Brexit: Edwin Poots orders halt to agri-food checks at Northern Ireland ports

By PA

Agriculture Minister Edwin Poots has ordered a halt to Brexit agri-food checks at Northern Ireland ports required under the terms of the Northern Ireland Protocol.

Mr Poots said he had received legal advice which stated that he could order a halt to Northern Ireland Protocol checks.

Speaking at Stormont, Mr Poots said: “I have taken legal advice in relation to my position from senior counsel. Earlier today I received that legal advice.

“It stated that at present there is presently no Executive approval for SPS checks.

"The implementation of SPS checks requires Executive approval.

“A decision to initiate or continue such checks could not be validly taken in the absence of Executive approval.

“The advice concluded that I can direct the checks to cease in the absence of Executive approval.

“I have now issued a formal instruction to my permanent secretary to halt all checks that were not in place on December 31 2020 from midnight tonight.

“I will prepare a paper for Executive consideration in the near future to seek agreement on a way forward.”

TUV leader Jim Allister welcomed Edwin Poots’ decision to halt port checks, but said the whole of the Northern Ireland Protocol now needed to be removed.

Mr Allister said: “It was something that should never have happened.

“Though we have had a year of allowing the protocol to bed in and indeed justification for them, it is welcome that he has come to the conclusion he has.

“Now the challenge is to bind together to make sure that the ill-gotten sovereignty of the EU over Northern Ireland is removed in its entirety.

“There is no place for Northern Ireland to be left subject to foreign laws, foreign institutions, foreign courts, foreign customs. It all has to go.

“The start that has been made tonight can only be the start. We need now to see the total dismantling and the unbedding of the protocol.”

Jim Allister

Sinn Fein has insisted the Northern Ireland Protocol is the law and it “must be adhered to”.

Deputy First Minister Michelle O’Neill branded Mr Poots’s actions a “stunt”.

She tweeted: “This stunt is an attempt by the DUP to unlawfully interfere with domestic and international law.”

Her party colleague John O’Dowd said that Mr Poots was “perfectly aware” of the Executive position over the protocol.

He said: “The protocol is the law.

“The DUP signed off at the Executive that they would adhere to the regulations within the protocol.

“I have a number of questions which require to be answered by Mr Poots. Where did he get this legal advice?

“Did he go to the Attorney General? Did he use Government legal advisers?

“The facts remain the same. The Executive has a position that they will adhere to the protocol, to the European Withdrawal Agreement, and the principle remains for all Executive ministers, you have to adhere to the law.”

Mr O’Dowd said he had no doubt civil servants would be “taking advice” over Edwin Poots’s decision to halt Northern Ireland Protocol checks.

Alliance Party MLA John Blair said Edwin Poots and the DUP were “addicted to disruption”.

Mr Blair said: “There is a legal obligation upon the minister to provide checks at ports, this has been made perfectly clear to him by his own officials and through previous advice from Defra.

“Here we are again at a time of uncertainty and the minister is behaving like a wrecking ball, bringing more uncertainty to our sectors and creating disruption the best he can.

“It is completely unacceptable and unsuitable at this time.

“This is a time for working with others to find solutions.”

Alliance Party leader Naomi Long tweeted that people were tired of “grandstanding and instability” over the protocol and urged Mr Poots to “step up and do the job or step aside”.

Naomi Long