More than half of Northern Ireland voters would vote to remain in the UK if a referendum were held. Photo: Peter Morrison
It's been almost eight years since the UK voted to leave the EU, and almost two years since the DUP began its boycott of power-sharing over the Irish Sea border.
Now Brexit could soon finally be “done” in Northern Ireland after Sir Geoffrey Donaldson announced the DUP was backing the deal.
The announcement, made in the early hours of Tuesday morning, came after a supposedly secret meeting lasting more than five hours descended into chaos as Sir Geoffrey clashed with his critics.
So deep are the divisions within the pro-Brexit party . that someone leaked details of Sir Geoffrey's speech to a loyalist activist, who tweeted his remarks about the so-called “surrender deal”.
Hardline unionists and loyalist opposition are not going away anytime soon.
The Irish Sea border, the customs barrier between Great Britain and Northern Ireland created by Brexit, will now remain.
What does this mean for the United Kingdom, which left one of its four countries behind when it left from the EU?
Northern Ireland continues to follow hundreds of EU rules and remains under the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice.< /p>
British goods will be subject to fewer checks when entering Northern Ireland, but border controls still exist. It is essentially part of the single market, just like the Republic.
For many trade unionists, this is tantamount to being trapped inside an economically united Ireland.
Brexit – and disappointment over Stormont's long preservation – has given fresh impetus to the debate over Irish reunification in the region, which voted to remain in the EU in 2016.
Sinn Féin, which wants a united Ireland, has been ousted The DUP as the region's largest political party for the first time in the 2022 Assembly elections and repeated the trick in local elections a year later.
Rebuilding Stormont would mean Michelle O'Neill would become Northern Ireland's first Sinn Féin First Minister for more than 100 years of history of the region.
The Irish Republic is expected to hold an election and poll this year – Sinn Féin leader has a real chance of getting into government.
Sinn Féin, in power in the North and South, will step up calls for a border call. The Nationalist Party predicts a referendum on unity will take place as early as 2030.
But more than half of Northern Ireland voters would vote to remain in the UK if a referendum, which can only be called, were held. if the majority is believed to be in favor of unity.
And the Irish A maritime border could ultimately anchor Northern Ireland in the Union.
The Windsor Framework Treaty gives the region unique and lucrative dual access to UK and EU internal markets, which should make it a magnet for foreign investment.< /p >
Leaving the Union, reuniting the island of Ireland and rejoining the EU will cost the UK's poorest region this double access.
This would mean the same trade barriers between the UK and Ireland as any other EU member state; undoing all the years of work to eliminate them in the form of a kind of “mini-Brexit”.
Details of the government's deal with the DUP have not been made public.
But it is clear that it does not meet any review of the Windsor Framework with Brussels and the DUP's seven tests for any agreement.
It includes £3.3 billion for Stormont, a patriotic border rebrand and Westminster legislation guaranteeing Northern Ireland's place in the UK.
Northern Ireland is one of the anchors, along with the war in Ukraine, the cost of living the crisis and the severity The bloc's single market is slowly dragging the UK back into the EU's orbit.
A future Labor government has promised a veterinary deal with the EU that would further reduce the border, albeit at the cost of closer alignment with Brussels rules.
< p>As The Telegraph reported last week, the government has promised the DUP it will review all new UK laws to ensure they do not create additional trade barriers to the Irish Sea.
Brexit supporters fear what this will bring sacrificing the hard-won freedom to regulate Brexit independently of Brussels and tie the government's hands if it deviates from EU rules.
For the pro-Brexit DUP: this is a Pyrrhic victory and a key factor in returning to Stormont.
p>They are more likely to betray the spirit of Brexit than the spirit of the Union.
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