Despite resistance from Northern Ireland’s main unionist party and some of its members, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will win parliamentary approval for a key post-Brexit plan on Wednesday.
Sunak has addressed one of the trickiest Brexit negotiations to avoid years of wrangling: providing unfettered commerce to Northern Ireland without a hard border with Britain or the EU.
As part of the Windsor Agreement to alleviate post-Brexit tensions, he agreed with the EU to introduce the “Stormont brake” to offer Northern Ireland more flexibility over accepting new EU laws.
Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), Conservative eurosceptics in the European Research Group (ERG), and his two predecessors, Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, will rebel in Wednesday’s lower house vote, losing Sunak political capital less than a year into his leadership.
Sunak is expected to win as the uprising may be subdued to give the Conservatives a majority, and the Labour Party has committed to back the administration if required.
Sunak and his ministers urged Parliamentarians to back the proposal.
According to Northern Ireland minister Chris Heaton-Harris, the Stormont brake underlies the Windsor Framework. The UK and Northern Ireland gain practical sovereignty.
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