Northern Ireland is on an island but is not an island: Devolution, withdrawals, protocols and protecting the Good Friday Agreement in all its parts
A decade has almost passed since the UK’s vote in June 2016 to leave the EU. The result raised concerns that Northern Ireland would become simultaneously peripheral to the Union of the United Kingdom and to the EU. The negotiations that followed led to a Withdrawal Agreement that proclaims in the preamble to its Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland – now the Windsor Framework – that the 1998 Good Friday/Belfast Agreement ‘should be protected in all its parts’. This commitment was made by both the UK and EU in recognition of various factors, including ‘the unique circumstances on the island of Ireland’ and that ‘cooperation between Northern Ireland and Ireland is a central part of the 1998 Agreement’. Beyond the preamble, Article 11 states that the Protocol/Windsor Framework ‘shall be implemented and applied so as to maintain the necessary conditions for continued North-South cooperation’.
Since the referendum, the framework of relations that is the Good Friday Agreement (GFA) was placed under considerable strain, and the conditions for North-South cooperation are uncertain. To relieve that strain and enable the restoration of the Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly, which collapsed in 2022 following the Democratic Unionist Party’s withdrawal from the devolved administration, the UK Government set out additional structures in its 2024 Safeguarding the Union Command Paper. These include the UK East-West Council and Intertrade UK and, as the Command Paper explains, contribute to addressing ‘the unionist community’s strong objections to the old Northern Ireland Protocol, and perceptions about [the] importance afforded to the North-South dimensions of the Belfast (Good Friday) Agreement relative to the East-West dimensions’.
Although it achieved its political aim of paving the way for the DUP to return to the Northern Ireland Executive and restore the devolved institutions that form one of the three strands of the 1998 Agreement, the Command Paper’s tone fed into notions that the Agreement’s other two strands – its North-South and East-West dimensions – were in rival camps.
This is a false rivalry based on what are seen as incompatible fears for Northern Ireland’s peripherality. Protection of cooperation and relations between Northern Ireland and Ireland has been interpreted as making it peripheral to the rest of the UK by creating an Irish Sea border. Arguments that to avoid cutting Northern Ireland off from the rest of UK it must be embraced within any moves the UK may make to diverge further from the EU are, on the other hand, regarded as making it peripheral to the rest of the island it forms a part of.
The movement of goods to and from Northern Ireland has been the prime cypher for the incompatibility between these positions. Significant political capital was spent by the UK and EU on the Windsor Framework, agreed in 2023, aimed at reducing trade friction between Northern Ireland and Great Britain, whilst simultaneously protecting frictionless trade between Northern Ireland and Ireland (and the rest of the EU) and its position within the European Single Market for goods. It also sought to address what was seen as a “democratic deficit”, introducing mechanisms such as the “Stormont brake” to allow members of the Northern Ireland Assembly to notify the UK Government of their desire for amended or replacement EU law to not be applied in Northern Ireland, as well as the establishment in the Assembly of the Windsor Framework Democratic Scrutiny Committee. However, not only have questions been raised as to the extent to which the Stormont Brake can be used by the devolved Assembly and as to whether its new Committee has sufficient capacity to properly fulfil its remit, their focus is almost exclusively on Northern Ireland’s position in terms of trade and applicable EU laws.
As surveys have shown, for those on the island of Ireland involved in cooperation between the two jurisdictions (North-South), as well as between those jurisdictions and Great Britain (East-West), Northern Ireland’s position in terms of trade has not been a primary concern. Instead, concerns have centred on the unilateral introduction of policies in other areas by either the UK Government or the EU. The UK’s Electronic Travel Authorisation scheme, for example, not only threatened to disrupt the lives of people residing along the Ireland-Northern Ireland border as it was originally introduced, but it also impacts directly on an area of devolved competence to Northern Ireland – tourism – and on an area of cooperation under the North South Ministerial Council, as well as on Tourism Ireland, both of them part of the structures under Strand 2 of the GFA. Similarly, the EU’s proposed “Defence of Democracy” directive, if unamended, would create obstacles to cooperation between civic society organisations on the island of Ireland.
Maintaining the necessary conditions for continued North-South cooperation requires a genuine understanding they are not solely defined by Northern Ireland’s place within trading flows, and that the GFA’s framework for relations within and between these islands encompasses much more than that. This means that the UK Government needs to move away from its current narrow interpretation of Article 11 of the Windsor Framework. As articulated in its response to a House of Lords report, this restricts its and the EU’s responsibility for maintaining the conditions for cooperation solely in relation to the implementation of Articles 5 to 10 – articles that have little or nothing to do with much of the North-South cooperation that takes place. It is an approach that does not prevent either the UK or the EU from introducing policies unrelated to the scope of Articles 5 to 10 that can undermine the conditions for North-South cooperation and can impinge on the ability of the devolved administration in Northern Ireland to exercise its obligations under Strand 2 of the GFA.
A more generous interpretation of Article 11 is required, along with a more explicit and intentional obligation by the UK Government to assess proposed policies in terms of their potential impacts on cross-border cooperation and relations. This would contribute to addressing evidence that support for the Windsor Framework is weakening, and more properly equip both the UK Government and the EU to maintain the necessary conditions for North-South cooperation. Perhaps more importantly, it would protect the Good Friday Agreement in all its parts, acknowledging Northern Ireland is on an island but not itself an island, with connections North-South and East-West that are not limited to trade.
About the author
Dr Anthony Soares is Director of the Centre for Cross Border Cooperation, an independent organisation with charitable status that is committed to cross-border cooperation that is integral to the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement. The Centre has a specific and unique role in contributing to the increased social, economic and territorial cohesion of the island of Ireland. Anthony’s role includes leading in the development and advocacy of policies at regional, national and European levels that support sustainable cross-border and transnational cooperation. The Centre was co-founded by Queens University Belfast where Anthony was also the founder and Co-Director of the Postcolonial Research Forum.
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