“The Windsor Framework (Non-Commercial Movement of Pet Animals) Regulations 2024 were laid in Parliament this week.
“This latest incarnation of the Protocol/Windsor Framework imposes new depths of EU control.
“Under these regulations, it will only be possible for U.K. citizens to travel from one part of the U.K. (GB) to another (NI) with pets if they have:-
- fitted their pet with a transponder (microchip) that complies with EU Reg 576/2013;
- Applied to and joined NI Pet Travel Scheme and have secured a Pet Travel document (a pet passport) – the definition and details of which rests not with U.K. but with EU;
- On travelling pets must be submitted to both documentary and full identity checks when joining and leaving the boat;
- If any lack of compliance is found, then, they will be sent to an SPS facility.
“It follows that persons moving from GB to NI with pets not only suffer the indignity of foreign controls, but they effectively lose their Common Travel Area rights, which are now trumped by EU diktat. And, if they then want to travel on to the Republic (also in the CTA) they are prohibited unless they submit to full SPS border checks – so much for the fiction that you couldn’t have SPS checks at the real border!
“These regulations are an impossible and preposterous assertion of both EU rule in NI and destruction of basic constitutional rights of free movement within one’s own country.
“Once more, this audacious power-grab was unaltered by the dud DUP/Donaldson Deal.
“I will, of course, be opposing these impositions in Parliament.”