Brexit. Why do Brits want Out of the EU?

Well, how difficult is it to get a Spanish drivers license? What's the problem?

At any rate, my concern is that fellow with the Dutch wife. Why wouldn't she be allowed to move to the UK?

Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland results out later on today.

The Foreign Secretary will reportedly move to discard large portions of the Northern Ireland Protocol after giving up on Brexit negotiations with the EU.

The Times reported officials working for Liz Truss have drawn up draft legislation to unilaterally remove the need for checks on all goods being sent from Britain for use in Northern Ireland.

The law would also ensure businesses in Northern Ireland are able to disregard EU rules and regulations and remove the power of the European Court of Justice to rule on issues relating to the region, the paper said.

Importantly, the bill would override the protocol agreed by Prime Minister Boris Johnson in 2019 and mean the UK had breached its obligations under the Brexit agreement.

The Times said Ms Truss is understood to have concluded talks with the EU and has been told the proposed bill could lead to a trade war with the bloc.

The government’s chief law officer Suella Braverman is said to have approved the scrapping of swathes of the agreement, giving the PM legal cover to make the move – despite White House and EU warnings against unilateral action.

Ms Braverman has advised that legislation to ditch protocol checks on goods would be legally sound because of the “disproportionate and unreasonable” way it has been implemented, according to The Times and the BBC.

The attorney general has submitted evidence accusing the EU of undermining the Good Friday Agreement by creating a trade barrier in the Irish Sea, and warned of “societal unrest” in Northern Ireland.
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Mr Johnson argued that the Good Friday Agreement was more important than the Northern Ireland Protocol – as the idea of possible response from the EU to impose trade sanction on the UK as “crazy”.

He said there was no need for “drama” from the EU as he doubled down on the idea of overriding elements of the deal unilaterally.

But Mr Johnson told BBC News on Wednesday: “Let’s face it, we’re talking about really, in the scheme of things, a very, very small part of the whole European economy … It is crazy. I didn’t think there’s any need for drama. This is something that just needs to be fixed.”

However, there is said to be a rift in the cabinet over the move, with Ms Truss, Ms Braverman and Brexit opportunities minister Jacob Rees-Mogg reportedly in favour, while chancellor Rishi Sunak is concerned about the impact on the economy.

Speaking to ITV’s Peston programme, Mr Rees-Mogg said the UK would not involve itself in any trade war with the EU. “Tit-for-tat retaliation of that kind is the economics of the school ground and it would damage British consumers at a time of rising (prices),” he said.

Northern Ireland minister Conor Burns said on Wednesday evening that the UK Government would have to take unilateral action over the protocol if it could not resolve issues with the EU.

“If the EU are saying to us that…. then we will have to take actions to prioritise stability in Northern Ireland, powersharing in Northern Ireland, to protect the institutions of the Good Friday Agreement, and that will mean intervention unilaterally, yes.”

German chancellor Olaf Scholz has warned: “No-one should unilaterally cancel, break or in any way attack the settlement.”

The White House stressed the need for talks to continue to resolve the issues, with a spokesman saying: “We urge the parties to continue engaging in dialogue to resolve differences and bring negotiations to a successful conclusion.”

DUP leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson reiterated his call for the government to take action, saying: “The UK government is well within its rights to act in these circumstances.”

Officials working for Ms Truss are drawing up draft legislation to unilaterally remove the need for checks on all goods being sent from Britain for use in Northern Ireland.

Claims that the UK government has discovered a legal justification for tearing up large parts of Brexit arrangements in Northern Ireland have been greeted with scorn by expert lawyers.

The attorney general, Suella Braverman, has reportedly approved overriding the Northern Ireland protocol on the grounds that it is being unfairly enforced by the EU. Her submission, understood to be based on external advice, claims the EU’s “disproportionate and unreasonable” implementation is undermining the Good Friday agreement (GFA), according to the Times.

