The UK Internal Markets Bill needs full Tory support as it begins its passage through Westminster today

If it does not, it will be due to the hysterical reaction that has emerged to the legislation.

The government is in large part to blame for the row, given the way in which Brandon Lewis handed its critics a sledgehammer with which to attack the bill when he said that it would break international law.

What the legislation is trying, modestly, to achieve is to ensure that one set of legal obligations does not obliterate an existing set of legal obligations.

As the government says, aspects of the Withdrawal Agreement could negate a core aspect of the 1998 Belfast Agreement, which enshrined the principle of consent: that is, the principle that sovereignty for Northern Ireland lies wholly with the UK until the people of NI decide otherwise.

It is troubling to hear of Tory MPs thinking of rebelling on this measure, which is designed to protect the Union.

Michael Gove, the cabinet office minister, is right to point out that the UK is being “generous” with the EU over the Brexit negotiations. It has been far too generous, indeed, and was recklessly generous last year, when Boris Johnson struck a deal with Leo Varadkar the implications of which, some informed observers say, he did not understand.

While it is only fair to observe that Mr Johnson had been put in a bind by the Benn amendment, which sought to make a ‘no deal’ Brexit impossible, his agreement with Mr Varadkar was nonetheless a betrayal of unionists, and a shameless u-turn on his previous pledges to the DUP.

It is important to recognise, however, that the government is trying to ensure that the worst of that deal does not come to pass, such as exit declarations on internal UK trade from NI to Great Britain. Unionists should not assume that this is a ruse, to secure Brexit concessions that have nothing to do with NI.

It seems to be an attempt to constrain the worst aspects of the Brexit deal, and needs full Tory support in Westminster.

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