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You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/aug/16/uk-to-seek-irish-border-waivers-on-customs-and-food-safety-after-brexit
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| UK to seek Irish border waivers on customs and food safety after Brexit | UK to seek Irish border waivers on customs and food safety after Brexit |
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| Britain will seek a series of waivers for goods and people crossing the Northern Ireland border under new plans that risk creating a “back door” with the European Union after Brexit. | Britain will seek a series of waivers for goods and people crossing the Northern Ireland border under new plans that risk creating a “back door” with the European Union after Brexit. |
| The government aims to avoid the need for any border posts with Ireland when the UK leaves the EU, an ambitious goal seen as essential to preserving the Good Friday peace agreement. | The government aims to avoid the need for any border posts with Ireland when the UK leaves the EU, an ambitious goal seen as essential to preserving the Good Friday peace agreement. |
| But details of the plan Whitehall officials unveiled on Wednesday have sparked a series of difficult questions about what the knock-on impact of having no border could be for wider EU-UK relations. | |
| When Brexit talks resume in two weeks, Britain will ask for an exemption for all small traders and farmers from a host of customs, agricultural and food safety checks. In return, it aims to seek “regulatory equivalence” with the EU to try to avoid the need for inspections of live animals and billions of pounds worth of other goods crossing back and forth. | When Brexit talks resume in two weeks, Britain will ask for an exemption for all small traders and farmers from a host of customs, agricultural and food safety checks. In return, it aims to seek “regulatory equivalence” with the EU to try to avoid the need for inspections of live animals and billions of pounds worth of other goods crossing back and forth. |
| Officials refused to speculate what consequences this might have for limiting the scope of trade agreements with non-compliant countries such as the US. Without matching regulations, the EU could block imports however, fearing that the open border is a back door into its consumer market. | Officials refused to speculate what consequences this might have for limiting the scope of trade agreements with non-compliant countries such as the US. Without matching regulations, the EU could block imports however, fearing that the open border is a back door into its consumer market. |
| Similar fears of a back door in the labour market were put to officials when they revealed that there would be nothing to stop EU economic migrants traveling through the Republic of Ireland into the UK under a continuation of the common travel area scheme. The government believes it can limit the impact of any such undocumented immigration through tighter checks on work permits in the UK. | |
| Officials concede the plan relies on unprecedented trust and co-operation with the EU but say it is worth it to maintain peace and prosperity in Northern Ireland. | |
| “The UK and Ireland have been clear all along that we need to prioritise protecting the Belfast agreement in these negotiations, and ensure the land border is as seamless as possible for people and businesses,” said the Brexit secretary, David Davis. | “The UK and Ireland have been clear all along that we need to prioritise protecting the Belfast agreement in these negotiations, and ensure the land border is as seamless as possible for people and businesses,” said the Brexit secretary, David Davis. |
| Perhaps the hardest negotiating issue in Brussels and Dublin will be UK proposals to exempt Northern Ireland food producers from so-called phytosanitary checks, which are currently intended to ensure animal welfare and consumer health standards are maintained for any imports into the EU single market. | |
| “We think if we can reach a deep enough equivalence arrangement with the EU it is possible to do that via processes that don’t involve the land border,” said one government official briefing journalists on the plan. “We believe we have got a strong track record on food safety. We think this can be done in a way that doesn’t introduce food safety and veterinary risks into the system.” | |
| However Britain will have to tread a fine line between satisfying European import concerns and not effectively ceding all control over food and agriculture regulation to Brussels, or preventing any trade deals with third-party countries that might want exemptions on, for example, genetically-modified crops or hormone-treated beef. | |
| The UK is likely to argue that for the purposes of health checks as well as customs tariffs much of the trade across the border is effectively local trade, not international trade, and should be exempted from controls that exist elsewhere in the EU in order to maintain borderless travel. | |
| Concern has also been raised however about the implications of allowing people to continue to travel without any checks, and whether this outsources UK immigration policy to the Republic. | |
| The UK government says that maintaining the common travel area should be possible because security and immigration checks are often carried out far away from the border already. However it concedes that the plan relies on the Republic of Ireland staying outside the Schengen travel zone. | |
| “Controls we introduce away from the physical border allow you to complete the required checks,” said the Whitehall official. “People can still be picked up for security purposes.” | |
| However, this has sparked fears of an increase in electronic tracking that could see physical border security and watchtowers simply replaced with an increase in virtual surveillance instead. | |
| “Using untested technology to police the border won’t instil a great deal of confidence,” warned William Foster a partner at the immigration law firm Fragomen. | |
| “The biggest question for businesses is what will this mean day to day? Will people be tracked when they drive from Belfast to Galway? Will software be used to log their movements?” | |
| UK officials said they “did not recognise” such surveillance fears and insisted there would be no increase in number plate recognition cameras at the border. | |
| The Northern Ireland secretary, James Brokenshire, said goodwill between London and Dublin governments should help find an acceptable solution. | |
| “It is clear that there are many areas where the UK, Ireland and the rest of the EU have shared objectives,” he said. “We have a lot to build on but need to work together intensively over the coming months.” | |
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