Two of Boris Johnson’s senior cabinet ministers have talked up the possibility of securing a Brexit deal through some divergence on the rules in Northern Ireland, as the government’s rhetoric showed fresh signs of shifting ahead of crucial talks next week.
With Johnson due to meet Jean-Claude Juncker, the European commission president, on Monday, Stephen Barclay, the Brexit secretary, and the home secretary, Priti Patel, accepted the Irish border was likely to be key to any potential agreement.
In a later interview, Barclay also suggested one potential way to smooth an agreement would be to extend the transition period following departure, currently due to end in December 2020, for another one or two years.
Following weeks of government discussion about preparedness for a no-deal departure, both ministers said the overwhelming focus was on leaving with an agreement.
“The entire machinery of government, now, is focused on getting that deal and is planning and preparing to leave on 31 October with a deal,” Patel told BBC One’s Andrew Marr Show.
With Johnson vehemently committed to leaving the EU on 31 October but bound by law to seek an extension if a deal is not in place by the time of the European council summit on 17 October, there has been intense focus on ways he could find a plan acceptable to Brussels but which would not be seen by Conservative MPs as a betrayal.
This has centred on ways to allow Northern Ireland to stay converged on some regulatory and standards border issues with the Republic of Ireland, preventing frontier checks while not having a full customs border in the Irish Sea.
Speaking to Sky’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday programme, Barclay said it was important to get the consent of all political sides in Northern Ireland, but also to abide by the Good Friday peace deal, which could potentially be breached by a hard Irish border.
“It is important we move forwards with the consent of both sides of the community in Northern Ireland,” said Barclay, who is due to meet the EU’s chief negotiatior, Michel Barnier, next week. “That’s very much part of the thinking and part of the consultations that we’re having.”
He insisted there had been definite progress in finding a successful compromise: “There has been detailed technical talks led by David Frost, the prime minister’s Europe adviser. They have been meeting with Michel Barnier’s team,” he said.
“The prime minister will be seeing President Juncker tomorrow, I’ll be meeting with Michel Barnier tomorrow, so there’s extensive talks been happening both at a technical level but also at a political level. So there has been a huge amount of work going on behind the scenes. We can see a landing zone in terms of a future deal but there is significant work still to do.”
Johnson is committed to getting rid of the backstop, the guarantee central to Theresa May’s rejected deal in which the UK would effectively stay within the EU’s customs union if no other solution for the Irish border could be reached before the end of a post-exit transition period.
Q&AWhat is a Northern Ireland-only backstop?
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The British government’s version of Brexit involves the UK ultimately leaving the single market and customs union, requiring the return of a range of checks on goods crossing the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. The “backstop” is intended as a standstill placeholder to ensure such checks do not have to be imposed between Brexit happening with a deal, and the start of a new free trade agreement yet to be negotiated between the UK and the EU.
Theresa May's withdrawal agreement proposed keeping the whole of the UK in a shared customs territory with the EU during this period. An alternative idea involves only Northern Ireland staying in the EU’s customs territory. That would place a customs border in the Irish Sea. May described it as a threat to the constitutional integrity of the UK, but the new prime minister, Boris Johnson, has opened the current talks by proposing an all-Ireland agri-food zone. The suggestion is that he will seek to quietly build on that with further NI-only arrangements.
Given an NI-only backstop was an EU proposal in the first place, the U-turn would be warmly welcomed in Brussels, although attempts to give the Northern Ireland assembly a veto on its continuation would not be acceptable, and the DUP would be unlikely to support the prime minister in such a move in parliament.
If there is a no-deal Brexit, then there is no backstop.
Another option would be a backstop just for Northern Ireland, but the government has rejected this. Barclay said while it was vital for the UK to “leave as a whole”, some divergence already existed between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK.
“We can get into those details as part of the talks. But that is different from the principle of the backstop, and the backstop needs to go,” he said.
In a later interview on BBC Radio 5 Live’s Pienaar’s Politics, Barclay noted that in the event of a deal none of the issues connected to the Irish border would apply “until the end of the implementation period, which is December 2020 or one or two years later by mutual agreement”.
Asked about a possible extension, Barclay said he was only stating “what the legal text says” and that “the point is, there is scope for an extension but it is by mutual consent”.
Patel was more cautious, saying she did not want to pre-empt the talks, but accepted the Irish border issue had moved on from the backstop in terms of discussions with the EU.
“The reality is we have to deal with the backstop issue, and people said, under the Theresa May deal, that the withdrawal agreement would never be considered or looked at again, and neither would the political declaration,” she said.
“We are in different territory right now, so it’s no point arguing about the past. We are moving forward now as a government, collectively, focused on leaving but leaving with a deal.”
She added: “We have to leave and we have to leave with a deal on 31 October, and there’s no point right now trying to prejudge the discussions that are taking place.”