UK’s Johnson issues warning on N.Ireland trade deal

Britain has yet to see solutions to resolve its concerns over a Brexit pact for Northern Ireland and will have to take the “necessary steps”, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Friday.

His comments, to reporters onboard his flight to Rome for the G20 summit, up the ante on British threats to suspend the application of the EU deal.

The so-called Northern Ireland protocol was adopted as part of Britain’s drawn-out divorce from the European Union, and reflects the special status of the British-held territory.

It seeks to allow free trade across the Irish Sea with mainland Britain, while preventing UK goods entering the EU single market across the land border with Ireland to the south.

However, Britain says it is no longer working in Northern Ireland’s interests.

“The answers to the problems of movements of goods east-west in our country between Great Britain and Northern Ireland should be very simple. I think we need to fix it,” Johnson said.

“I’m not convinced that the solutions that we’re seeing (from the EU) do fix it.

“And we will have to take the steps that are necessary to protect the territorial integrity of the UK and the UK’s internal market.”

Britain particularly wants to end the oversight role of the European Court of Justice over the implementation of the protocol.

Brussels insists the court must remain the final arbiter of its single market, but has offered compromise proposals as London threatens to abandon the protocol altogether.