Boris Johnson is poised to pull back from an imminent confrontation with the EU over the controversial post-Brexit Northern Ireland Protocol.
It comes after the government reportedly threatened a new law at next week’s Queen’s speech to override parts of arrangement, but the Northern Ireland secretary Brandon Lewis signalled last night this would not happen.
According to The Times, the prime minister, who signed the agreement in 2019, is also said to be giving talks with the EU “one last chance” and will use the upcoming election result in Northern Ireland to urge the bloc to agree reform.
It comes as voters in Northern Ireland head to the ballot box today to vote on the next 90 members of the Assembly representing 18 constituencies — before crucial talks begin over forming the next Stormont executive.
Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, the DUP leader, has urged the government to act on unionists’ concerns around the post-Brexit trading arrangements, criticising them as harmful to the union and calling for Northern Ireland’s position in the UK internal market to be protected.
Earlier this week Sir Jeffrey said he wanted to lead the DUP into a new executive, but stressed issues around the Protocol needed to be “resolved now” and urged the UK government to take “decisive action”.
Asked whether the government is planning to introduce a new law allowing it to waive elements of the controversial protocol, Mr Lewis signalled on Wednesday evening it would not be in the Queen’s Speech on 10 May.
He told an interview with ITV’s Robert Peston: “Our focus is on resolving the issues with the Protocol, ideally we want to do that by agreement with the European Union.”
Pressed on whether an announcement would come next week, the cabinet minister replied: “No… we’ve not said that”.
“What we’ve been clear about is at the moment, the Protocol is causing problems in civic society, it’s causing problems with the Good Friday Agreement,” he added. “Our duty to the people of Northern Ireland is to resolve those issues. Yes, we want to do that with the EU and that’s what Liz Truss has been focused on”.
Mr Lewis later tweeted: “We will do whatever it takes to protect the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement. It is clear that the Protocol does not have the support of the unionist community and is not working for people and businesses in Northern Ireland.
“We have to address the outstanding issues and we want to do that by agreement with the EU, but as we have always made clear, we will not shy away from taking further steps if necessary.”
The European Commission has previously stressed that it is “fully committed” to working with the UK government to “find long-lasting solutions for Norther Ireland”, including certainty for business.
A spokesperson added last month: “Only joint solutions can do that: jointly-agreed solutions. And if you look at it, this approach is working. Only a couple of days ago we reached the solution on medicines for Northern Ireland which was agreed in record time. It’s important to underline that.
“As you know, last October, we came forward with a number of serious, wide-ranging solutions for Northern Ireland. We’ve been working on them since and our intention is to continue working on these solutions with the UK over the coming weeks.”
