Doug Beattie: PM can’t allow sea border between NI and GB

The next prime minister can never agree to a sea border between Northern Ireland and Great Britain, UUP leader Doug Beattie has said.

Writing in the News Letter today, ahead of next week’s Tory leadership election campaign climax, Mr Beattie said: “No prime minister should have agreed to putting a border between Northern Ireland and Great Britain and no future prime minister should continue to stand over this.”

He urged the next occupant of 10 Downing Street to ensure that “the consent principle of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement must be respected and Northern Ireland’s place with the UK internal market is protected”.

The UUP leader said the new prime minister “must act decisively” over the Northern Ireland Protocol upon taking office next week.

“Continuing the circular conversation of the last three years cannot be an option. If the EU continues to be inflexible then the prime minister must of course act in the best interests of the United Kingdom. It will be for Rishi Sunak or Liz Truss to demonstrate quickly that they understand what those interests are,” he said.

On the NI Protocol, Mr Beattie added: “It continues to cause problems for business and consumers while uncertainty remains. It is also contributing to a toxic atmosphere in Northern Ireland politics with devolution still not having been restored almost four months on from the Assembly election.”

The front runner in the contest to succeed Mr Johnson remains Foreign Secretary Liz Truss who is expected to defeat Mr Sunak next Monday in a ballot of Tory Party members across the United Kingdom.

Whoever wins the contest will have to oversee the passage of the NI Protocol Bill through its final stages at Westminster before it can get Royal Assent. This entails scrutiny by the House of Lords with many Europhile peers threatening to hold up, dilute and even possibly scupper the legislation before it goes back to the House of Commons.

During hustings among Northern Ireland Conservatives last month, Ms Truss emphasised that she had “pushed through Whitehall” the NI Protocol Bill.

But TUV leader Jim Allister has warned that it would be “very foolish indeed” to take at face value promises from either candidate that they will use the bill to overturn the Union-threatening protocol and face down the EU.