Northern Ireland Protocol

Greg Smith Excerpts

Monday 27th February 2023 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

There was a lot in there. My hon. Friend is right that long-standing arrangements have been in place to protect biosecurity on the island of Ireland, and indeed on the respect that the UK has had for the single epidemiological zone on that island. We will continue to respect all of those things. Nothing in the framework changes that. It is something that everyone has agreed with in the past. No one has objected to it and it is right that we continue to move forward with those procedures.

[Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)]

The headlines of the Windsor framework make it clear that a great deal of progress has been made, and I commend my right hon. Friend for that. I look forward to getting stuck into scrutinising the detail. As I get on with the exercise of seeking to answer the question of whether this framework fully restores Northern Ireland as a full and equal part of the United Kingdom, can the Prime Minister help me to understand how it is that under the Stormont brake—unprecedented as that mechanism is—EU law is still presumed to take primacy with an option to opt out of it, as opposed to UK law being the primary law with an option to opt in to EU law, should that be right for Northern Ireland?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend should recognise that we are talking about less than 3% of EU law. That law applies with the consent of the people of Northern Ireland, and it is there because it avoids a hard border on the island of Ireland—something that I think everyone agrees with. It also preserves access to the EU single market for Northern Ireland businesses—something that we have heard from colleagues and businesses that they also value. The important point is consent. That is why the Stormont brake is so important; it ensures that it is the institution and the people of Northern Ireland who get to decide whether they think that those laws are appropriate for them. It is a powerful safeguard that ensures that the UK has, if needed, a veto over laws that cause concern. That is why the Windsor framework represents such a decisive breakthrough.