Nigel Dodds welcomes assurance that NI Protocol ‘cannot endure without cross-community support’

In questions to the Prime Minister’s new Minister for EU issues, David Frost, Lord Dodds said: “The Protocol is preventing the free flow of trade within the UK’s internal market, and it stops any elected representative either at Stormont or at Westminster from having any say or vote on making laws relating to a large section of the economy.

“As a sovereign and democratic country, the UK must now address and correct the fundamental defects of the Protocol.

“Only by doing so will we able to achieve a long-term stable future for devolution in Northern Ireland, and a balanced and fair interpretation and implementation of the Agreements.

“I welcome the acknowledgment by the Minister that the Protocol could not endure without cross-community support.”

The protocol sees Northern Ireland follow a number of EU trade rules which has necessitated additional checks on goods arriving from Great Britain.

Unionists have criticised the disruption and dubbed the mechanism a border in the Irish Sea.