Northern Ireland

Lord Morrow Excerpts

Tuesday 27th February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Morrow (DUP)]

My Lords, like other noble Lords I particularly welcome the affirmation in the humble Address of the “foundational importance” of the provisions of Article VI, given that we are all aware that these provisions have been partly suspended in Northern Ireland because of the actions of this House and the other place in sanctioning Section 7A of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018.

If we agree the Motion, then we will be duty-bound—if we are not to be two-faced about it—to look to for the first opportunity to amend the withdrawal agreement Act, so that these provisions, which are not merely important but of foundational importance, can be restored to the people of Northern Ireland immediately. As Carla Lockhart, the Member for Upper Bann, observed yesterday in another place, you cannot remove foundations, even temporarily, without placing the superstructure that they uphold in jeopardy.

I will dig a little deeper into this point, drawing on the Minister’s letter to those of us who took part in the recent debate on the statutory instruments that give effect to the deal that occasioned the restoration of Stormont, which has in turn occasioned this humble Address. Having commented on economic ties between Northern Ireland, the rest of the UK and the Republic of Ireland, the Minister says:

“That is why the Command Paper places specific emphasis on ensuring Northern Ireland has full and unfettered access to the UK’s internal market as well as its privileged access to the EU single market”.


That really is the heart of the proposition—that the deal gives Northern Ireland full and unfettered access to the UK’s internal market and privileged access to the Republic.

However, how this can be the case when, first, all the product that has to travel on the red lane—which includes all inputs into Northern Ireland manufacturing coming from the rest of the economy of which Northern Ireland is a part—is subject to a customs border that is more demanding than that experienced by products travelling from Germany, a foreign country, to England, and secondly, when all the product that travels on the so-called UK internal market system is also subject to the fettering of customs and an SPS border?

Lest anyone should contest the fettered access provided by the UK internal market system, I would direct them to the place the fettering is set out: EU regulation 2023/1128, which amends the EU Customs Code to simplify customs border fettering, and EU regulation 2023/1231, which simplifies the SPS border fettering. I do not question the fact that both these provisions simplify the border fettering, but the critical point is that they do not remove it. If you do not comply with the border fettering put in your way by the misnamed UK internal market system, your only other options will be the red lane or not to cross the border.

Moreover—and this is critical—for so long as we submit to the Windsor Framework, we agree that these matters are ultimately for the EU to determine and that the simplification of the border fettering is enjoyed at its pleasure and could be removed if it chooses to do so, defaulting back to the greater fettering of the red lane, as set out expressly in Article 14(5) of EU regulation 2023/1231.

By contrast, if we look at the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, we find no customs or SPS border fettering of any kind. I therefore suggest that the Minister transparently has it the wrong way round. The Government’s arrangements propose full and unfettered access to the Republic of Ireland and, to the extent of the so-called UK internal market system, privileged access to GB, in that while this does not afford us unfettered borderless access to GB, the fettering has been reduced from what would otherwise be the case.

This is a huge problem for unionism because unionists are very clear that our priority is our relationship with England, Scotland and Wales. The South decided to break away from that relationship. That was its decision. We regret it and stand with England, Wales and Scotland in our United Kingdom. In this context, while of course we want the best possible access to the Republic, that has to be subject to the basic unionist imperative—the union—and thus no customs fettering between any constituent part of the union.

The Safeguarding the Union Command Paper has things the other way around, prioritising the relationship with the South and the advent of a border between ourselves and the rest of the United Kingdom. It is a nationalist rather than a unionist solution because it sacrifices the unionist imperative. Of course, this all has to be seen in the context of the fact that the purpose of the border is to uphold the integrity of a different legal regime in Northern Ireland. That is the result of our disenfranchisement in relation to 300 areas of the laws to which we are subject, and the enfranchisement of a foreign Parliament. My noble friend Lord Dodds has already outlined specifics in relation to this issue.

In this respect, it is also important to reflect on the Minister’s assurances in his letter that the shortcomings of the brake are acceptable when seen in the context of the additional democratic consent safeguard—the so-called consent motion. The shortcomings of the brake include, of course, that it creates a second-class citizenship in which, rather than having the right to stand for election to make the laws to which you are subject, you have to make do with the right to stand for election to try to stop laws in 300 areas that have already been made for you by a foreign Parliament; and that it does not apply to all EU-imposed law anyway. We have already heard my noble friend Lord Dodds comment on that too.

That assertion simply does not stand up to scrutiny. The so-called democratic consent motion should really be called the “renouncing democratic consent procedure”, because that is, in effect, what it is. If, on the one hand, we humour the proposition that it constitutes democratic consent and treat it as a vote on all the laws made in the last three or four years, that does not work, both because it would be absurd to engage intelligently with three to four years’ legislation with one vote and because a no vote would not result in any of the legislation falling away. If, on the other hand, we treat it as a vote on all the laws to be made in the next three to four years, that does not work, for the above reasons and because you cannot vote on legislation that does not yet exist.

The practical impact of a yes vote will be for an MLA to agree to renounce the rights of his or her citizens to be represented in the making of the laws to which they are subject in 300 areas for the next four to eight years, depending on the scale of the vote. Rather than the so-called consent motion filling the democratic shortfall of the brake, therefore, it merely compounds it.

I am of course aware—and this was mentioned earlier—that there has been debate in recent weeks around Bushmills whiskey, which I say very gently is completely beside the point, and a lot of tosh, to use an Ulster word. You do not have to be an expert on this at all, and I do not profess to be one, but, as anyone who knows anything about the history of internal markets knows, they have become progressively more integrated across the world over time, especially in the case of the United Kingdom because, as the celebrated German economist Friedrich List pointed out, England and the UK invented the internal market.

People did not wake up one morning and say, “Let’s create an internal market”; it evolved over time. Rather than judging attempts to take it from the perspective of what being in an internal market was like in 1802, we have to judge it from the perspective of what it is like now. The relevant point in looking at these matters today is what Article 6 delivers in the 21st century, which we enjoyed through the foundational provisions of Article 6 until 31 December 2020, which Parliament has now partially suspended, and yet which today this House is urged to tell His Majesty is not merely important but of foundational importance.

I hope that we pass this Motion, but let us be clear: if we do, we will then be duty-bound to restore those Article 6 rights, because no Parliament worth its salt can tell its Head of State that certain provisions are of foundational importance in the context of a Motion that is specifically about a people who have been partly deprived by that same Parliament of those same provisions.