Northern Ireland special: The Windsor change

Inside Briefing with the Institute for Government

Institute for Government

News, Politics, Government

4.6 • 252 Ratings

🗓️ 3 March 2023

⏱️ 51 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Will Sunak’s new deal with the EU solve the vexed issue of a customs border in the Irish Sea? Can the “Windsor Framework” finally bring the rancorous Brexit debate to an end? How will it work? What about the “Stormont Brake”? And what’s in the small print? To examine the Windsor Framework the IfG’s Jill Rutter and Jess Sergeant are joined by special guests Georgie Wright of the Institute Montaigne, John Campbell of BBC Northern Ireland and Sam McBride of the Belfast Telegraph. “This deal gives business most of what it was asking for.” – John Campbell “We can’t be certain of how the deal will work but it’s a hell of a lot better than the previous one.” – Sam McBride “There’s trust for Sunak in the EU that just wasn’t there for Boris Johnson.” – Georgie Wright “You do have to ask, how much are UK products really going to diverge from EU standards in future?” – John Campbell Presented by Jill Rutter with Jess Sargeant. Audio production by Alex Rees. Inside Briefing is a Podmasters Production for the IfG. www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello, everybody and welcome to this special Northern Ireland edition of Inside Briefing. I'm Jill Rutter. I'm a senior fellow at the Institute for Government.
0:19.6	A week is a long time in politics.
0:21.3	It now seems an age ago when we were speculating whether Rishi Sunak would be facing
0:25.1	resignations and becoming the fourth Conservative Prime Minister to be brought down by Brexit
0:29.6	in the days before he finally unveiled what we now know as his Windsor framework. Instead, we got a
0:36.4	warm press conference in Windsor and perhaps even more
0:39.3	surprisingly a very good reception on the Conservative backbenchers in Parliament, despite Sunak
0:44.2	reminding MPs at length just how bad the initial Johnson-Frost deal they voted for was. And his
0:51.0	cabinet, as we record, remains intact. There is still some opposition.
0:57.0	Boris Johnson said he would be unable to support the Windsor Framework. The ERG is still studying it
1:02.4	and in Northern Ireland, the Democratic Unionists are still waiting to give their final verdict,
1:07.2	though some of their MPs like Sammy Wilson and Ian Paisy Jr. have joined Jim
1:11.7	Alistair of the TV in making clear that for them, as Ian Paisy put it, the mustard is not
1:18.7	cut. Words used interestingly also by Nigel Farage, remember him. So to dissect the deal
1:27.2	and to focus in particular on what it means for
1:28.9	Northern Ireland, but also to bring in a European dimension, I am joined by John Campbell of BBC
1:35.0	Northern Ireland, Sam McBride of the Belfast Telegraph, both joining us, I think, from Belfast,
1:41.9	Georgina Wright of the Anteumontaine joining us from Paris and our very own
1:47.0	Jess Sargent, who I think is here in London. So let's get stuck straight in. Georgie, let me start with
1:55.0	you. Why did the EU decide to get serious with Sunak? Was this deal, as some people have said, really available to his predecessors?
2:05.6	So that's a really good question, Jill.
2:07.2	I think there are three reasons why this deal, you know, materialised now.
	...

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