But George Peretz QC, a barrister who specialises in EU law, told the Guardian: “I can’t see how any lawyer could possibly advise the government that they’ve got a slam-dunk case. What I’ve seen so far doesn’t give them sustainable legal cover.”

Sir Jonathan Jones, who resigned as head of the government’s legal department in 2020 when ministers last threatened to ditch parts of the protocol, told BBC Radio 4’s PM programme: “The government knew about the Good Friday agreement when it entered into this protocol, and the protocol is said to be a way of protecting the interests of the Good Friday agreement. So the idea that now becomes a basis for walking away from the protocol I think is very problematic.”

On Thursday the foreign secretary, Liz Truss, reiterated UK plans to scrap parts of the protocol, telling the EU’s Brexit negotiator it was a matter of “internal peace and security”.

According to the Times, Braverman’s advice says the GFA has “primordial significance” over the protocol and its current implementation is creating “societal unrest”.

Peretz said: “‘Primordial significance’ is not a legal term that I’ve ever come across.”

Catherine Barnard, a professor in EU law at Trinity College, Cambridge, agreed. She said: “There is no hierarchy of treaties in law. The GFA may be a political priority, but it has no primacy in law.”

She said the UK could come up with a legal argument for invoking article 16, which allows for suspending some obligations under the protocol, if specific difficulties could be proved. But this was “very limited” in scope and time, and subject to review.

She said the legal requirement for ditching the protocol was “an extremely high bar”.

Peretz reckoned the government would struggle to justify invoking article 16 based on economic problems, because these were known about in advance. “It was pretty obvious to both parties that putting a border down the Irish Sea was going to divert trade, so that would be a bizarre argument,” he said.

He added that growing sectarian tensions, reportedly cited by Braverman, would not be enough to overturn an international treaty. “In international law, social unrest is not a basis for denouncing a treaty which you’ve signed,” Peretz said.

Braverman’s reported claim about the primacy of the GFA over the protocol also runs counter to the text of the agreement, Peretz said. “Article 1.3 says the protocol is not only consistent with the GFA but necessary to it,” he said.

He pointed out that this principle had been upheld in the court of appeal. “The government itself has argued strenuously in court that the protocol is entirely consistent with the GFA, so I don’t see how this can possibly get off the ground.”

Barnard called for Braverman’s advice to be made public.

Peretz said the government may be reluctant to publish. He said: “When I was a government lawyer 30 years ago, it was drummed into me that you never ever published the attorney general’s advice. The advice may be guarded and nuanced, and say that the arguments against are quite strong. To publish something like that is not that impressive.”

Some lawyers have backed the government’s plans for a bill to override the protocol. They include Martin Howe, the chair of the pro-Brexit group Lawyers for Britain.

In a Telegraph article last month, he wrote: “The EU must be brought to recognise that no sovereign and independent state can long tolerate a part of its territory being subject to foreign courts and laws. The EU would understand that once the bill became law they would lose the power to continue to impose the protocol.”

Peretz said this was a minority view among lawyers. He said: “If the advice is all about the conditions for exercising article 16, this is something the government might arguably be able to run. As to whether there’s an argument for simply ditching parts of the treaty on the basis that the text isn’t binding on the UK any more, that’s much more difficult. And I think there’s general agreement about that.”

He added: “I have no idea the extent to which the government has hawked around the bar until it found a lawyer who is prepared to say what it wants. But that’s possible.”

The UK government is threatening to write new laws to allow it to unilaterally override parts of the Northern Ireland Brexit protocol due to concerns over “peace and stability”.

But what options are open to the UK, given the protocol was part of a legally binding international treaty co-signed with the EU?

Catherine Barnard, a professor of EU law at the University of Cambridge, thinks there are five options to consider.

Article 16 of the protocol

This is the most oft-cited set of clauses allowing for “safeguard measures” which could include a pause of the checks and controls on goods crossing the Irish Sea in the event of “serious economic, societal or environmental difficulties that are liable to persist” or in the event that there is “diversion of trade”.

