Now the ball has been passed on to the DUP will they have the courage to pick it up as the UK and EU seek to clinch NI Brexit Deal before February

European Union and British officials are seeking to unlock an agreement on their post-Brexit trade relationship by February and put to rest a contentious dispute that’s overshadowed relations since the UK left the bloc three years ago.

James Cleverly Photographer: Toby Melville/AFP/Getty Images 

◾The NI Protocol has soured EU-UK relations

◾Šefčovič, Cleverly will meet in Brussels on Thursday

           14th December, 2022. 

The two sides have intensified talks over recent weeks on the so-called Northern Ireland protocol after months of stalemate, according to people familiar with the matter. The mood in London and Brussels is more positive than it has been in a while. 

Read More: UK to Delay NI Vote, Hopes for EU Deal First

STORMONT: Maroš Šefčovič outside parliament buildings 

The EU’s Brexit chief, Maros Sefcovic, will meet UK Foreign Secretary James Cleverly in Brussels on Thursday to take political stock of matters. The meeting — their first in person — is not expected to provide an immediate breakthrough but the hope is it will give impetus to accelerate negotiations further in the new year, said the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private discussions.

Any agreement would need the UK to move away from a position that has so far demanded that the European Court of Justice has no role in solving disputes relating to EU law, while the EU would need to further ease hurdles to trade flows between Britain and the North of Ireland and other obstacles such as the free movement of pets, according to one of the people.

The change in mood from EU officials reflects what their UK counterparts have been saying in recent weeks. Bloomberg previously reported that London had decided to delay elections in the North of Ireland to February in order to allow time for the UK and EU to strike a deal by that date.

The hope is to reach a deal well before the April anniversary of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement/Belfast peace agreement, the person said but cautioned that it was not a given as any settlement would likely need to satisfy the Democratic Unionist Party in the North of Ireland and Tory members in Westminster who supported Brexit. From the EU side, possible arrangements would need to respect the bloc’s rulebook.

Read More: Biden to Tap Special Envoy for Northern Ireland to Boost US Sway

A British official said the UK was not softening its stance on the ECJ (European Court of Justice). Any agreement would allow the two sides to move forward and focus on delivering the trade deal part of the UK-EU accords, including cooperation on research programs and a memorandum of understanding on financial services, one of the people said.

The NI Protocol is a key plank of the Brexit deal negotiated and agreed by former Prime Minister Boris Johnson some three years ago now but one that successive UK prime ministers have refused to implement, leading the EU to open several infringement procedures against London.

The protocol is the part of the Brexit agreement that keeps the North of Ireland in the EU customs block to avoid a hard border on the island of Ireland. 

Throughout November, the EU also carried out tests on the UK’s live database for tracking goods flowing from mainland Britain to the North of Ireland. If the bloc is satisfied, it could pave the way for an agreement on customs checks on Brexit Sea Border. 

With many thanks to: Bloomberg News and Alberto Nardelli, Alex Wickham, and Ellen Milligan for the original story. 

Follow this link to to find out more on this story: UK, EU Seek to Clinch NI Brexit Deal by February

— With assistance by Jorge Valero 

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Jamie Bryson: Government's clever legal footwork over the NI Protocol will not hoodwink the PUL

Last week in the High Court there was a remarkable (and illuminating) development, which went largely unnoticed.

      In an intervention in the High Court               last week, the UK Government                submitted that in matters of trade             'the UK is no longer a unitary state' 

     Wednesday 21st September, 2022. 

In the challenge being brought against the entirely legitimate instruction by DUP Minister Edwin Poots to halt Irish Sea border checks, which itself was a response to legal proceedings issued by Unionist Voice Policy Studies, the UK Government intervened.

In this intervention, the UK Government submitted that in matters of trade “the UK is no longer a unitary state”.

It is hard to put into words the significance of that constitutionally outrageous submission. Whilst talking tough and playing up their unionist credentials publicly (and privately), the UK Government are simultaneously telling the High Court that in terms of the trading element of our precious Union, Northern Ireland is no longer truly part of it.

    The PUL community are no fools when          it comes to the NI Protocol, says             (Pound-shop lawyer) Jamie Bryson 

In an illuminating exchange it was pointed out by Mr Justice Colton, and accepted by counsel for the UK Government, that Article 4 of the Protocol (which purports to ensure NI remains within the customs territory of the UK) says one thing, but does another.

In practice, as previously pointed out by distinguished jurist Lord Justice McCloskey, Northern Ireland is more in the EU customs territory than that of the UK.

And that, in practice, is precisely what is in dispute in this case. The issue, it seems, is that the relevant Regulation (2017/625) which requires checks, was never amended to exclude Northern Ireland from the customs territory of the UK.

The UK Government now want the Court to do this for them by simply interpreting the territory as Great Britain and excluding Northern Ireland, without having to bear the political cost of openly removing Northern Ireland from the defined territory of the UK for the purposes of the relevant Regulation.

