Hilary Benn 'acting like Pontius Pilate' over Irish Sea border says Sammy Wilson

The DUP MP for East Antrim made the remarks in a debate in the Westminster Hall section of Parliament today.

He had secured the hour-long session for the MPs to discuss the UK internal market.

Mr Wilson accused Hilary Benn of having an “I couldn’t care less attitude” to the Protocol / Windsor Framework’s effects on Northern Ireland.

"Pontius Pilate-like, he has washed his hands of it all,” he said.

"If anything, he acts more like an EU emissary to Northern Ireland than a Secretary of State for Northern Ireland…

"Let us look at some of the Secretary of State’s comments. When my honourable friend the Member for Upper Bann (Carla Lockhart) recently raised a statistic from the FSB survey in the House, his attitude was, ‘Well, if some of the businesses can trade with Northern Ireland, why can’t the rest of them? It is up to them to decide where they want to trade and where they don’t.’

"When someone who is meant to be standing up and fighting for Northern Ireland takes that kind of attitude, I despair about whether this issue is being taken seriously.”

Mr Wilson gave the example of how the sea border recently affected the movement of custard around the country.

"All the paperwork, all the regulations, all the delays and all the checks are founded on one thing: that goods entering Northern Ireland from GB are regarded as at risk of going into the Irish Republic, contaminating its economy in some way and breaking EU rules,” he said.

"Custard, the stuff we heat and pour over apple tarts or put into trifles, was deemed to be a dairy product, but it was not required to be labelled until phase 3 of the labelling requirements.

"However, the EU decided that perhaps custard should have been regarded as a product at risk, so it changed the labelling requirements.

"One of the big supermarkets had custard in its supply chain, and the EU bureaucrats decided that this custard must be hunted down – ‘We cannot have it coming into Northern Ireland and finding its way into the Irish Republic’.

"Lorries with mixed loads were stopped and searched. The offending custard was hunted down, discovered and exposed.

"That delayed the lorries, which did not reach the depot in time, so their goods could not be broken down and distributed to the various shops. It affected the supply chain and the supply of shops in Northern Ireland.

“Here is the irony: the supermarket did not have any shops in the Irish Republic. The offending custard was okay one day, but not the next, because it did not have a label that it did not require the previous day...

“I am sure many members could tell story after story about how the regulations are having an effect. What is it all down to? It is down to goods presenting a ‘risk’.

"What risk?”

Also speaking was TUV MP Jim Allister.

"If we construct, at a foreign institution’s behest, an internal international border within our own country and require customs checks and declarations, and the payment of tariffs on the movement of goods, it should be no surprise that we will hugely upset our country’s internal market,” he said.

"That is exactly what has happened. I would go further and say that that is exactly what was intended, as it was notoriously said in Brussels that the price of Brexit would be Northern Ireland.

"What we have evolving before our very eyes is the dismembering of the United Kingdom, as an object lesson to any other member state of what happens if they dare to leave the EU.”

UUP MP Robin Swann said: “Even major retailers are pushing back. We will hear about all those businesses and companies that make it work, but in June Stuart Machin, the chief executive of Marks & Spencer, called the implementation of these labels ‘bureaucratic madness, confusing for customers, and completely unnecessary given the UK has some of the highest food standards in the world’.

"If the chief executive officer of one of the UK’s most established food retailers finds the system hugely bureaucratic, says it is ‘adding yet another layer of unnecessary costs and red tape’, how can we expect small firms, often with just a handful of staff, to cope?”

Responding to these and other points was Justin Madders, junior business minister.

"Honourable members have spoken passionately, as we would expect, about the Windsor Framework.

"I hope it goes without saying that this government are wholly committed to the Windsor framework.

"It forms part of the withdrawal agreement between the UK and the European Union, and it supports the peace and prosperity brought about by the Good Friday Agreement – one of the proudest achievements of the previous Labour Government.

"It also plays a vital role in ensuring the smooth flow of goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland. That is why we supported the Windsor framework in opposition, and we continue to support it in government.”

However, he added: “I recognise that the framework does not operate perfectly for everyone.”

He also said “I take issue with the comments made by the right honourable member for East Antrim [Sammy Wilson] about the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, who I believe is an honourable man”.

He continued: “He is committed to Northern Ireland, and I do not accept at all the characterisation that he is disdainful or could not are less about Northern Ireland. Nothing could be further from the truth.”