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New Partnership with the EU

Brexit is a bigger factor in the political discoloration in Northern Ireland at the moment, partly because common membership of the EU and its institutions was absolutely germane to the Good Friday agreement. The Secretary of State needs to recognise that any negotiations that follow these elections and precede the restoration of our institutions will involve returning to and renewing fundamentals of the Good Friday agreement. That means that people will be looking at strand 2, and the need to ensure that the island of Ireland can work and be worked as part of the European economic area in the future.

The question of when powers over rights are transferred or devolved after the great repeal Bill will be a key political issue. No one in Northern Ireland will trust the House of Commons with the dilution of rights before powers are devolved when any attempt to improve them can be vetoed by the Democratic Unionist party, as we have seen in the past. It would be like asking Attila the Hun to mind your horse.