussions with the Irish Government later this week to establish some further detail on how and when they plan to bring these measures into force.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

The Minister for the Environment in the Republic of Ireland said that

“inspections of cross-border fuel movements will be required.”

Does the Minister not think that shows huge hypocrisy from the Irish Government? The border sometimes matters—when it affects them—but as far as anything to do with the protocol is concerned, there could not possibly be any kind of border at the frontier. The Minister is being very patient with the European Union. Is he beginning to feel that time is running out and that it is time to simply say, “This is not working; it has to go”?

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness makes a very good point. The UK and the Republic of Ireland are obviously different countries divided by an international border, and most areas of national life—for example, legal systems, currency, taxation and many others—change when you cross that border. Some of those arrangements relate specifically to the movement of goods—VAT and excise, for example. These differences are nevertheless managed in market, without the need for physical infrastructure at the border, so I wait for the discussions with the Irish Government. I do not want to prejudge them, but obviously I do not see why we would have any difficulties if the Irish Government wished to manage one further regulatory difference between our two countries in a sensible and pragmatic way, as goods go on to the Irish market.

Retained EU Law

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

Thursday 18th November 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness makes an extremely good point, and it is our wish to widen this debate as far as we can. One of the ways of doing it, we hope, will be the standing commission on deregulation, which I referred to in my Statement of 16 September, on which I hope to be able to update the House fairly shortly.

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, the Minister talks repeatedly about stability in Northern Ireland, which is very important. How can he possibly think there will be stability in the future if Northern Ireland, under all these retained laws, will not get the benefit of them? Will he say now whether he actually contemplates Northern Ireland remaining under the EU’s VAT rules, for example?

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, we set out our position in the Command Paper of 21 July on VAT and many other points. Having two different systems of lawmaking on important points within the United Kingdom is likely to build up tension and divergence and create difficulties over time. We are trying to design a system in these negotiations that will resolve that. I wish we were making a bit more progress, but we will keep trying.

Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland: Power-sharing

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

Thursday 16th September 2021 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Hoey]

To ask the Minister of State at the Cabinet Office (Lord Frost) what assessment Her Majesty’s Government have made of the operation of the Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland on power sharing in Northern Ireland and the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement.

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord Frost) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government’s position on this matter is set out in the Command Paper we published on 21 July. In brief, the Government are indeed concerned that the operation of the protocol is causing political instability in Northern Ireland and risks undermining the Belfast/Good Friday agreement. That is why we wish to negotiate significant changes to its operation on the basis of the proposals in our Command Paper. We are, of course, discussing these issues with the EU.

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

I welcome Her Majesty’s Government recognising that the east-west dimension of the Belfast/Good Friday agreement has been broken by the protocol, which has led to destabilisation of all the institutions in Northern Ireland. Does the Minister understand that many people in Northern Ireland are saying that Her Majesty’s Government must actually choose, very soon, between the protocol and making the devolved institutions carry on successfully?

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, the institutions in Northern Ireland are, of course, extremely important, including for delivery in a range of domestic policy areas—health, transport and so on—and it is important they are robust and continue. We absolutely recognise the frustration with the current situation, which is leading to the build-up of tensions and pressures on the institutions that we are seeing. That is why we need to find durable solutions to the protocol and the trading situation in Northern Ireland that will be a reasonable settlement consistent with the integrity of the UK and the UK’s internal market.

Brexit Opportunities

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

Thursday 16th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I very much welcome this Statement from the Minister. It is one of the reasons millions of people all over the country voted to leave the European Union. I want to ask him about the timescale, because I worry that sometimes reviews get stuck at the bottom of some civil servant’s tray. I would like to make sure that this comes back to us very quickly and that we see the results of leaving the European Union as soon as possible. I ask him to say something about the timetable.

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, there is a complex list of proposals, consultations, ideas for legislation, specific plans for legislation, and so on, so it is hard to generalise. However, I wish to be clear that we intend to pursue all this urgently. That is why it is my responsibility as a Cabinet Minister to make this happen, over and above the departmental responsibilities that other Secretaries of State have. We certainly intend to pursue the review of EU law extremely urgently so that we can deliver results and make a difference rapidly.

Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland (EUC Report)

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

Monday 13th September 2021 Grand Committee

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, when I used to appear at referendum campaign rallies with the previous speaker, I always made it clear that I would only speak before him. Unfortunately, today, I have to follow him and can say what a great speech that was. I also pay tribute to the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Caine. I am really looking forward to the book, which will be well worth reading. We were all enlightened today to hear a little more about the negotiations going on way back under the former Prime Minister.

Like most committee reports, by the time they have been published and debated, they are a little out of date as events have moved on, but I welcome the reports, as far as they go, and accept that they are preliminary and that this project is ongoing. I suggest the committee tries to meet some of the younger pro-union loyalists next time, who are now beginning to speak out in Northern Ireland. The problem for establishment committees such as this is that they go for the well-known, regular commentators, and they know what they are going to say before they turn up. Those at the grass roots of what is happening in Northern Ireland get ignored, not listened to.

We saw that just last week, when Vice-President Šefčovič—I apologise to him for my pronunciation—spent two days in Northern Ireland. He refused to meet the leader of one of the main unionist parties, the Traditional Unionist Voice party, Jim Allister. He did not meet any of the loyalists I am talking about in their communities. The whole idea of outreach, which the EU has made a great deal of, needs to be looked at.

There are two points I want to put on record at the beginning. First, there is a tendency for those who voted to remain in the referendum to tell us leavers that we own Brexit, that we own the protocol and that it is our fault. I campaigned for Brexit very strongly and I would do it again, but I campaigned for the whole United Kingdom to leave the European Union in totality. I did not see on my ballot paper a little bit put off saying, “Do you want to leave the United Kingdom, but to leave out Northern Ireland?” I strongly believe that we do not have Brexit in Northern Ireland, and that is part of the problem.

Secondly, we hear a lot from many people, including those in government, that Brexit made an Irish Sea border inevitable, but anyone who says that is actually stating that Northern Ireland voters did not have the right to take part in a nationwide referendum on the same basis as those in the rest of the United Kingdom, and that the outcome of that referendum applied in Northern Ireland without any qualifications. Those who say that do not really believe in the union of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. If they are being honest, they should say that they are not unionists. The trade checks are not done in the Irish Sea, anyway. They are on the land of the island of Ireland, at Larne, Belfast, et cetera. All those who said we could never have a land border on the island have exactly that; the only difference is between one part of the United Kingdom and another, not between Northern Ireland and the Republic.

In Northern Ireland, the good, decent, honest people who feel British and believe that they were guaranteed the right to be British unless there was a majority who did not wish to be, are expected to put up with this. Would noble Lords be sitting here debating in the same way if it had been the other way round—if it was a nationalist community saying, “We don’t want a land border between Northern Ireland and the Republic”? The pro-union community is expected to put up with it. We know why we have this. It is because the collusion between the Irish Government and the European Union, and the threats of violence, led our Government to go along with saying that there can never be a trade border on the island of Ireland at the frontier—which is where any normal country would think it should be. The Belfast agreement would be broken, according to nationalists and many here, by a land border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, but it is not broken by having a border between one part of the United Kingdom and another. The Belfast/Good Friday agreement was based on balance and the balance has now gone completely the other way.

I am very surprised that the committee did not say more about the court judgment at the end of June, which I know the Lord Speaker has said we can refer to, when Mr Justice Colton confirmed that

“the government has removed critical aspects of the Acts of Union 1800; the legislation that effectively created the United Kingdom.”

As one of the applicants for the judicial review along with Jim Allister, Ben Habib, Arlene Foster, Steve Aiken and the noble Lord, Lord Trimble, I find it very concerning. It has huge political ramifications as well as legal significance. It represents a direct challenge to what the Prime Minister said in response to Sir Jeffrey Donaldson in Prime Minister’s Questions, when he said explicitly that this provision had not been repealed by the withdrawal agreement and the protocol. We are going to appeal. The case raised complex legal issues, but they will eventually be settled, and I am sure many noble Lords here will be delighted that it will be going to the Supreme Court and keeping our lawyers in business. The Acts of Union are a constitutional statute and the courts do not seem to have considered a case like this before where constitutional statutes clash.

