On The Frontline of Brexit

The Documentary Podcast

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary, Personal Journals

4.3 • 2.6K Ratings

🗓️ 16 February 2023

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

No part of the United Kingdom has felt the impact of Brexit more strongly than Northern Ireland. Home to the country's only land border with the European Union, the province is the focus of passionate debate about Britain's future relationship with Europe. Three years on from Brexit, the temporary agreement, the so called “Protocol,” that was designed to ease the UK's exit from the EU but left Northern Ireland in legal and political limbo is coming to an end. And what might replace it is causing uncertainty and unease there. David Baker travels to Northern Ireland and assesses the impact of Brexit. He meets businesses that have benefited from the agreement and want it to stay and others who say it’s been damaging and feel their identities are threatened. Producer: Jim Frank (Photo by Stephen Barnes via Getty Images)

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello and thank you for downloading this edition of Assignment.
0:05.0	No part of the United Kingdom has felt the impact of Brexit more strongly than in Northern
0:11.0	Ireland. David Baker has been finding out why.
0:17.3	It's a cold, wet winter morning and I'm standing on the ridge of a hill.
0:23.0	To my right is Northern Ireland, part of the United Kingdom.
0:27.6	To my left is the Republic of Ireland, a member of the European Union which Britain left
0:33.1	in 2020.
0:35.4	You can't see any sign of a border here but this is where the UK meets the EU.
0:41.6	Making Northern Ireland itself the focus of passionate debate about Britain's future
0:46.6	relationship with Europe.
0:49.0	Unionists do see the Northern Ireland protocol as an existential threat to Northern Ireland.
0:55.3	It's pushing us away from Britain, it's pushing us towards their Republic of Ireland.
1:00.6	If business doesn't grow what happens is that we get unemployment, we lose prosperity.
1:07.4	What you have left is residual angry community, mired in poverty, the environment in which
1:15.9	violence can emerge.
1:18.4	I'm David Baker and in this edition of Assignment I've come to the front line of Brexit
1:24.2	to discover its impact on the people of Northern Ireland and their sense of identity.
1:29.3	For 30 years Northern Ireland was the scene of almost constant violence.
1:43.0	More than 3,600 people were killed and tens of thousands injured.
1:48.8	The conflict was about many things, not least the long-running historical dispute about
1:54.5	the province's status, whether it should be part of a United Ireland or remain part of
2:00.1	the United Kingdom.
	...

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