Thread by @PropertySpot

Q: Why did the government not realise that leaving the SM/CU while maintaining a frictionless border with Ireland would require a specific solution for Northern Ireland?

A: Because they were so obsessed with immigration that it didn't occur to them.

Thread. (1/x)

Let's start with the campaign. Early on, in February 2016, Boris Johnson said the border would be unaffected because the free travel area predates EU membership. (2/x) bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northe…

In April 2016, the then Northern Ireland Secretary is asked about the impact of Brexit on the border. She dismisses it and her entire answer focuses on movement of people and illegal immigration. (3/x)

Fast forward to the period after the vote. The first indication of May's Brexit strategy came in her October conference speech on Brexit in which she heavily trailed the decision to go for a hard Brexit. There is no mention of the Irish border. (4/x) politicshome.com/news/uk/politi…

A week later, new Northern Ireland Secretary James Brokenshire floats the idea of moving UK immigration controls to Ireland’s ports and airports as a way to avoid a hard border on the island of Ireland. (5/x) theguardian.com/politics/2016/…

In January 2017, Theresa May's Lancaster House speech set out her red lines. The Irish border is mentioned only in the context of immigration, despite now making it explicit that the UK's position was to leave the single market and customs union. (6/x) gov.uk/government/spe…

It's worth mentioning that at this point, the government's majority was based on a manifesto which said there was "no one-size-fits-all solution" for the United Kingdon. ucrel.lancs.ac.uk/wmatrix/ukmani… (7/x)

The current impasse is a direct result of the government not reflecting the logic of their own manifesto and facing up to the consequences of their own decision to leave the single market and customs union. (8/8)

PS: Here's an extraordinary clip of a Newsnight discussion before the referendum where Penny Mordaunt is asked about the Irish border, with the standard response, and then Richard Walton, formerly of the Met Police starts explaining why a border would be a good idea.