Allister warns of attempts to 'hoodwink' voters that Irish Sea border has been removed

The DUP’s Edwin Poots, who is one of 12 party officers who will take the final decision on any deal, confirmed to the BBC this morning that plans to limit future trade divergence between Northern Ireland and Great Britain are one part of a deal. However, he said that on its own wouldn’t be enough.

The proposal would stop future additional checks and barriers between NI and GB being caused by UK legislation – but by its nature acknowledges that Northern Ireland will remain in a different regulatory system from the rest of the United Kingdom.

There have also been suggestions that the Windsor Framework’s ‘green lane’ could effectively disappear or be renamed the UK Internal Market Lane.

TUV leader Jim Allister said: “With ‘informed’ speculation about the Government’s offer to the DUP focusing on the presentation/packaging of the Irish Sea Border, it is timely to spell out exactly and fully what the Irish Sea Border actually is.

“It arises because under the Protocol NI is subject to the EU’s Customs Code which requires GB, as non-EU territory, to be treated as a third or foreign country whose goods must be subject to EU checks when entering its territory, which NI is deemed to be and where EU law applies.

“Only the removal of NI from under the EU Customs Code and associated EU law can remove the legal basis of the Irish Sea Border. Anything else is tinkering.

“It is suggested the UK government may promise to direct removal of checks in ‘the green lane’ and thereby claim the Irish Sea border is gone. Even its legal capacity to do this is suspect - given its surrender of sovereignty on border issues to the EU - but, such would not remove the partitioning sea border.

“A key fact is that all raw materials for NI manufacturing passes through the red lane. So, even dissipating the green lane leaves untouched the vast array of imported material which, under the Protocol, is presumed to be at risk of entering the EU single market. In truth the green lane largely assists supermarket supplies and little else.

“Thus, easements in the green lane, even its total abolition, would not remove the Irish Sea border, nor the constitutional affront which it presents.

“Nor would easements in the green lane remove one syllable of EU law, with every jot and tittle of the hundreds of imposed European laws in Annex 2 of the Protocol continuing to be imposed. Nor would less divergence by GB undo any of the law and structures which created the partitioning sea border in the first place. Unless and until sovereignty is reclaimed from the EU over our trade and border, nothing of constitutional substance will change.

“So, to unionists I say, when the inevitable attempt to hoodwink you that the Irish Sea border has been removed, judge what you are being told not by the spin but by the reality that the iniquitous Protocol remains unaltered.”

In parliament this week, Sir Jeffrey Donaldson launched an attack on the record of Mr Allister’s party, claiming it had done nothing to secure changes to the Irish Sea border.

The DUP has refused to get into a “running commentary” on its discussions with the government.