NIP

One of the very forst things I learned about Brexit, nearly 5 years ago, was that in order to find what Brexit you were going to get, decide where the regulatory border for Ireland would be.

As I have written there were just three choices.

May chose one, that would have been impossible to police and would have been clearly against the GFA, upset the US making a trade deal them it impossible.

The other two choices were, either to have all of the UK remain in the SM and/or the CU or have the border down the Irish Sea.

No other choices.

Choose one.

You have four years, on your marks, get set....

Runaround-ah.

May chose across Ireland, as she had defined Brexit as leaving the SM and CU. Johnson did not, or could nto change that, so either accept May's agreement with the backstop of have the border in the Irish Sea.

Despite being the Conservative and Union Party, he chose to break up the Union of the UK. Maybe not break it, but fracture it, and this was always going to cause trouble when it became clear, as it would, what it meant in reality. No amound of denials could change the fact that border posts were being built.

Thing is, the GFA was like the Judgement of Solomon, beutiful in its elegance, and underpinning it was the fact that both NI and the Republic, and GB, were in the EU, that borders no longer mattered, as rules, standards and regulations were the same both side. Both Nationalists and Loyalists could claim to be either part of Ireland of the UK, whilst both being true.

Former Conservative Foreign Secretary, Willaim Hague, wrote at the time:

‘Relations between London and Dublin are by far the warmest they have ever been since Irish independence, and the people of Northern Ireland are among the beneficiaries of that.

‘For that, the credit goes to a whole succession of British and Irish leaders, and to the tireless diplomacy of the United States. Yet it has also partly been facilitated by both countries being part of a common framework.

‘If the UK were not in the EU, the impact on such close relations, though hard to quantify, would certainly not be positive.

‘The Good Friday Agreement was based on the assumption that the two countries would be in the EU together, and the various cross-border institutions it established are built on that.

‘Hundreds of millions of euros of European funds are currently diverted into the border region through a special peace programme.

‘Most important of all, the open border between Northern Ireland and the Republic would be called into question.’

Hague also warned, two days before the referendum, that a vote to Leave would endanger all of this.

So Cameron knew, may knew and Johnson knew, and yet May planned one violation, whilst Johnson went the other way, agreed to something he said he never could, and Parliament ratified it.

But its remainer fault. Or the EU's. Or something.

Brexit changed all that, it requires a border.

At least until both sides agree again on common rules, standards and regulations on both sides, of there is some other work-round that can eliminate such checks. Such "alternative arangements" and "max-fac" were mooted for several years, and can be the slution, but they have to be developed and shown to work and be acceptable to the UK Government and the EU. Until then, the NIP is in place.

The GFA states:

‘The British and Irish governments […]

‘Wishing to develop still further the unique relationship between their peoples and the close co-operation between their countries as friendly neighbours and as partners in the European Union’

The agreement also expressly provided that the north-south ministerial council ‘consider the European Union dimension of relevant matters, including the implementation of EU policies and programmes and proposals under consideration in the EU framework. Arrangements to be made to ensure that the views of the Council are taken into account and represented appropriately at relevant EU meetings’.

DAG stated in his blog yesterday :

The Good Friday Agreement is, in terms of its practical importance, perhaps the most significant single constitutional instrument in the politics of the United Kingdom.

It is of far more practical importance than, say, Magna Carta.

It shapes what is – and is not – both politically permissible and politically possible.

It largely explains the curiously elaborate – and, for some, counter-intuitive – nature of Brexit in respect of Northern Ireland.

It meant that the clean absolute break with the European Union sought by many Brexit supporters did not happen.

The Irish border was to be kept open.

But the Good Friday Agreement does not only protect the nationalist community, it also should protect the unionist community.

And the Brexit arrangements – with a trade barrier effectively down the Irish Sea – is seen as much as an affront to the unionists as a visible land border infrastructure would have been an affront to the nationalists.

There is no easy answer to this problem – perhaps there is no answer, easy or hard.

It took membership of the European Union to make the Belfast Agreement possible.

Perhaps there is no alternative geo-political workaround to take its place.

Had the United Kingdom stayed within the single market and the customs union, even if as a matter of legal form it would not technically be a member of the European Union, then perhaps this problem could have been averted.

But the fateful decision by then prime minister Theresa May in the months after the Brexit Referendum that Brexit would mean leaving the single market and the customs union meant that problems in respect of the position of Northern Ireland would become stark.

And as nods to the articles by Hague and Kenny show, it cannot be averred that the United Kingdom government was not warned.