Frost’s departure must not lead to a softer UK stance with the EU: Editorial

Frost showed how standing up for British interests could get results – the UK Government must not be cowed into making concessions that secedes Northern Ireland to the EU

Montage © Facts4EU.Org 2021

For Liz Truss, taking on Frost’s role is a poisoned chalice; for the PM it is his last chance to live up to his word

A Facts4EU.Org editorial

It is not often that Facst4EU.org is moved to publish solely an editorial piece light on facts. The resignation of Lord Frost is however of such import that our good habits of seeking to be evidence-based must be broken – for a good reason.

The resignation of Lord Frost as the UK Government’s chief Brexit negotiator is a seminal moment of catastrophe among many calamities that have befallen this pro-Brexit Government (many, it has to be said, unforced and of its own making.)

Yes, the Northern Ireland Protocol that Lord Frost was seeking to amend was originally negotiated by him and signed off by the Prime Minister – but let’s not miss the point. The UK Government had been put in a bind by a Remainer Parliament passing the Benn Act – the sub-optimal deal then negotiated was a means to leave the EU. It was an unsatisfactory means, not being complete and equal for the whole of the UK, but it was a means to get out and then live to fight another day.

The vindictive EU and the attempted unification of Ireland

True to form, and as many such as this website and a few others predicted, the EU, rather than be magnanimous and co-operative having won an advantage in retaining part of the UK within the Single Market and Customs Union, then sought to turn the screw.

The Northern Ireland Protocol became a bludgeon with which to punish the UK by seeking to turn us against ourselves. More checks were being made on goods entering Northern Ireland from mainland Britain than were being made on those from mainland Britain into the EU channel ports – despite the latter being considerably larger by volume and value.

Worse still, there was some evidence that NI-GB trade was being substituted by NI-RoI trade, so that the economic future of Northern Ireland would re-orientate away from the British mainland towards the Irish Republic. Thus the constitutional implications of the NI Protocol were also slowly being revealed.

Breaking the Act of Union and the Good Friday Agreement

Astonishingly it was established that the Act of Union of 1801 that founded the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland – guaranteeing unrestricted trade between all the parts of the UK – had been breached by the EU Withdrawal Act repealing “implicitly” aspects of the Act of Union.

Unashamedly the UK Government admitted as much when defending the Protocol in the Judicial Review brought by Unionist leaders together with former MEP Ben Habib and the former Labour MP, Baroness Kate Hoey.

Further, by not seeking the consent of the Northern Irish people for adopting this process of amending the Act of Union the terms of the Belfast (GFA) Agreement were broken. Ironically this was done all in the name of peace, yet it risks the Belfast Agreement retaining acceptance in the Unionist community and the very preservation of peace.

Lord Frost identified these emerging flaws relatively quickly, as they became so onerous that extension of the periods of grace whereby certain checks were not required were extended.

Lord Frost stood his ground

Frost was then assailed by all sorts of critics aspiring to a united Ireland or reasserting the authority of the EU over the UK, calling on him to back down and agree to whatever the EU offered. He stood his ground and threatened to invoke Article 16 which would suspend the Protocol and allow the UK to impose its own customs procedures on all of its own land.

Frost’s stubbornness brought the EU to the bargaining table when EU Commissioners had said they would not renegotiate. Now they plainly are renegotiating and it is only their British fifth column that gives them solace when they are the abusers in the relationship.

Frost was also clearly holding out for change in regard to the superiority of the European Courts of Justice over disputes that might arise from the Northern Ireland Protocol – despite being undermined by a nameless civil servant briefing against his position without authority. Have no doubts, the Remainer establishment Blob continues its nefarious work.

But for all that, now he has gone. Apparently not because of the lack of Government or Party support he was receiving in trying to reform or repeal the Protocol – but because of the direction of travel that Boris Johnson’s government is now taking over the economy, dealing with ‘climate change’ and facing up to the pandemic.

[ Sources: Opinion article ] Politicians and journalists can contact us for details, as ever.

Brexit Facts4EU.Org, Tues 21 Dec 2021

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