A new report has come from Prosperity UK’s Alternative Arrangements Commission, suggesting that a new shared food safety and animal health area, taking in the island of Ireland and the island of Great Britain as a whole, should be created to prevent the Irish backstop taking effect.
The report suggests that such a measure would remove the need for customs, food safety and animal health checks between the two nations.
The report, written by two Remain voting Conservative MP’s, Nicky Morgan and Greg Hands, who have resolved to enforce the people’s first vote.
The pair added that their new system, which would replace the backstop while preserving the Good Friday agreement, they claim, could be “fully up and running within three years”.
Special Economic Zones
It also called for Special Economic Zones, based on relevant WTO exemptions, as well as a multi-tier trusted trader programme for large and medium-sized companies, with exemptions from customs checks for smaller firms.
The group also suggested that Sanitary and Phyto-Sanitary (SPS) checks should be carried out by mobile units
away from the border, using the existing EU Union Customs Code or a common area for SPS measures.
These types of checks are normally carried out on an EU-third country border, which the UK will now fall under once it leaves the bloc.
The ACC added that Northern Ireland would have to determine if it wanted to remain within the all-Ireland common SPS area or stayed within the diverging UK SPS area.
'No Way'
The report went as far as to say that the Irish Government, therefore, has a strategic interest in such a move to make sure the land bridge works (Dover-Calais), but According to RTÉ News, Irish sources have rejected the idea of Ireland being dragged out of the EU by the UK.
“There is absolutely no way Ireland is going to be dragged out of the single market by the UK leaving the EU, and left with this terrible decision in a couple of years time if Northern Ireland changes its rules,” one source said.
“What do we do then? We're left with the mess. It's utterly unattractive.”
© 2019 Checkout – your source for the latest Irish retail news. Article by Aidan O’Sullivan. Click sign-up to subscribe to Checkout.
