No border to see here, insists Secretary of State Brandon Lewis – six days into Irish Sea border reality

For six days now, border checks overseen by EU officials have been taking place at Belfast ports, lorries have been stopped and searched if they have not correctly filled in the new paperwork, UK Border Force officials are directing which vehicles to search and what the government itself describes as new Border Control Posts – built by the government at a cost of £40 million – are being manned.

However, during an interview with Talkback yesterday Mr Lewis defended his insistence that there is no new border. Mr Lewis said he had “always been clear through the course of 2020 that we would be building on the SPS [sanitary and phytosanitary] checks” and said that “SPS checks have been in place in one form or another since the 19th century so as I say we said we would build on that”.

He went on: “More widely, some of the issues that we’ve been seeing in the last few days have been actually more linked to the end of year and some of the issues we saw at Dover-Calais”.

Referring to the empty shelves in many Northern Ireland supermarkets over recent days, he said “I think you’ll find that in the next few days, the next week or two, as that restocks that’s actually linked to the issue we had at Dover-Calais just before Christmas”.

He said that “people will see that things are flowing through and parcels for example are flowing through as companies have understood what is clear in the guidance”.

When it was put to him that many people are “utterly confused” that he cannot accept the existence of a new border, he said: “As I say, I would expect to see over the next few months that people will see that things will continue to flow and trade will be there as it was in February last year and January of last year.”

Presenter William Crawley put it to Mr Lewis that “this will sound to some people a little Trumpian – that you are denying what is clearly visible in front of all of us; there are actual customs border posts”.

Ignoring the question about customs, Mr Lewis replied: “Well, you’ve always had, and we’ve always had in Northern Ireland, SPS checks...”

When it was put to him that there were multiple other checks, he said: “Well, there are administrative checks for companies that are trading with the EU and that applies to companies in GB as well as in NI...we fully accept that things will be different, particularly in the first few days as companies are getting used to it.”

Top customs expert admits: New Irish Sea border is ‘cumbersome’ and hugely complex – even for me, with 40 years experience

Irish Sea border which Secretary of State Brandon Lewis claims doesn’t exist empties shelves and ends business in Northern Ireland

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