Member

I will refer to a particular legal case that went to both the High Court and the Appeal Court literally in the last 24 hours. A young man called Jamie Bryson, representing himself, brought judicial review proceedings against the Secretary of State, which were heard on an emergency basis in the High Court last night and before the Court of Appeal today. The case tested the so-called constitutional safeguards put into legislation by the so-called Safeguarding the Union deal. Mr Bryson ran the case on the basis of what the Government and the leader of the DUP at that time, Jeffrey Donaldson, had said the legislation achieved—despite lots of us having made clear at the time that it had no such effect. He was right to test its strength, and it was important to test it because this has exposed that the legislation—which Jeffrey Donaldson and those who supported him relied upon to justify returning to Stormont to implement the Irish Sea border—is absolutely worthless, as many of us warned. It does not do anything and has absolutely no legal effect. As Justice McAlinden said, it was nothing more than throwing “breadcrumbs”—a presentational trick to give cover to those who were desperate to return to Stormont. This finding about how worthless the constitutional legislation is was upheld this morning by the Court of Appeal, after an emergency move.