They want the words to say one thing, but do something else, in the hope no one will notice. Unfortunately for them, it was noticed.

The substance of the point in dispute on its face is highly complex, but in reality it is straightforward. In the Regulations which continued to apply to Northern Ireland post the UK (or, more accurately, Great Britain) leaving the EU, it states that checks are to be carried out at the point of entry into the EU territory.

In the same regulations the UK territory is defined as Great Britain and Northern Ireland; it is obvious to point out therefore that goods moving between GB and NI are not entering EU territory. Therefore, by the letter of the law, there is in fact no legal requirement for checks.

Interestingly, no one now even disputes that is the plain meaning of the relevant legal text, but rather the Court is being urged to ‘interpret’ the problematic provision in a manner that would make it compatible with the ‘intent’ of the Protocol which, it is said, envisages Northern Ireland being effectively part of the EU customs territory.

Put simply, the Court is being asked to overlook the letter of the law, and instead effectively re-write the relevant provision in order to make it fit the Protocol’s objective. It seems trite to point out that exercise isn’t applying the law, but suspiciously close to making law.

If Courts begin substituting an interpretation to reach some politically subjective ‘greater good’, for the clear words of the legislation, Courts enter the political arena, and when they do it is inevitable partisanship, or allegations thereof will arise. If that happens the legitimacy of our entire democratic system, inherent within which is the principle of judicial independence, is undermined.

If, as it seems, the failure to amend the Regulation is an error, then it isn’t for the Court to fix that error in order to prop up the Protocol.

This entire episode displays the duplicity and deceit at the heart of the Protocol. It symbolically says one thing (e.g. NI is to remain in the UK customs territory), but in practice does something entirely different (e.g. Northern Ireland is in fact part of the EU customs territory).

The unionist community are no fools. The majority of us saw the deception the first moment the Protocol was breathed to life, and if the Government thinks they are going to hoodwink us with some clever footwork then they are sadly mistaken.

If the Government want checks entering EU territory, and they want that to mean Northern Ireland, then they must own that and bear the political cost.

The political cost of the Protocol should be well understood.

Let us put it simply, lest the Government be entertaining any false ideas: there will be no power sharing in Northern Ireland until - as a matter of law and in practice - Northern Ireland is restored to a full part of the United Kingdom in line with the Acts of Union.

With many thanks to the: News Letter and Jamie Bryson - Pound-shop lawyer for the original story. 

Jamie Bryson is the author of Let's Talk (Utter Bollocks) Loyalism and author of Constitutional Law: Acts of Union and NI Protocol

Follow these links to find out more on this story: Border poll 'yes' vote would require British parliament consent

Brexit: NI Protocol is Working and gives our economy a boost in the North of Ireland

Ulster Bank economist Richard Ramsey suggesting it's now a pretty safe assumption that the Protocol has boosted food manufacturing in NI: food and beverage output amongst NI manufacturers has increased

Jamie Bryson: Government's clever legal footwork over the NI Protocol will not hoodwink unionists

DUP being allowed to scatter Good Friday Agreement to the winds.

The DUP and loyalists should not be allowed to scatter Good Friday Agreement to the wind. 

      ALL STRANDS: Of the Good Friday     

      Agreement must be implemented in          full - Free From Sectarian Haressment 

                   08 August, 2022. 

Micheál Martin, Leo Varadkar and the rag-tag group of meaningless individuals that constitute the incumbent Free State government should hang their heads in abject shame at the way in which they have allowed the Good Friday Agreement (GFA) to be scattered to the winds by the DUP and the British government.

As co-guarantors of the GFA, it is their responsibility to ensure the workings of all three strands of the agreement, and they have failed miserably in every way possible. The British government is the other co-guarantor of the GFA, but one can expect little from this shamed institution which is currently in turmoil, and which will continue to use the six counties for the benefit of its own selfish interests. The Irish government is so enmeshed in simply keeping itself in power that it has neither the time nor the interest in protecting the GFA and is allowing the DUP, a party which never supported the agreement, to use it for party political gain.

The complete lack of interest being shown by the government in the south should be of no surprise to nationalists in the north as previous governments have also shirked their responsibility in actively encouraging an all-Ireland approach on the island. Now, however, the government of the south is sitting idly by while the DUP uses the Agreement as a bargaining tool with the British government to get their own way over the Northern Ireland Protocol. 

The DUP are, in fact, holding the whole population of the six counties – unionist and nationalist – to ransom at a time of great economic poverty and in the midst of a lethal pandemic. They are being allowed to do this virtually unchallenged, and while families are struggling to put food on their tables and heat in their homes, the DUP are solely interested in their own narrow and selfish political aims. Unionist families, as well as nationalist families, are suffering now on a daily basis and the DUP appears not to care enough to put people before politics

  Loyalist paramilitaries want to continue     breeding hatred and division into their         own communities to suck their own           areas dry and paramilitary leaders 

                       in control 

Every other party in the north, except the TUV of course, have called on the DUP to stop preventing the institutions from getting up and running, all the parties in Britain have called for the same as have the political parties in the south, along with the administration in the US.

All these calls have fallen on deaf ears. There is a way out of this impasse if the two co-guarantors are serious about protecting the agreement which is clearly being abused by Donaldson and company.

         Recent images posted by anti-                   agreement loyalist groups who                 wish to pull its young people back            into the past of hatred and division.         

Simply introduce some changes to the rules as they did at St Andrews and get all three strands working as they are supposed to, and get the much-needed help out to the people who are currently struggling to make ends meet. That simple change would be to offer the DFM post to the next largest unionist party if the largest refuses to comply with the rules. 

SEAN SEELEY

Craigavon, Co Armagh. 

With many thanks to: The Irish News for the original publication. 

Follow these links to find out more on this story: Cleric rejects Dee Stitt’s suggestion that UDA/UFF part of ‘Protestant culture’ as Jamie Bryson announces north Down loyalist is ‘a client’

DUP Lies Won't let Protocol facts get in way of Brexit devotion

Cambridge academic says senior Tories are 'woefully and willfully' misunderstanding the protocol's impact on the Good Friday Agreement

DUP being allowed to scatter Good Friday Agreement to the winds.

The British Government's top law officer Attorney General Suella Braverman who advised Boris Johnson to rip up the NI Protocol

The Government’s top law officer declared her love for Britain and named her heroes when challenged over the leak of Brexit legal advice.

           Thursday 26th May,2022.  

Attorney General Suella Braverman sidestepped a call from Labour to say if she played a role in the Northern Ireland Protocol briefings.

Thursday 26th May, 2022. 

Instead, she began comparing herself to her Labour counterpart and told the Commons: “My heroes are Churchill and Thatcher, hers are Lenin and Corbyn.”

Shadow attorney general Emily Thornberry was left open-mouthed at the response and complained that Ms Braverman had failed to answer the question, with Deputy Speaker Dame Eleanor Laing intervening to remind MPs of the need to “stick to the specific subject of the question”.

    Attorney General Suella Braverman

The protocol is aimed at avoiding a hard border with Ireland but has created a series of economic barriers on Irish Sea trade.

The UK Government last week announced its intention to table legislation at Westminster that would override parts of the protocol without the approval of the EU, amid the ongoing power-sharing impasse at Stormont.

For Labour, Ms Thornberry told the Commons: “The Attorney General has said again today that there’s a long-standing convention that prevents her discussing either the fact or the content of her legal advice on the Northern Ireland Protocol, which makes it all the more remarkable that on Wednesday May 11 The Times newspaper and BBC Newsnight not only disclosed the fact of her legal advice but actually quoted from its contents.

“So, can I ask the Attorney General one very straightforward question, which only requires a yes or no answer: did she personally authorise the briefings to The Times and to Newsnight regarding her advice on the protocol, yes or no?”

Ms Braverman replied: “I take the convention incredibly seriously; it is a running thread through the integrity and robustness and the frankness with which law officers can provide advice.

“I don’t comment on media speculation and that is the Government’s line.”

She went on to defend the Government’s proposals, before adding: “There are big differences between (Ms Thornberry) and myself and I’m very disappointed at the line of attack that she is taking.

“I love the United Kingdom; the right honourable lady is embarrassed by our flag.

“I’m proud of the leadership the United Kingdom has demonstrated, and the right honourable lady wants us to be run by Brussels and wants to scrap Trident.

“My heroes are Churchill and Thatcher, hers are Lenin and Corbyn.”

In 2014, Ms Thornberry was sacked from the Labour frontbench for a tweet apparently sneering at a white van driver’s display of the cross of St George on his house months after the World Cup.

Earlier, DUP MP Ian Paisley (North Antrim) said the Government is “well within its rights” to bring forward legislation to “protect the integrity” of the UK’s single economic market and the union.

He said: “Could the Attorney General take the opportunity today at the despatch box to spell out to the misinformed US Congress delegation visiting Northern Ireland that defending and upholding and protecting the union is consistent with the New Decade, New Approach agreement and consistent with the Belfast Agreement?”

Mr Paisley asked the Government to bring forward legislation before the summer recess in July.

Ms Braverman replied: “The Bill that is proposed will take vital steps to protect the integrity of the United Kingdom, our precious union and protect peace, which is cemented by the Belfast Agreement.”

She said the proposals are “consistent” with the Belfast Agreement and Northern Ireland’s “place within the United Kingdom”, adding: “I urge all members here and parliamentarians abroad to support them.”

With many thanks to the: News Letter and the PA Reporter for the original publication. 

Follow these links to find out more on this story and more information and on Suella Braverman the British Attorney General: When even the Attorney General flouts the law what hope does Britain have - Suella Braverman.

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‘My heroes are Churchill and Thatcher’: Attorney General Suella Braverman’s response to Northern Ireland Protocol question