Jim Allister: Northern Ireland can’t be in EU single market without being subject to their laws

The claim by Micheal Martin, if correct, that all the main Stormont parties, including the DUP, want to retain access to the EU’s single market, requires any party opposed to the protocol to clarify their position.

It is access to and de facto membership of the EU single market which subjects us to hundreds of foreign EU laws and which going forward means NI would be a supplicant rule taker of laws we don’t make and can’t change. This is very much part of what makes the protocol unacceptable.

Thus any who believe we can shed EU laws will placing ourselves in their single market needs to bring clarity to their muddled thinking. NI’s exports to the EU single market needs to be on the same trading basis as the rest of the UK if we are to maintain the sanctity of our UK membership. It is being in the UK single market that matters.

Jim Allister MLA​​​​​​​​​​​​​​