In a statement earlier this week, the government said 200 retailers had stopped delivering to customers in Northern Ireland.

But while article 16 allows the UK to take “safeguard measures”, this has already effectively been put in place through earlier unilateral action to suspend the checks on many goods.

The section of the protocol also requires the UK to give the EU a month’s notice that it is invoking article 16 and the protective measures must be reviewed with the EU in the joint committee every three months.

As a negotiating tool, this is not strong. But it could score points among unionists and Brexiter backbenchers.

Article 7 (a) of the withdrawal agreement

This gives direct effect to the supremacy of the withdrawal agreement over domestic law. It covers all three elements in the agreement – the Irish border, citizens’ rights and the divorce bill.

To invoke it fully would be tantamount to walking away from the Brexit deal entirely.

Using article 7 (a) would be very serious because it would mean removing the entire agreement which would remove citizens’ rights too. What the government could be looking at doing is just turning the agreement off in respect to anything to do with the Northern Ireland protocol.

Section 8 (c) of the Withdrawal Act 2020

This enables the UK to implement updates to any EU directives in relation to the Northern Ireland trading arrangements without having to go through an act of parliament.

It results in what is known as “dynamic alignment” of British and EU laws in this limited geographical area of the UK. This would delight the unionists who have complained that the UK’s sovereign right to make its own laws for the entire country has been undermined by the protocol.

Section 38 (b) of the Withdrawal Act 2018

This is known as the Bill Cash clause, which recognises that the parliament of the UK is sovereign. While the clause has been frequently referred to in EU scrutiny committee hearings chaired by Cash, a veteran Eurosceptic, it has never been challenged. It is also seen as stating the obvious, and is unlikely to be the core of legal manoeuvres made by the foreign secretary, Liz Truss.

Article 62 of the Vienna Convention

Barnard thinks this is where Truss and the attorney general for England and Wales, Suella Braverman, could be focusing their legal arguments.

The 1969 pact allows for a country to withdraw from an international treaty when “a fundamental change of circumstances which has occurred with regard to those existing at the time of the conclusion of a treaty, and which was not foreseen by the parties, may not be invoked as a ground for terminating or withdrawing from the treaty”.

Barnard says this would be open to challenge, as all parties knew about the divisions in Northern Ireland and the Belfast Good Friday agreement includes mechanisms to respect all parts of the community.

Plans to shred parts of the Northern Ireland protocol “would send headlines around the world” that the UK is prepared to break treaties, Ireland’s foreign minister has said, as a British cabinet minister insisted the UK did not intend to break the law.

The business secretary, Kwasi Kwarteng, said the UK had “the right to act in a sovereign way” and to “reopen or re-examine the protocol” but denied the actions would constitute a breach of international law.

Boris Johnson will travel to Belfast on Monday, where he will vow not to scrap the protocol negotiated as part of the Brexit deal, and said he is only seeking reform that has “the broadest possible cross-community support”.

In a move to put pressure back on parties at Stormont, Johnson will urge them to “get back to work” after the Democratic Unionists blocked the election of a Speaker at the Stormont assembly on Friday, meaning the assembly is unable to function.

Signs that the government was rowing back its rhetoric on the protocol came amid mixed messaging over a trade war, with Johnson allies claiming he had a “conciliatory” call with Ireland’s taoiseach last week. However the Irish Times on Saturday reported Irish sources describing it as “the single worst call he has ever had with anyone”.

On Sunday, Simon Coveney, Ireland’s foreign minister, “criticised sabre-rattling and grandstanding” from ministers over the past week, including reported plans by the UK foreign secretary, Liz Truss, for a bill on Tuesday which would unilaterally override parts of the protocol in order to lift checks on goods crossing the Irish Sea.

Johnson has already been warned that dozens of Conservative MPs will attempt to stop the bill becoming law if it reaches the later stages – though many see it as a negotiating tactic.

