The Government for some time now have been deceitful to the people of Northern Ireland, that the Windsor Framework and these regulations are for our own benefit in Northern Ireland, I would argue that the impact of these regulations is to deepen the reality of the border down the Irish Sea rather than to remove it.
The people of Northern Ireland feel betrayed by this Government, the Prime Minister even said on 27th February 2023 the Framework “removed any sense of Border in the Irish Sea”, we know that this clearly is not the case and these Regulations prove that.
On 7th November 2019, Boris Johnson when asked about customs forms and papers, replied “If somebody asks you to do that, tell them to ring up the Prime Minister and I will direct them to throw that form in the bin. There will be no forms, no checks, no barriers of any kind. You will have unfettered access.” Sadly, this is simply untrue.
The Government claimed they had removed the Irish Sea border, but this is not so. It is clear that in fact even those trading solely within the UK internal market must obtain ‘authorisation’ to trade less restrictively, but certainly not freely, via the ‘green lane’. In order to obtain this authorisation, a customs declaration must be completed, this is not free trade within an internal market of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
The scenes yesterday evening at the Second Delegated Legislation Committee on the Postal Packets (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2023, Members who did not agree with the Regulations and may have voted against them were removed by the Government, this is total and utter skullduggery from the Whips Office.