Member

I want to say something about the Irish Sea border. For a long time, traditional unionism defined itself by saying that the arrangements in 2017, 2019 and so on—checks of any sort in the Irish Sea—were an affront to the Act of Union. Nobody bothered to read the Act of Union. Articles in the Act of Union bring in a much stronger Irish Sea border than anything envisaged, and a much greater range of checks than anything agreed, in this document. At the time, that was actually a complaint of Irish nationalists. They said it was not the simple deal that they were offered. Unionists took the view that it was a price worth paying, and they paid it for most of the 19th century. In the 20th century, Safeguarding the Union again shows that there is an Irish Sea border. There are checks and payments on many products going between the rest of the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland.