VAT/Brexit thought for the day. When hard Brexiters point out that @BorderIrish is already a “VAT border” they ignore two vital points.
1. Since it’s currently a border between two EU Member States, VAT isn’t payable on importation (ie at the border), but only when the purchaser does its VAT return. So no border infrastructure is needed now: but it will be needed when VAT has to be paid at the border.
2. That system will be hard to replicate post Brexit because it relies on close cooperation between VAT authorities and harmonisation of law backed by robust enforcement and adjudication mechanisms (ultimately the ECJ).
But hard Brexiters object to those constraints: so that leaves VAT chargeable at the border as the only option. And that means infrastructure.
The only way out of that is for NI to stay part of the EU VAT area as proposed by the EU in its backstop proposal. That means a VAT border between GB and NI.
NB: when that is posited as impossible within a single state, remember that there are already VAT borders between the Channel Islands and GB, and between Canary Islands and mainland Spain. /ends
