BREAK: The UK drops all its 'law breaking' clauses - including plans for more in forthcoming taxation bill - after @michaelgove
and
@MarosSefcovic agree deal on terms of implementing Northern Irish Protocol. 1/

https://t.co/MdBbcI8vjd

@michaelgove @MarosSefcovic This is obviously very good news - recalling that it relates to the implementation of last autumn's deal to allow #Brexit to happen without returning a trade border to island of Ireland...but leaving one in the Irish Sea. /2
@michaelgove @MarosSefcovic The statement says that the two sides have determined "criteria for goods to be considered 'not at risk' of entering the EU" - though the extent to which goods pay tariffs UK-EU will depend on whether we get an FTA with the EU. (Even if we do, some still will) /3
@michaelgove @MarosSefcovic The two sides have also agreed on the 'reachback' of Article 10 or the "application of State aid under the terms of the Protocol" which the UK govt feared could be used to constrain UK govt subsidy decisions after January 1 /4
@michaelgove @MarosSefcovic This was because EU state aid law applied to UK in respect of NI Goods - so risk of 'catching' a UK decision to, say, give a bank a tax break if it had NI Clients...thereby blowing hole in @BorisJohnson 'sovereign' Brexit. An understanding has been reached here. /5
@michaelgove @MarosSefcovic @BorisJohnson Other bits also seem to have been sorted - for example the 'chilled meats' question (EU rules say all exports to third countries of prepared meats must be frozen)...we'll see if that can be applied GB-EU if/when we get FTA /6
@michaelgove @MarosSefcovic @BorisJohnson It looks (we await details) as if there is a fix on export summary declarations for goods going NI-GB, which was subject of the other 'notwithstanding' clauses that UK is now dropping. /7
@michaelgove @MarosSefcovic @BorisJohnson Industry will now wait for full details of how the Irish Sea border is going to operate...and what it means for those not lucky enough to have authorised operator exemptions or fall under a supermarket scheme - wholesalers, parcel operators and small traders etc /8
@michaelgove @MarosSefcovic @BorisJohnson So then, the big question: Does this bring us closer to an FTA? Or even pave the way for a 'no deal' - given that this now puts something of a political floor under that eventuality, assuming the pacts holds for NIP in event of an acrimonious 'no deal'. Can argue it both ways. /9
@michaelgove @MarosSefcovic @BorisJohnson But that is for the future - for now the implementation of the Protocol has (finally) been put on an agreed footing and a pretty damaging episode (in my view) for UK international credibility has a line drawn under it.

The devil now will be in the detail. /10
@michaelgove @MarosSefcovic @BorisJohnson Because as yesterday's thread explained, for a lot of businesses this clarity (and we hope information, tho we wait no tariffs) is coming just too late - in part, I suspect, because this whole deal was delayed by the lawbreaking gambit./11

https://t.co/IzEhY13An0
@michaelgove @MarosSefcovic @BorisJohnson In any event, it is going to be a very testing January as the UK ingests the reality of a pretty full fat Irish Sea trade border that some will decry, particularly if we're in a no deal world and the trucks are backing up at Dover etc. /12
@michaelgove @MarosSefcovic @BorisJohnson The arguments advanced over the summer by hardcore Brexiters of @CentreBrexit asking for the end of the Withdrawal Agreement risk coming back, if all (four) sides don't make this work. ENDS

https://t.co/sNrokYZtjl

More from Peter Foster

Another head-banging day for the £112bn UK creative sector that is starting to ingest how difficult #Brexit is going to make their lives - and how little the government is really willing to do to fix the lack of a 'mobility' chapter in the EU-UK trade deal. Quick update.../1

First Equity @EquityUK put out a letter to @BorisJohnson warning that #brexit was a "towering hurdle" (you'd want Brian Blessed reading that part) to UK actors plying their trade in EU - a double whammy with #COVID19 /2

https://t.co/mXjTAISqZk


@BorisJohnson One third of Equity members say they've seen job ads asking for EU passport holders: "Before, we were able to travel to Europe visa-free. Now we have to pay hundreds of pounds, fill in form after form, and spend weeks waiting for approval" /3

@BorisJohnson Worth recalling that all this goes back to the UK desire NOT to have a 'mobility' provision within the TCA - all part of 'ending Free Movement' and the professional services folk - including musicians, actors, fashion models etc -are all victim of

@BorisJohnson What's the government going to do about all this? Good question, which brings us to todays @CommonsDCMS hearing in which the Culture Minister Caroline Dinenage @cj_dinenage frankly pin-balled around the issues /5
Good to see @Marthakearney on @BBCr4today taking @pritipatel to task over the numbers of lorries in Dover - now 1,500 in Stack (M20) and Manston airfield combined - rather more than 170 that @BorisJohnson said yesterday, baffling haulage groups /1

@BBCr4today @pritipatel @BorisJohnson She won't say whether lorry drivers will have to take a PCR test (long-winded, requires RNA extraction etc. 24-48hrs) rather than much faster (and less sensitive) lateral flow test. Short Strait will struggle to operates with PCR tests. You'd need one yesterday for tomorrow! /2

@BBCr4today @pritipatel @BorisJohnson Because of the delays that have empty lorries already stuck in the queues, in an earlier interview British Retail Consortium @the_brc Andrew Opie said fresh food shortages would occur within days because lorries couldn't get back to Spain etc to reload /3

@BBCr4today @pritipatel @BorisJohnson @the_brc Haulage experts like @RHADuncanB are always at pains to explain that the lorries at Dover (and GB-IE, for that matter) are flowing in a continuous cycle. More than 85% are from EU countries. So if you block one side, or artery the whole system starts to grind to a halt/4

@BBCr4today @pritipatel @BorisJohnson @the_brc @RHADuncanB This episode has been a bit of a teaching moment, exposing the canard that the UK can unilaterally "take back control of its borders". It can't. Borders are membranes. Traffic flows in both directions. Actions by one side impact the other - as French move has demonstrated. /5

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