As there are many lawyers here and I am sure they read the European Journal of International Law, I want to refer to a recent, excellent article by Professor Joseph Weiler. He has written about the treaty of Versailles, Brexit, the Irish protocol and the Versailles effect. As someone who used to be head of the European University Institute in Florence and a very strongly pro-EU person, he quite explicitly argues very coherently about why the European Union has been so wrong in the way it has handled the whole of the Northern Ireland protocol. I suggest that Members might like to refer to that.

The grace periods have been extended and I thank the noble Lord, Lord Frost, for all that he has done. I know he is battling against very difficult European Union representatives who still seem to want to find ways of punishing us more for leaving. The grace periods have been extended, but that does not change what is currently happening. They were going to bring in much worse things, both in trade issues and in other ways; those have now been put off, but it does not change what is happening. There are still checks in Larne and companies in Great Britain not wanting to send anything to Northern Ireland. Not a week goes past but there is something else and another company says, “We can’t really be bothered with this; it’s not worth the hassle, we really don’t want to do it.” Tinkering with the protocol is not good enough. Even if we manage to get trade flowing freely, as long as we in Northern Ireland are left under European Union rules and the European Court of Justice, that will not be acceptable to people in Northern Ireland who want to stay part of the United Kingdom.

When people talk about compromise, they have no understanding of the strength of feeling. The United Kingdom Government cannot compromise any more. They need now to stand up, be strong and speak up for the country they are meant to be running. This Government have a choice to make. I am very pleased that Sir Jeffrey Donaldson—I am not a member or necessarily a supporter of the DUP, but I support anyone in Northern Ireland who speaks up for the union whatever their political party—has come out and said that since the east-west dimension of the Belfast/Good Friday agreement has been broken, why should we carry on with the north-south?

I think it is rather sad that one Unionist is now saying let us have more north/south bodies. Would that really make things better? I do not agree with that, and I am very pleased that Sir Jeffrey has spoken about this. We need to take his warning very seriously. The Government have now got to make it clear that the protocol is not sustainable, as the noble Lord, Lord Caine, and others said. It is not sustainable; it has to go. The Government have to choose: do they want to see stability in Northern Ireland, do they want to see institutions maintained and to keep that balance that has been so difficult over many years, or do they want to keep the protocol? They cannot have both. That is the dilemma the Government face. I hope that committees like this will understand that this is a crucial time. There is no point in having more committees, meetings and lots more reports over the next six months. We do not have six months. I know that the noble Lord, Lord Frost, understands that and I hope the Prime Minister understands that and will now recognise that this protocol has to go, one way or another.

Cash Network

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

Tuesday 7th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Agnew of Oulton (Con)]

As my noble friend is aware, the DWP payment policy is to pay benefits and pensions into a standard bank, building society or credit union. The DWP encourages customers to provide standard bank account details, to give them greater choice in where and how they collect their money. Customers who receive their payment into an account of their choice are financially included and can benefit from a wide range of financial services, such as direct debits. A standard account allows customers to access cash payments via post offices, as I mentioned in a reply to an earlier question. The DWP payment exception service is a small-scale scheme where vouchers are uploaded to a card or sent electronically by SMS or email. It is available to that small minority of claimants who cannot open or use a standard bank account. It is not a prepaid card and cannot be used to purchase goods and services.

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, the Minister knows that the ending of the Post Office card account, with the Government refusing to renew the contract, is going to really hit those very poorest pensioners who depend on that cash—that is practically all they have to take out each week. Week after week they are now getting letters telling them they must get a bank account or some other kind of digital banking. Why will the Government not accept that the Post Office card account should be retained to help those very poorest pensioners who rely on it, without the bureaucracy of a bank?

[Lord Agnew of Oulton (Con)]

My Lords, it is not difficult to open a bank account. What we need to do is keep encouraging these elderly people who do not have an account yet to open one.