European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill

Gavin Robinson Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons & Programme motion: House of Commons
Tuesday 22nd October 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Mr Speaker, I give way to the hon. Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson).

[Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP)]

I am very grateful to the Prime Minister for giving way. I have heard clearly not only what he has tried to do this afternoon to assure the House, but his answer to the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith). How can the Prime Minister square the pledge he has given—that Northern Ireland can fully benefit from free trade agreements—with the provisions in the agreement he reached at article 13(8) that require the EU to have a say in whether we secede from the protocol arrangements?

[The Prime Minister]

There is absolutely no provision for the EU to have a say. As the hon. Gentleman knows, there are special provisions in the agreement that apply to Northern Ireland in respect of trade in goods, sanitary and phytosanitary measures and the single electricity market. The benefit of that temporary four-year alignment is that it allows us to avoid a hard border in Northern Ireland—that is its great benefit—and to respect the Good Friday process, but those arrangements are automatically terminated after—