@pakman said in Brexit:
@pakman said in Brexit:
@mikethesnow said in Brexit:
@jc said in Brexit:
@pakman said in Brexit:
It ought to be entirely feasible for the UK to run Northern Ireland trade in a fashion whereby the UK does not need to erect a hard border. In which case if the EU doesn't want a hard border then the simple answer is for it not to erect one. It's not beyond the wit of man.
In fact, what the EU is actually saying is that it refuses to accept that Northern Ireland can ever leave the EU, even if the rest of the UK does.
Is that true? If the referendum did one thing it showed that the UK public had lost patience with uncontrolled immigration, where in effect anyone from the EU could travel without hindrance across the soft UK border. A Brexit without a hard border will simply not deliver what most leavers (and frankly many remainers too) wanted.
But maintaining a soft border between the Republic and Northern Ireland will still allow anybody to walk from the EU into the UK, albeit with one additional step of going to Ireland first. How does that deliver the immigration controls that people expect?
Or are you suggesting that a hard border between the Republic and NI is the way forward? Maybe I'll let someone like @Derm-McCrum comment on that from an Irish POV, but I was in the UK before and after the Good Friday agreement and IMO it was one of the best things to have happened in the mainland. I was at work in Bishopsgate on the Saturday morning when the bomb went off. Nobody should have to live under the threat of that and I'd hate to see a return. Irish troubles are hardly the EU's fault.
Surely an immigrant / migrant would still be checked leaving NI and entering mainland UK?
JC, First point is that EU doesn't care a rat's RRRs about the people border. It's concern is goods being imported into a future lax U.K. trade territory and being spirited across to Eire, thus representing a backdoor entry for noncompliant goods into EU.
I had the experience in the 90s of having an office we were about to sign a lease for being severely damaged by an IRA bomb which went of at Baltic Exchange, so take your point.
About to head for a flight to Dublin. Passport needed to enter and return. Flights from NI use separate area of airport and random checks made. Wouldn't take much beefing up to discourage illegal EU immigrants, who could be identified from the flight manifesto.
As for road entrance into a AI, presume it could operate like Geneva French border, again with random checks.
For me nothing for Brits to get too excited about.
https://amp.theguardian.com/politics/2018/nov/16/ireland-to-remain-open-door-to-uk-for-eu-citizens-post-brexit
Joke
