EU Referendum: UK-Ireland Border

David Simpson Excerpts

Tuesday 19th July 2016 Westminster Hall

[Dr Alasdair McDonnell (Belfast South) (SDLP)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered implications of the UK leaving the EU for the UK-Ireland border.

It is a privilege to be able to move the motion for debate under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. The debate covers one of the many acute aspects of the decision by Britain to leave the European Union. It is one of the most acute for me.

The recent referendum result to leave the EU sent shockwaves right across the world, economically and politically. In my opinion, and in that of so many people, it was a bad decision taken for all the wrong reasons. In Ireland, we define a referendum as a process that gets the wrong answer to a question that was not asked in the first place. That seems to be a very appropriate definition of what has happened here.

I congratulate the Minister on his appointment and thank him for his generosity to me on many occasions in the past. I thank him for being here today and welcome him to his new post. I and others in my party will be seeking a meeting with the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland to discuss all the issues involved in the aftermath of the referendum, but the future of the Irish border is a specific issue for which the Home Office has a particular responsibility. It is critical that the Home Office is fully engaged with the Northern Ireland Office, the parties in Northern Ireland and the Irish Government, on all the questions around the future status of the border.

The political, legal and economic complexities of a British exit from Europe are sobering, to say the least. The challenges that lie ahead will not be easy to surmount for Britain or Ireland, but they are particularly difficult for Northern Ireland. The effects of the vote for Britain to leave the EU are already being felt, with markets suffering and the sense of uncertainty turning off would-be foreign direct investors. The pound has lost almost a sixth of its value against the dollar. I have no intention of perpetuating “Project Fear”. Instead, I am asking myself how the delusions of “project fantasy” managed to persuade so many voters that leaving the EU would be truly in their best interests.

It is unfortunate that many of the key protagonists in the leave campaign have now jumped ship and absolved themselves from taking any responsibility whatever for the damage that I believe they have caused—but I am not surprised. When the size of the task at hand dawned on them and the result became clear, they seemed totally overwhelmed. They had no plan A, let alone a plan B. What has become patently clear is that the leave side did not believe for one moment that they would succeed. Secondly, they did not have any coherent plan for steering us through the very choppy seas of the UK in post-leave mode.

I do not claim to have all the answers to the uncertainty—I am struggling to find some as I go—but the uncertainty that we now face is worrying. I am determined to do all that I can to ensure that the economic and social damage to Northern Ireland, as a result of the intended withdrawal from the EU, is minimised. After all, the majority of people living in Northern Ireland believe that the UK is better off in the EU—56% of them voted to remain.

During the EU referendum campaign, my colleagues and I in the Social Democratic and Labour party worked tirelessly to ensure that we had a high remain vote right across Northern Ireland. I have a particular sense of pride that my constituency had an excellent turnout, with more than 70% of those people voting to remain.

Personally, I have always thought that the EU is not perfect and requires much reform, but the reality is that if we were to dismantle the EU in the morning, we would have to find a new way of reinventing it the next day. People take all the benefits of the EU for granted and will only become fully aware of them when we have left. I urge our new Secretary of State to be cognisant of that fact, and fight, and fight again for the interests of people in Northern Ireland, to ensure that our unique circumstances are considered throughout the forthcoming negotiations. I believe that Northern Ireland’s interests cannot receive the full protection they deserve unless Northern Ireland has at least one, and preferably two, seats at the negotiating table as we go forward.

Prior to the referendum, at Prime Minister’s questions, I asked the former Prime Minister what assurances he could give us about the Irish border. I asked because many of my constituents were writing to me. They and I were deeply worried that there could be a return to a hard border and passport checks between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic, which would be damaging to both parts of Ireland, economically and socially. In his response, the right hon. Gentleman warned of the checks along the Northern Ireland border with the Republic and of the possibility of people travelling from Belfast to other parts of the UK having to provide documentation in the event of an exit. The referendum result has created a major uncertainty about border controls and what they might look like. I welcome recent remarks by our new Secretary of State, who has said that there should be no border controls between the UK and the Republic of Ireland. On immigration and customs controls, there will be some changes.

[David Simpson (Upper Bann) (DUP)]

If we were not depressed before we came into this debate, we certainly will be now, listening to the hon. Gentleman. I congratulate him on obtaining the debate. Does he not accept that we are now not going to have the tanks and the guns and the barbed wire at the border? There is a new opportunity now for the United Kingdom as a whole to move forward and create a better country for the future of our young people, and to control our own destiny.

[Dr McDonnell]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving us an example of “project fantasy” and the delusions associated with it. Those are the very delusions that we have put up with for a number of months, on the fairyland that was going to be created post-exit. The only thing he missed out on was telling us the tooth fairy is going to come round, and that Santa Claus is going to come round next week and give us all a bag of money.

I am not depressed or being depressed—I am looking quite simply at the facts. It may be a giggle for the Democratic Unionist party, but it is not a giggle for a lot of people. On the Sunday two days after the result became obvious, I got 200 emails screaming at me— 200 emails on a Sunday. I might normally get one email on a Sunday, if I am lucky, but I got 200, which were screaming at me and demanding to know what I was going to do about the mess that had been created. That is coming from the people I am elected to represent. Perhaps they have got it wrong—but I see no evidence of that. I see an awful lot of make-believe.

We have two or three simple options. If we do not have a hard border in customs and immigration terms, we have to have checks and controls at Larne, at the airports, and possibly even at Dublin, Dún Laoghaire and other places. An alternative option might be that the barriers are created somewhere about Dover and similar points of entry.

The issues, however, are serious, and make-believe and delusions will not help solve them. We will require a serious discussion with countries that remain in the European Union to ensure that we go forward with a positive agenda. That agenda will not be helped by delusions or aggression; it will require honest engagement and honest dealing with the facts.