The UK Supreme Court has ruled that a Brexit protocol between Brussels and London is lawful, blocking a bid to scrap the controversial arrangement which governs trade in Northern Ireland.
The so-called Northern Ireland protocol – which keeps Northern Ireland in the European single market and customs union – has proved deeply unpopular with Northern Ireland's pro-UK unionist politicians.
They argue it casts Northern Ireland adrift from the rest of the United Kingdom and makes a united Ireland more likely.
Unionists and a cohort of high-profile Brexit supporters launched a legal challenge, arguing in a hearing last year that the legislation was incompatible with the 1998 Good Friday Belfast Agreement, which ended three decades of violence over British rule in the province.
They also sought to scrap the protocol on the grounds that it was incompatible with the 1800 Act of Union which merged the kingdoms of Britain and Ireland.
But a panel of five Supreme Court judges on Wednesday "unanimously dismissed the appeals" on all grounds argued by the claimants.
Lord Bew: Supreme Court is right to say Northern Ireland's constitutional status is unchanged by protocol ... but even so government must address unionist alienation.https://t.co/JTLKiDkkrI
— Belfast News Letter (@News_Letter) February 9, 2023
'Existential threat'
Northern Ireland has been without a devolved government at the parliament in Stormont after the pro-UK Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) walked out, mainly in protest at the protocol.
The DUP wants the deal overhauled or scrapped entirely.
Responding to Wednesday's ruling, DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson said the case had highlighted his party's problems with the protocol, adding that it was "an existential threat to the future of Northern Ireland's place within the Union."
"The checks on the Irish Sea border are the symptom of the underlying problem, namely, that Northern Ireland is subject to a different set of laws imposed upon us by a foreign entity without any say or vote by any elected representative of the people of Northern Ireland," he added.
Last month, Britain's Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said that talks with the European Union had led to improvements in the row over the protocol's implementation.
"The conversation is happening in good faith, very discreetly and that discretion I think has helped us make real improvements," Cleverly said during a visit to Washington, which is also taking a keen interest in the issue.
Today I have introduced a Bill to create more time for Parties to work together and return to government. An election in the coming weeks will not be helpful or welcome for people in Northern Ireland.
— Chris Heaton-Harris MP (@chhcalling) February 9, 2023
1/3 https://t.co/81B2Oojt3z
More time to form executive
Meanwhile, the British government is giving Northern Ireland more time to form a new power-sharing executive, eliminating the threat of elections that could derail efforts to renegotiate a post-Brexit trade deal for the region.
On Thursday, Northern Ireland Secretary Chris Heaton-Harris introduced legislation extending the deadline for forming a new government by up to a year.
Without the move, elections for the Northern Ireland Assembly would have been required by mid-April after the previous deadline passed on 19 January.
Northern Ireland has been without a government for more than a year after Unionist politicians resigned over their opposition to the protocol.
