fter four and a half years of circuitous discussions, dozens of broken deadlines and a long but decidedly unproductive telephone call, can Boris Johnson’s face-to-face meeting with EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen break the deadlock?
The decision by the British government to cancel some clauses in the Internal Market Bill and the Taxation Bill certainly helps. This move came as the parallel talks on the implementation of the Northern Ireland Protocol ended in (apparent) success. This was in fact unfinished business from the withdrawal agreement reached last year and ratified in principle this year. The EU believed that the British government’s behaviour suggested bad faith, while the British found the EU’s insistence on checks across the Irish Sea frustrating and impractical. At least for now those arguments seem to have been dissolved, and chicken sandwiches can be delivered to supermarkets in Strabane without provoking a diplomatic incident or a return of the Troubles.
There is also the pressure of time, the continuing Covid pandemic and the longstanding pleas of business people that are propelling the two sides to compromise.