Coveney said the behaviour of UK ministers was “creating a lot of tension in my country, your closest neighbour, and also potentially being on the verge of making a decision that could fundamentally undermine the functioning of the institutions of the peace process in Northern Ireland”, he told Sophy Ridge on Sunday on Sky News.

He said the majority of people in Northern Ireland were in favour of the protocol. “There is a minority, a large minority within unionism, who are unhappy with the protocol,” he said.

“There are solutions that we can put in place that can ease that concern and that’s what we need to focus on doing together, as opposed to the British government acting on its own, illegally in a way that doesn’t reflect majority opinion in Northern Ireland and perhaps, most importantly, sends a message to the world that this British government when it suits them will set aside international law.”

He said that the relations between Britain and Ireland were being fundamentally damaged because of “unhelpful briefings that we’re getting from very, very senior levels within the British government this week”.

Coveney said the EU had not threatened any specific retaliation – though several European parliamentarians have said there will be consequences, including the potential suspension of the trade deal, should the UK government act unilaterally.

“There’s no way the EU can compromise if the UK is threatening unilateral action to pass domestic legislation to set aside international obligations under an international treaty that, don’t forget, the UK was the primary designer of along with the EU,” he said.

“We can get there to a landing zone if we work in partnership. But, you know, sabre-rattling and grandstanding in Westminster ratcheting up tension is not the way to do it.”

Kwarteng said the UK had a right to act unilaterally contained within article 16 of the protocol – though sources close to Truss have briefed that invoking article 16 is not the route the government intends to take.

“Political stability in Northern Ireland is our number one priority,” Kwarteng told Ridge. “We should be able to act in a sovereign way. Northern Ireland is as much part of the United Kingdom as England, Cornwall, the south-east, and we are responsible for that.”

He said he did not think there would ultimately be a trade war with the EU and that any imposition of tariffs would be likely to take considerable time.

“I don’t think there is going to be a trade war. There has been a lot of talk, a lot of threats about what the EU will or won’t do. That is up to them,” he told the BBC’s Sunday Morning programme.

“As far as I am concerned, our primary duty as the British government is to look after political stability in Northern Ireland. If that means re-looking at the protocol, we absolutely have to do that.

“I think this talk of a trade war is irresponsible and I think it is completely getting ahead of ourselves. It is up to the EU. We think it would be completely self-defeating if they went into a trade war, but that is up to them.”

Boris Johnson has said a legal move to ditch parts of the Northern Ireland protocol is only an “insurance” policy, as it emerged that the controversial legislation has been delayed for some weeks.

Liz Truss, the foreign secretary, is expected to give a combative statement on Tuesday threatening to bring forward the draft legislation, after a cabinet discussion on Northern Ireland.

However, the timetable for the draft laws has now slipped, with the text now only promised before the summer break, according to Whitehall sources.

The prime minister came under sharp criticism from all sides on Monday when he flew into Belfast in an effort to revive the devolved government at Stormont, amid the continuing row over the protocol.

One of the major sticking points is the protocol aligning Northern Ireland’s trade with the EU rather than the rest of the UK, with the DUP refusing to return to power-sharing without major changes.

During his visit, Johnson said he was committed to negotiations with the EU on the protocol but that he would not be dragging his heels on potential legislation if talks did not result in a solution.

He said: “We would love this to be done in a consensual way with our friends and partners, ironing out the problems, stopping some of these barriers east-west.

“But to get that done, to have the insurance, we need to proceed with a legislative solution as well.”

Johnson said the UK does not want to “scrap” the Northern Ireland protocol, but believes it can be “fixed”.

He told broadcasters during a trip to Belfast: “We don’t want to scrap it. But we think it can be fixed.And actually five of the five parties I talked to today also think it needs reform.”

No 10 has not appeared to be as keen as Truss on the option of legislation to undermine the protocol in recent days.

One diplomatic source said one of the prime minister’s top aides had been privately telling people that the government was very committed to negotiations and no decision had been taken on pressing ahead with the legislation.