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What was the nature of the Irish Sea border that the UK signed up to & how much of that can be negotiated away?
NI will effectively stay in the EU’s single market for goods & will enforce the EU’s customs code at its ports (we’ll park the VAT issue for now)
CUSTOMS: The EU concern is that NI shouldn’t be used as a way for GB goods to hop into the customs union without paying the correct tariff. This introduced the concept of ‘at risk goods.’ An at risk good would have EU tariff imposed at point of entry to NI.
Tariff then rebated if good is shown to stay in UK or govt just covers the cost up to state aid limits. This rebating concept is novel & complicated. The Joint Ctte is supposed to agree which goods are at risk. Some experts think a lot of trade impacted https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-50439671
The way to do away with almost all the ‘at risk’ issue is a zero tariff trade deal between the EU & UK. No tariffs = no risk. For some observers a zero tariff deal is necessary to make the NI Protocol stick. So difference between trade deal/ no deal is huge.
However even if there is zero tariff a trade deal there will be new customs related bureaucracy. Goods will need to be declared (to make sure they qualify for zero tariffs.) But UK Gov says it will (initially at least) sort all the admin https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-53685266
STANDARDS: The big issue here is food & agri products (known as SPS). Even before the deal the govt acknowledged this was insoluble without infrastructure & physical checks (the 2 October plan https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-49909866 ) due to strict EU rules in this area.
So the UK govt has committed to building Border Control Posts at NI ports for this purpose. Moving goods from GB-NI will require substantial new admin & costs.
There are ways to mitigate this: firstly a deep SPS agreement between the EU & UK (similar to EU - New Zealand) which would minimise, but not eliminate, checks & bureaucracy. This requires a good deal of trust & ongoing engagement.
Secondly by pressing the EU to be creative in the Joint Committee, the UK is pushing the idea of a novel ‘trusted trader’ scheme for firms (mostly supermarkets) who can demonstrate very high levels of transparency & traceability in their supply chains.
So long as the UK is a third country with its own SPS rules there will still have to be some checks & controls. But they will be determined by the quality of ongoing engagement.
Non-SPS goods are less of issue & can mostly be managed ‘in market’ rather than at the the border.
TL;DR:
There will still be some new checks & controls but a trade deal will help a lot. So will good ongoing engagement, creativity from the EU & support from the UK govt.
There will still be some new checks & controls but a trade deal will help a lot. So will good ongoing engagement, creativity from the EU & support from the UK govt.
