Statement by TUV leader Jim Allister:-
“The magnitude and irreversible constitutional damage of unionists implementing the Union-dismantling Protocol cannot be overstated.
“That the Protocol is Union dismantling is incontrovertible:-
it partitions the UK with a customs border on the basis of EU law declaring GB as a foreign country and NI as EU territory;
it subjects NI, colony like, to foreign laws we don’t make and can’t change – our entire goods economy is governed by these foreign EU laws (and court), identical to those prevailing in ROI;
the effect of being governed, even in part, by foreign laws is of immense constitutional significance, because it means NI is effectively now a UK/EU condominium, ruled in some respects by UK laws and in others by EU laws;
any doubt as to the constitutional effect of the Protocol was removed by the UK Supreme Court declaring that foundational cornerstone of the Union, Art 6 of the Act(s) of Union, as having been put into suspension by the Protocol.
“It is equally incontrovertible, that if unionists return to the Stormont Executive they will have no choice but to implement this Union-dismantling Protocol. That was made very clear in the High Court ruling in Rooney-v-Poots when the attempt not to implement the Irish Sea border was overruled.
“Protocol implementer is a role no DUP MLA, true to their election mandate, should contemplate. There is no mandate for Sir Jeffrey Donaldson to return the DUP to Stormont under the Protocol.
“Once unionists return to Stormont to inevitably implement the Protocol, they are accepting and practising that never again will NI be a full part of the UK, but, rather, is in transition, through all-Ireland economic alignment, out of the UK.
“Trite contentions that better to have a hand on the steering wheel than no power, fall away when the direction of travel is pre-ordained by the iniquitous Protocol.”