Removal of medicines from the Northern Ireland Protocol is essential — but only a first step

Apologists for the Northern Ireland Protocol at times point to what they say is the lack of major opposition to the new arrangements.

It is true public anger at the protocol seems to wax and wane.

There was very little concern in the initial weeks of the year, when the checks began, and then great alarm when the various implications became clear.

But it is misleading to measure the protocol only against the popular mood at any particular time.

The complexity of the protocol is such that not only did most of the public fail to grasp its significance, but most of government did too.

How else to explain the shocking fact that 900 medicines are due to be withdrawn from Northern Ireland and a further 2,400 are at risk? Presumably almost no-one on the UK side of the negotiations knew this was likely.

If they did, and if any of them were government ministers, then there should be retrospective resignations.

It is clear that medicines should be removed from the protocol, as London is trying to achieve.

But even if that happens, which it must, it is only the beginning of the overhaul that is needed.

The protocol has disastrous implications for Northern Ireland’s place in the UK, which is why republicans are so thrilled with it. East-West connections have been trashed, and the principle of consent gravely damaged.

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