Brexit: Government to publish NI Protocol plans in July

Lord Frost blames a "lack of clarity" as being behind the major difficulties around the Northern Ireland Protocol

The government will publish its plans for the future of the NI Protocol in the next fortnight, before Parliament rises for the summer recess.

Lord Frost said it was still possible for the UK and the EU to agree changes without the UK having to take unilateral action but that the situation was becoming "urgent".

He said the EU had still not responded to 12 papers tabled by the UK.

Speaking to Policy Exchange, he denied he was setting the EU a deadline.

Lord Frost said the UK and EU could not have a constructive relationship until these issues were solved.

Lord Frost says the plan will be published before the summer recess on 22 July

"We are confident given everything that we've been through the last few years that there are ways of finding a new balance and finding the necessary adjustments," he added.

"But obviously all options remain on the table for us."

Identity issue

At the same event, Northern Ireland Secretary Brandon Lewis said the EU was being "intransigent", jeopardising the parts of the protocol which protect the single market of the UK and the daily lives of people in Northern Ireland.

Mr Lewis said there was an "identity issue" for unionists in Northern Ireland, which the EU needed to understand.

But he added that the out-workings of the protocol was an issue for all communities in Northern Ireland.

"Whatever your constitutional view, if you can't get a product from Amazon or from your supermarket that you used to be able to get and as a UK citizen you should be able to get, that is an issue and we need to deal with that, for the benefit of citizens and for businesses who want to grow and develop and prosper," he said.

'Lack of clarity'

Separately, Brexit Minister Lord Frost denied that the government had been dishonest with the public over the risks to trade and identity when it originally negotiated the protocol.

"We have always been clear that there were processes between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and I will point to the fact that we have delivered our commitment to non-fettered access between Northern Ireland and Great Britain as the prime minister said we would," he said.

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"In the other direction we were always clear there were processes that were there to protect the single market and support the other aspects of the protocol. That was part of the deal.

"The issue is how those processes are to be operated and in October 2019 a lot of that was still unclear."

He added: "It is the lack of clarity, the uncertainty about how these provisions would work in practice that has in the end turned out to be one of the major difficulties we're facing."

Neither Lord Frost nor Mr Lewis would be drawn on the threshold for the UK triggering the suspension of the protocol, the infamous Article 16.