When the fireworks went off last night in London, Britiain’s drawn out path to severing ties with the European Union was complete, creating more problems in Northern Ireland, already a neglected stepchild of Westminster. Whatever the misgivings over Brexit, 56-year-old Prime Minister Boris Johnson delivered what his 64-year-old predecessor former Prime Minister Theresa May could not: Exiting the European Union. Johnson completed a nearly impossible divorce with the EU, designed to make it difficult for any EU country to leave the Union. But since Britain joined the Treaty of Maastricht Nov. 1, 1993, the official EU, the U.K. never really fit in, not matter how hard former Tory British Prime Minister John Major tried to cram a square peg into a round hole. U.K.’s 67-year-old former Labor Party Prime Minister rejected the Eurozone Jan 1, 1999, retaining the pound sterling and Bank of England.
Johnson may have won the Brexit battle but he may wind up losing the war for the U.K. if Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales wind up leaving the U.K. for the European Union. Northern Ireland was torn with conflict for over 100 years after declaring its independence from Ireland May 2, 1921, creating the Irish Republican Army in 1919, but morphing into a guerrilla fighting force to reverse 1921 Anglo-Irish treaty allowing British control of Northern Ireland. IRA violence with the U.K. reached a crescendo in the Bogside massacre on Bloody Sunday Jan. 30, 1972 when British troops opened fire, killing 14 pro-Ireland protesters. It took another 26 years of bloodshed before the Good Friday Agreement was signed April 10, 1996, ending over 70 years of violence by pro-unification Irish forces led by the IRA. Recent Brexit talks were concerned about preserving the Good Friday Agreement.
Johnson’s final trade deal Dec. 24 keeps the Northern Ireland border open with the EU’s Ireland but permits the EU certain customs checks, including phytosanitary checks with agricultural products. Northern Ireland remains in the U.K.’s custom territory but must align with EU standards, especially when it comes to agricultural products. Northern Ireland’s Ulster Unionist Party didn’t like Johnson’s trade deal because it didn’t place tighter restrictions on the 500 km or 300-mile border with the Irish Republic. “It think it’s a disgrace,” said Mervyn Gibson, grand secretary of the Protestant Orange Order, concerned the EU goods would flood across the Northern Ireland border. Northern Ireland’s residents already feel like second-class citizens when it comes to U.K. citizens living in England. Northern Ireland British pounds are not recognized in U.K. banks.
Ulster’s trade unions didn’t want Johnson to make all the concessions to the EU, especially on French fishing rights in British territorial waters. “We should be treated equally whether we live in Devon or Corwall [in England] or Antrim or Down [in Northern Ireland]. We’ve been let down and indeed betrayed by the prime minister who promised us there would be no border down the Irish Sea,” Gibson said. Gibson’s more concerned than ever that Northern Ireland has been sold out to the EU by Westminster in the final Brexit trade deal. Northern Ireland doesn’t want its trade with the Republic dominated by the EU. Some Unionists think that if the trade deal favor the EU and Irish Republic, it will drive folks to seek reunification with Ireland, mainly to get out of Britain and join the EU. What happens in Northern Ireland depends on what happens to Scotland and Wales decision to exit the U.K.
With the ink not dry on Johnson’s trade deal with the EU, much confusion remains especially in Northern Ireland about the practical impact especially on the fishing industry. “You can’t see the Irish Sea border, it’s all happening on paper. If it starts to hit them in their pockets, that’s the sort of thing that will make them very annoyed and quite truculent,” said David Hume, a historian, former member of Northern Irelands Flags and Culture Commission. Unionist are concerned about losing fishing rights to French trawlers permitted under the EU-U.K. Brexit trade deal to continue sharing fishing rights in British territorial waters. “Unions will be very suspicious as to the longer term,” Hume said, not sure how over time Northern Ireland fisherman could lose fishing rights to the EU. Hume thinks more problems with fishing rights could lead Unionists to seek to join the Irish Republic.
Northern Ireland’s largest nationalist party Sinn Fein sees Brexit and the recent trade deal as an omen for eventual Irish unification within the next decade. “More and more people are asking themselves the questions, what is my identity outside the European Union, what has Brexit done to my identity and there are people saying my identity as a European can be protected under a united Ireland,” said John O’Dowd, senior Sinn Fein lawmaker in the Northern Irish Assembly. If Johnson doesn’t spend some time improving Northern Ireland’s ties to Westminster, including issues with Northern Irish pound recognized across the Irish Sea, O’Dowd’s prophesy could come true about Irish unification. “Brexit has opened up a discussion among some perhaps who thought the would never have to have that discussion,” O’Dowd said about the prospects of unifying Ireland.
