Brexit Min Frost: EU riding roughshod over NI protocol, ignoring 'political sensitivities'

Accusing the EU of enforcing "overly strict” Northern Ireland (NI) Protocol on the UK, Brexit minister Lord Frost on October 31, Sunday said that not only European Union has behaved "without regard to the huge political, economic and identity sensitivities" but also has “destroyed cross-community consent.” As relations between the UK, and EU deteriorated over the post-Brexit NI protocol, the former UK Cabinet office minister and ex-chief negotiator for Brexit derided the EU’s failure in achieving a middle ground for a workable approach in Northern Ireland. 

His remarks, made in the foreword to a new paper for the Policy Exchange think tank came as the UK and the EU put forward their proposals to address the challenges and dispute over the NI protocol. Frost outlined the EU’s negotiating position as he asserted that there was "ambiguity about what was required from the UK". 

Post-Brexit agreement without reciprocal commitments

In the paper, The Northern Ireland Protocol: the origins of the current crisis published by UK’s leading think tank Roderick Crawford, Frost described that the Brexit process was hampered due to the early decisions reached in 2017. When the UK published its Northern Ireland paper in August 2017; it was solid on the Belfast Agreement but much less so on how to actually avoid a hard border — its customs proposals and its waivers for small businesses. "This was immediately rejected by Brussels," Frost revealed. The latter provided the chronology of Brexit negotiations and noted what went wrong.

He revealed that he had considered stepping down from his role as a foreign affairs special adviser to Boris Johnson, who was UK’s foreign secretary at that time, after a joint report was drafted and he noticed that the “crucial pass had been sold”. Frost stated that making this post-Brexit agreement without reciprocal commitments to secure the balance of the Belfast Agreement and accommodate the UK dimension to Northern Ireland "was the origin of the core flaw in the Northern Ireland Protocol". Furthermore, he accused the EU of deliberately not signing up to support East-West cooperation or to protect the UK internal market. 

"It was in the Joint Report that the core commitment was made that in order to avoid a hard border Northern Ireland would remain aligned with the necessary EU regulations to secure continued and future NorthSouth cooperation, the all-island economy, and to protect the Good Friday Agreement," Frost the chief Brexit negotiator claimed in the report.

He added, "Though the commitment to alignment encompassed the whole UK, this is not what was meant." 

Frost condemned the EU, saying that its focus since the start and its response to the UK’s interpretation of the Belfast Agreement was "to counter it, not respect it, learn from it or engage with it". He went on to add that the EU published its own "guiding principles". He stated that in December the protocols agreed by the UK were a result of the “extreme weakness” of the Theresa May administration. And even as the joint EU UK report was changed to accommodate the DUP, the Irish border solutions were put in a legally binding withdrawal agreement rather than trade in the future. Frost asserted that protocol’s terms were enforced on the UK, and the country's initial priority for avoiding a hard border was ignored. "The UK accepted the EU’s ‘guiding principles’ paper without gaining any concessions from the EU to address key UK concerns," Frost revealed.