Back off, Barnier

There’s an unwritten law governing Boris Johnson in Westminster: every-thing he says or does is a gaffe, or can be portrayed as one. Yet actually Johnson has an uncanny knack for conjuring similes which sum up the political situation precisely. So it was for his much-ridiculed remark, in response to a question about the Irish border, that there are no border posts between London boroughs even though they have different business rates and policies on various other things. His phrasing was careless but the point stands: it is nonsense to claim that different regimes must mean border patrols. There are significant tax and excise differences on either side of the Northern Irish border, but they’re managed without any need for checkpoints. It’s amazing what can be achieved through goodwill.

But goodwill is not a commodity in abundant supply in the offices of Michel Barnier, who likes to portray the Irish border issue as one that can be solved only by keeping Northern Ireland within the customs union. That is quite absurd. Switzerland has for many years managed to operate as part of the Schengen area with scant customs formalities on its borders with four EU states, in spite of it not being part of the EU or the customs union. So why can’t Britain and Ireland continue to operate their own mini-Schengen?

Better still, if the EU would get on and do as it promised to do last December and open talks on a post-Brexit trade deal, we might well find that there will be no tariffs to collect on goods crossing the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic. Even if there were tariffs, it does not follow that there would be any need for formal customs posts.