Tory blames Covid for Northern Ireland trade problems & admits it would have been better to stay in EU
Empty shelves: in fact this shot is from the shortages when people were panic-buying before the first Covid lockdown. It should therefore be no surprise that Brandon Lewis is using Covid as an excuse for the consequences of Brexit.
How else are we to interpret Brandon Lewis’s admission that the European Union’s Single Market offers a “competitive advantages”?
Wasn’t the UK supposed to become more competitive by leaving the EU?
Lewis was responding to complaints that hundreds of products have disappeared from supermarket shelves in Northern Ireland after Brexit.
According to the Belfast Telegraph,
Hundreds of products have disappeared in shops, many online sellers have stopped supplying NI customers, and freight hauliers report bottlenecks caused by new EU paperwork needed before lorries can board ferries from Great Britain.
Lewis said the shortages were due to Covid-19, not Brexit. But we all expected that, didn’t we?
As soon as Covid arrived many of us said it was as plain as a pikestaff that the Government would use it as a cover for the consequences of Brexit and sure enough here is pathetic Tory pike-hand Brandon Lewis blaming Covid for problems with N.Ireland trade. #r4today
— Briefcase Michael (@BriefcaseMike) January 19, 2021
If that’s the case, then why this post-Brexit disruption when traders had been promised unfettered access between Great Britain and Northern Ireland?
He said – well, hear it for yourself. As an added bonus, you get Peter Stefanovic demonstrating that Lewis was lying:
As soon as Covid arrived many of us said it was as plain as a pikestaff that the Government would use it as a cover for the consequences of Brexit and sure enough here is pathetic Tory pike-hand Brandon Lewis blaming Covid for problems with N.Ireland trade. #r4today
— Briefcase Michael (@BriefcaseMike) January 19, 2021
In another interview, on Radio 4’s Today programme, he undermined the entire argument for leaving the European Union at all:
Brandon Lewis on R4 saying that because NI can trade as part of the single market it has a unique position in the world and – I’m quoting here – a “competitive advantage”
In other words, being in the SM is a good thing and mainland Britain is at a disadvantage because it’s not!
— Buck Frexit! 🇪🇺🇺🇦🌎🐟FBPE #GTTO #PR (@Beany_1) January 19, 2021
Wow.
Okay.
In that case, let’s challenge Lewis to put it to the test.
If he thinks Brexit has put Northern Ireland at a “competitive advantage”, let’s see him go there and stand in front of a supermarket explaining to disappointed shoppers why they are now better-off.
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The point Tories will try and make is that NI has the supposed advantages of being in the SM yet still have empty shelves whereas mainland UK isn’t in SM and DOESN’T have empty shelves. The argument, either way, is disingenuous. The SM has nothing to do with the shortages and neither does COVID (or again, mainland UK would have shortages too) No, it’s the ‘border in the sea’ that differentiates NI and has caused the problem, it’s the only difference between how things were and how things are. Of course, even this could’ve been overcome if the government had planned for it in advance. This wasn’t possible though as the transition period, a full year, which was to have been used by govt and business to ready itself for the transition was entirely wasted. Negotiations took up eleven and a half months of it leaving about ten days to prepare. These preparations had to take place against the background of a pandemic too.
We know how awful this is, we know how it could have been avoided but there is nothing about this that can be undone. Boris can’t be voted out for a few years yet and it really would be undemocratic to overturn the vote. Even if it were possible I could see that a few EU members would be unwilling to have us back again. Remember, the French vetoed our joining on the grounds ‘we’d only want to leave again’ Prophetic words indeed..
The issue, here, isn’t whether, or not we remained in the European Union but the agreement which was reached with it, built on Theresa May’s woeful negotiation. Northern Ireland having different rules from the rest of the U.K. is the cause of the problem. Sadly, highlighting the cause of the problem, now, won’t solve it.