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Since the Brexit Secretary is unable to expand on what “alternative arrangements” in the Brady amendment might mean, a thread about what they would have to mean in order to keep the Irish border invisible.
It’s important to remember that *no one* thinks that the solution to the border is just about technology.
It is also, inevitably, about close cooperation on rules and procedures and extensive sharing of sensitive information: that requires strong legal frameworks and trust.
That is recognised even in the ERG “Better Deal”, drafted by its knitting circle of trade advisers. See img1.wsimg.com/blobby/go/bf4d…, Annex 2.
And see also Annex 4 which requires continued U.K. participation in EU customs systems (Article 8): the knitting circle can’t bring itself to admit that that would be conditional of accepting the jurisdiction of the ECJ and Commission, but that is the reality.
But it’s also about regulatory alignment: see eg Articles 55 and 59 of that Annex.
NB though that the knitting circle can’t bring itself to do more than provide for an “agreement to agree” mutual recognition.
As to that, see Annexes 5 and 6. These essentially contemplate mutual recognition of standards.
That, to put it gently, raises huge issues for the EU that go right to the heart of the operation of the single market and the maintenance of its regulatory autonomy.
If this is what is meant by “alternative arrangements” in the Brady amendment (and this must be the ERG’s view of what it must mean) it’s a complete non-starter.
“Alternative arrangements” could also mean EEA + a customs union (Norway +). Those arrangements would work, and if negotiated by the end of transition would prevent the backstop coming into operation. But that is not, I think, what the ERG or the Government has in mind.
Norway + would also not at this stage require any changes to the current WA, but, rather, to the “soft law” political declaration.
Apart from leaving NI on its own in a Norway + arrangement with the EU, there really isn’t anything else that *anyone* has put forward that can be described as “alternative arrangements” that secure the objective of an invisible Irish border.
Which is why yesterday’s vote for the Brady “alternative arrangements” amendment is a compromise between MPs, but not a compromise with reality. /ends.
