The DUP met with Lord Frost yesterday and demanded that the Northern Ireland Protocol had to go. The EC’s Ursula von der Leyen says the Government must implement it and Lord Frost says he hopes if the UK tears up the NIP the EU won’t mind. But to follow international law the UK has to implement the protocol, tearing it up would also break international law and the EU would most certainly react.
It is strange that the Government didn’t understand all this when it negotiated the Northern Ireland Protocol last year because it has whole departments of international lawyers who could explain this to a five year old in seconds.
A simpler explanation is that the Government knowingly sold Ulster Unionists down the river and is now looking for a magic policy to solve the mess but there isn’t one. Tear up the NIP and the unionists stop rioting and the republicans start rioting. Yet there is no amount of softening the border controls and avoiding red tape that will stop the Unionists from thinking there is a border between them and the rest of the UK, because there is.
The Brexiteers fantasy solution to this conundrum is to tear up the whole withdrawal agreement and face massive tariff barriers on UK trade with the EU, which would also ruin all the FTA’s the Government has so far managed to roll over and put the border between Northern Ireland and the South. So no solution to the NI problem and a far worse economic hit for the whole UK- which is exactly why the Government sold Ulster unionists out in the first place.
There is therefore no solution to this problem, except rejoining the EU, just saying.
https://jonty.substack.com/
There is another much cleaner solution, it involves Ireland becoming an island nation, with Britain withdrawing it interest. It’s a lot more plausible at this moment than the EU even entertaining the idea of allowing the UK back in the club.