Letter: Unionism needs to be a problem rather than a complainant over Windsor Framework
A letter from R G McDowell:
The News Letter printed an interesting report in which Sammy Wilson MP correctly described the Labour government as cloth-eared to unionist concerns (Labour 'cloth-eared' on Irish Sea border says DUP MP: 'We must hope for a Reform victory', July 23).
He is to be commended for tabling a debate on the subject at Westminster Hall.
I do not agree with the observation, however, that all we can do is keep raising the issue and wait for a Reform government.
I think it is unwise to simply hope that a future Reform government might restore NI to full UK membership. Firstly, such a government may never come about.
Secondly, if it does it could be four years away (how much worse will the unionist position be after four more years of all-Ireland economic integration?).
Thirdly, some of the best advocates for NI have already left Reform such as Ben Habib. And fourthly, some of the people who have since defected to Reform were actually Conservative MPs when the Irish Sea border, Windsor Framework, etc were passed.
If they didn’t stand up for British sovereignty when their vote actually mattered, why should they do so under Reform after years of this arrangement having become entrenched?
Have we not already had the European Research Group (ERG) experience where those MPs we might have expected to defend a full UK Brexit seemed to espouse pantomime patriotism that melted away when British sovereignty actually needed defending.
Unionists might want to hope that a future Reform government may be a more sympathetic audience to unionist concerns but why would any Westminster government of any stripe take a more hardline position than unionism themselves are taking?
If we allow a narrative to take root that the Windsor Framework protects the Good Friday Agreement, no government is going to give themselves the headache of trying to renegotiate with Europe.
Unionism needs to be a problem rather than a complainant.
Disrupting the NI Executive is not a good option but it is the only option which makes unionist grievance visible.
Unionism must embark upon a strategy of delegitimising the Irish Sea border. That is incompatible with executive participation under the current terms.
R G McDowell, Belfast BT5