The TUV submission to the Northern Ireland Affairs Select Committee inquiry on the operations of the Windsor Framework calls out the deceit employed by the term ‘the UK Internal Market System. In seeking to sell the Windsor Framework the argument has been made that the impact of the Irish Sea border has been dramatically constrained by means of replacing the old Green Lane with the UK Internal Market System.
Dan Boucher said:
“This language suggests that all goods moving within the UK Internal Market System move within the UK internal market and so are not troubled by the Irish Sea Border. This is designed to make people think that the UK Internal Market for goods remains when it has in fact been replaced for these purposes by a GB single market for goods and an all Ireland/EU single market for goods precisely because the Irish Sea border remains where it has been since 1 January 2021. Until we are honest about what we talking about, it will be impossible for Northern Ireland to move forward.”
The submission states:
“The term ‘internal market’ has an established meaning. If you are in an ‘internal market’ you can move goods without encountering the costs of having to negotiate a customs or international SPS border. (There are two aspects to the costs of a customs border, one is the paperwork which exists regardless of whether duties must be paid, and the second is any duties that may have to be paid.) As soon as you arrive at such a border, you reach the geographical limit of the internal market in which you have been located, its boundary, and if you cross that boundary, you cross over into another internal market.
”In this context the use of the term UK Internal Market System for the Green Lane arrangements is deeply misleading because the arrangements in question remove neither the customs nor the international SPS border. They simplify some of the paperwork, but they do not remove the reality of the border which conveys the end of one internal market and the beginning of another, that of the EU single market.
“Thus, rather than giving effect to a UK internal market for goods, the so-called UK Internal Market System is concerned with managing the movement of goods from the Great Britain Internal Market for goods to the EU Single Market for goods. This is obvious to see, not least by means of comparing and contrasting: a) the requirements for moving goods from England to Wales, in relation to which one has unfettered access, and b) crossing the end of the GB Internal Market for goods, into the EU Internal Market for goods where, by contrast, one must have an export number, fill in and submit a customs and if necessary an SPS declaration and be subject to 10 to 5% identity checks at a border control post entering Northern Ireland (the EU Internal Market for goods).
”It is true that on the green lane the customs and SPS forms are simplified, but the critical point is that they are not removed and that the border exists marking the end of the Great Britain internal market and the beginning of the EU internal market. (Indeed Article 14 of EU Regulation 2023/1231 makes it clear that the underlying default arrangement is not just the existence of a normal expression of an international border in the Irish Sea border in relation to the red lane, but also in relation to the green lane).
“Moreover, the benefits of simplification are offset by additional requirements: having to successfully apply to join and remain on a trusted trader scheme (something you don’t have to do in trading within the GB internal market), having to provide ‘Not for EU’ labels and having to demonstrate that the goods do not enter the Republic of Ireland. Thus, the costs associated with negotiating the international border are better understood as having been redistributed rather than removed. These green lane costs are very considerable, especially demonstrating that goods don’t enter the Republic, such that some traders are choosing either to stop selling to NI, or to use the red lane.
“Moreover, in order to fully appreciate the sense in which the UK Internal Market for goods no longer exists, we have to remember that we are not just looking at goods moving from Great Britain to Northern Ireland having to negotiate the border dividing the Great Britain Internal Market System from the EU Internal Market System with simplified customs and SPS forms in exchange for additional balancing ‘Not for EU’ costs. We also have to remember that the border exists first and foremost in the conventional way. There are many goods that are not eligible for the green lane and that have to travel on the red lane, that is cross the border between the GB Internal Market and the EU Internal Market with full customs and SPS forms but without the burden of having to be accredited, provide Not for EU labels and prove the product does not reach the Republic.
“The principal impact of the operation of the Windsor Framework UK Internal Market System is therefore to propagate confusion, because of its misleading name. If it was a product for sale, it would not meet the Trade Descriptions Act. It conveys the impression of an effect that is entirely contrary to its actual effect. It is a bit like taking a product that is highly calorific, and marketing it as unusually un-calorific. It should be renamed to acknowledge its true purpose and effect, along the lines of ‘the Windsor Framework GB – EU Trade Border System.’