Two years after the Democratic Unionist Party put the institutions of the 1998 Belfast/Good Friday Agreement into suspension by withdrawing from them, those institutions returned, and devolved government exists in Northern Ireland again, headed by a Sinn Féin First Minister. Negotiations between the UK government and DUP led to a deal, embodied in a white paper. Alan Whysall looks at the paper, and the prospects for the Agreement settlement.
How we got here
The history of the dispute has been set out on this blog and a recent Constitution Unit podcast. Briefly, a Protocol to the EU Withdrawal Agreement left Northern Ireland effectively within the EU single market for goods and customs arrangements. This avoided the necessity for a border within the island of Ireland, which would be acutely difficult in both political and practical terms; it gave Northern Ireland rights to trade freely in the EU as well as Great Britain. But potentially it inhibited trade with GB, the symbolism of which antagonised some unionists. Hardline pressure grew. The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) responded by withdrawing from the institutions in February 2022, thereby shutting them down.
The Windsor Framework, agreed between the UK and EU in 2023, was intended to respond to the DUP’s demands – but it stayed out. Negotiations went on, in private, between the DUP and London, reportedly involving Julian Smith, who more or less uniquely among recent secretaries of state is widely respected in Northern Ireland. There was also a brief interparty discussion in December in which the government made an offer of relief for Northern Ireland’s desperate public finances. But deadlines came and went.
Finally, a week or so ago, DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson presented the proposals emanating from the negotiations to various party groupings; and securing majorities, albeit not it appears large ones, announced acceptance.
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