Quote:
Originally Posted by 1andrew1
What seems under-reported to me is that whatever is agreed or not agreed this weekend, Northern Ireland will still be subject to EU rules and the jurisdiction of the ECJ. So, we've not really got the sovereignty of the UK back.
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Northern Ireland is a millstone that in the long run is destined to drift into the Republic. Demographics will see to it even if European politics doesn’t. And British sovereignty there was compromised years ago as a necessary condition of the peace process. There was no functioning executive in Stormont from 2017 to 2019 yet the place was run by the Northern Ireland Civil Service (which is independent of the British home civil service that, internally, treats its Scottish and Welsh operations as departments just like all the others). The British Government could have restored direct rule but it was considered too politically difficult to do. The British Government chose not to exert its authority in part of its own sovereign territory. That really ought to set the present situation in some sort of context.