Chris McDonald

I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising that. He raises concerns around bureaucracy and paperwork, essentially, for small businesses, and the hon. and learned Member for North Antrim mentioned our own House of Commons gift shop as well for low value items. I very much want to come on to this point in my speech, so I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising it. I will start by talking about the general performance of Northern Ireland trade with the rest of the United Kingdom. Northern Ireland’s goods exports within the UK and with the European Union have been strong. In fact, Northern Ireland’s exports to the European Union have outperformed the rest of the United Kingdom, increasing since 2019, whereas in the rest of the United Kingdom, exports have decreased in that period. It is therefore important to note that Northern Ireland does benefit from being a fundamental part of the UK internal market and having unique access to the EU single market. Of course, I do recognise—and the point was made by the hon. and learned Member for North Antrim—that this experience varies across sectors, companies and individual constituents, which is why this debate is so valuable. I will go on to talk more about that. I understand the challenges around this, but public authorities have a statutory requirement to have special regard for Northern Ireland’s place in the United Kingdom internal market under section 46 of the United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020. That guidance gives real statutory power to ensure that policymakers within the United Kingdom actively consider Northern Ireland’s place in the internal market when they are implementing the Windsor framework or making policy involving the movement of goods in the United Kingdom. Where that is the case, the statutory guidance ensures that those policymakers must have special regard for Northern Ireland’s place in the UK internal market. Most importantly, one part of having special regard means the need to facilitate the free flow of goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, with the aim of streamlining trade between the two, and maintaining and strengthening the integrity and smooth operation of our internal market. The guidance ensures that policymakers must give that special regard considerable importance and weight above other factors in policymaking. That represents how this Government have implemented a key commitment in the “Safeguarding the Union” Command Paper published under the previous Government to ensure that proper process is in place to always consider both Northern Ireland’s place in the UK internal market and the flow of goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Members have spoken in detail about the Windsor framework and the challenges it brings. I would like to stress that the Government are wholly committed to the Windsor framework. The framework supports the peace and prosperity brought by the Good Friday agreement, one of the proudest achievements of our last Labour Government, and it plays a vital role in ensuring the smooth flow of goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, but of course I recognise the concerns raised by hon. Members. It is clear that the Windsor framework is delivering benefits and smoothing the flow of goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland. I have already noted how the Northern Ireland-Great Britain supply of goods has been maintained through the implementation of the framework. Over 15,000 traders are now signed up to the UK internal market scheme, and more than 1,100 operators are registered for the Northern Ireland retail movement scheme and the Northern Ireland plant health label. Northern Ireland traders are benefiting from these facilitations, and businesses are choosing to invest in the dual market access that Northern Ireland uniquely offers. The hon. and learned Member for North Antrim is concerned about the level of investment and believes that businesses will not wish to invest in Northern Ireland for that reason. On my recent visit to Northern Ireland, however, I saw significant investment from Boeing, Airbus, Navantia and many other businesses. It is clear that this is not a uniform experience across all businesses, but it has been possible for Northern Ireland to attract significant inward investment.