You get what you vote for – and the UK voted for an utter imbecile: stunts like this allowed Johnson to push through a Brexit deal that he hadn’t bothered to read (because he’s “not a ‘details’ man”). Now the UK – and especially Northern Ireland – is suffering shortages of vital supplies including medicines because of this man’s stupidity.

This is what happens when you let stupid Tories mess around with the fundamentals of your life.

Boris Johnson is threatening to suspend parts of the Northern Ireland protocol of his own Brexit agreement because it is doing exactly what he negotiated. That’s what it means when he says he’s threatening to trigger Article 16.

That is to say, the loss of imports into Northern Ireland that has put the province into crisis is a logical result of the agreement that Johnson not only negotiated, but demanded that the public endorse in the 2019 general election and that MPs vote through after.

And look what it did to the people there. Trade is being choked off – particularly the supply of medicines, at a time when Covid-19 has restricted healthcare:

Article 16 of the NI Protocol says that the UK or EU may take safeguarding measures – without agreement with the other side – “if the application of the protocol leads to serious economic, societal or environmental difficulties that are liable to persist, or to diversion of trade”:

Irish minister for enterprise, trade and employment Leo Varadkar is on the record as having said that, if the protocol is stopping Northern Ireland from getting medicines from the UK, the province can get them from the Irish Republic (the EU) instead. That’s diversion of trade:

Some commentators are saying the entire NI protocol would be suspended. They are mistaken.

Article 16 makes it clear that any changes will be restricted to what is strictly necessary in order to remedy the situation. And if the UK invokes it, the EU may retaliate if its own rights and obligations are prejudiced by those changes.

So this is a realistic appraisal of the options:

This means the creation of that hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic that the NI Protocol was written to avoid – angering US President Biden and ending the prospect of a trade deal between the UK and the United States. Boris Johnson would have nobody to blame but himself.

Could it be avoided? Apparently not:

TL;DR means “too long; didn’t read” and here it implies that the people who are calling for Article 16 to be invoked haven’t actually bothered to read up on what it is and/or what its consequences will be.

So brace yourself – especially if you live in Northern Ireland.

Because of Boris Johnson’s stupidity – and the desperation of English Tory voters to “Get Brexit Done” without actually knowing what it meant – you are facing a winter of deprivation and despair.

Don’t let Johnson tell you he didn’t want it because his actions show that he did. The evidence suggests that he is simply one of the many who couldn’t be arsed to read his own agreement and still does not understand what it means.

You get what you vote for – and in 2019 the UK voted for an utter imbecile.

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/mike-sivier-libel-fight/

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