Northern Ireland Protocol

Thornton Manor in Merseyside, where secretive breakthrough talks between Boris Johnson and Leo Varadkar took place in October 2019

The Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland, commonly abbreviated to the Northern Ireland Protocol, is a protocol to the Brexit withdrawal agreement that sets out Northern Ireland’s post-Brexit relationship with both the EU and Great Britain.[1] The Withdrawal Agreement, including the Protocol, came into effect on 1 January 2021.[1] Citing the island of Ireland's "unique circumstances," the Protocol governs unique arrangements on the island between the United Kingdom and the European Union; it regulates some aspects of trade in goods between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom.[2]

The Protocol's arrangements, under which Northern Ireland but not the rest of the UK remains in the EU single market for goods,[3] allow the maintenance of the open border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. The establishment of the open border was a key aspect of the Northern Ireland Peace Process and Good Friday Agreement which ended the Northern Ireland Conflict. The Protocol instead creates a de facto customs border in the Irish Sea between Northern Ireland and Great Britain.[4][5][6]

Principally to address concerns of Ulster Unionists about the Protocol, in 2022-23 the EU and UK agreed revised arrangements for its operation – the Windsor Framework – which took effect on 24 March 2023.[1] The Democratic Unionist Party declined to accept the Framework as meeting their concerns until further adjustments to its operation were agreed on 31 January 2024 and the formation of a new Northern Ireland Executive began.[7]

  1. ^ a b c "Northern Ireland Protocol: The Windsor Framework" (PDF). House of Commons Library. March 2023. Archived from the original (PDF) on 6 May 2024.
  2. ^ "AGREEMENT on the withdrawal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland from the European Union and the European Atomic Energy Community". Official Journal of the European Union. Document 12020W/TXT (L 29/7). 31 January 2020. Archived from the original on 28 March 2024.
  3. ^ "Brexit Questions and Answers". Northern Ireland Assembly. 2023. Archived from the original on 2 February 2024.
  4. ^ "Brexit: What is in Boris Johnson's new deal with the EU?". BBC News. 21 October 2019. Archived from the original on 9 April 2024. Retrieved 2 January 2020.
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference bbcNewDeal2 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ Parker, George; Brunsden, Jim (11 October 2019). "How Boris Johnson moved to break the Brexit deadlock". Financial Times. Retrieved 2 January 2020.
  7. ^ Carroll, Rory; Courea, Eleni (31 January 2024). "Northern Ireland to get new Brexit trade rules in deal to restore power sharing". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 20 February 2024.

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