Reg Empey: Our warnings in the Ulster Unionist Party years ago were ignored by those who charged into a hard Brexit

Unionism faces a real dilemma following a badly negotiated Brexit.

We ended up in 2019 with the Northern Ireland Protocol which created a border in the Irish Sea, the supremacy of the EU Court and customs declarations being required to be made by traders sending goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Now we have the Windsor Framework and the question being asked is what does it do that the protocol doesn't?

It’s clear that the framework is an improvement, or a stepping stone in the right direction as Doug Beattie called it earlier this week. It’s a less invasive form of the protocol that has reduced the number and volume of checks and paperwork, but there is still a border in the Irish Sea and will continue to be one as long as Northern Ireland is in the EU single market and Great Britain is not.

Whatever one’s views on the protocol or the framework, all of this was foreseen and foreseeable.

Genuine warnings and urges to tread carefully were issued by the Ulster Unionist Party years ago, but those unionist representatives who claimed to know better and who urged a charge into an ill-thought-out idealised version of a hard Brexit told us of all the benefits Northern Ireland would receive outside of the EU. From my perspective there weren’t going to be any, just constitutional damage and broken relationships. Now those same people are pretending to be in some heroic struggle to right the great wrongs that they have delivered.

While all this rages, in many cases above the heads of many people faced with huge cost of living challenges, Northern Ireland still needs to be governed. What we have now is the worst of both worlds – no ministers to take decisions, no assembly to hold them to account and pass legislation, and no budget and no accountability for what passes for governance.

With over three wasted years because of a Sinn Fein boycott of the assembly, we are facing into our second year of a DUP boycott. Both were wrong and both have caused real and lasting damage to the delivery of key public services.

Unionists must look clinically at the alternatives on offer. More boycotting of Stormont will leave us with no local government and with a new government likely in Westminster and perhaps even Dublin, this is a good time to take stock.

Parliament has made its views known on the framework and the EU is signing off on the details. While the Ulster Unionist Party will always support and campaign for measures to lessen the damage done to our constitutional situation and the Belfast Agreement by Brexit and what flows from it, we will not abandon the people by making our Institutions unworkable.

Which way are we more likely to gain influence? Boycott or government? For me there can only be one answer – we choose government. It is the better option and gives unionism some foothold against circumstances where Sinn Fein could be in government in Dublin and Labour in Downing Street.

Not perfect, as we know, but better than the vacuum we have right now, which ultimately will be filled by those who choose division and for some perhaps even violence over politics.

This is a huge challenge for us all, but we will face it as we have in the past with a determination to do all we can to repair constitutional damage and see what steps an executive can take to improve the lives of our people in these times of adversity.

There are clearly opportunities arising from our unique circumstances and common sense tells us that we should seize every one we can. If we can attract some additional Foreign Direct Investment we should do so. Any improvement in our economic circumstances that can bring about a rise in prosperity will ultimately help secure the Union. Recent economic shocks have shown that money and investors don't like political uncertainty. If we can provide some stability we will all gain.

I fully accept and understand that there are those who really don't like Stormont or its rules and similarly didn’t support the Belfast Agreement, but if they think we can just go back to the old style direct rule of the 1980s and 1990s, they are gravely mistaken.

These are the same people who thought Brexit was going to be a great idea. While the Sinn Fein boycott of Stormont worked for them, as they secured the Irish language legislation and a raft of other apparent inducements as a result of the New Decade New Approach deal of January 2020, which the DUP supported and the UUP didn't, the DUP boycott is clearly not working.

All the key elements of the protocol remain, such as the border in the Irish Sea, the EU Court and rules being made for us in Brussels. What reason is there to believe that more of this will work? A change of strategy for broad unionism is urgently required. We have little to gain but much to lose the more unstable our institutions become. Let's get Northern Ireland back to work!

Lord Empey, Ulster Unionist peer, House of Lords, Westminster