Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Penn on 12 April (HL7072),  what discussions they plan to have with the European Commission to enable residents of Northern Ireland to buy duty free products when travelling from Northern Ireland to the EU.

This question was answered on 12th May 2023
The Government’s duty-free policy remains unchanged after the agreement of the Windsor Framework. Northern Ireland enjoys frictionless trade with both the rest of Great Britain and Northern Ireland – the Government is committed to ensuring that remains the case.

Enabling duty-free shopping between Ireland and Northern Ireland could lead to significant distortions of trade on the island of Ireland as well as a significant revenue loss for both UK and Ireland by creating a legal route for unlimited amounts of alcohol and tobacco to flow into the UK and EU markets duty-free.

The Government therefore has no plans to raise this matter with the European Commission.