Brexit: Rishi Sunak's Windsor Framework looks like a turning point in UK-EU relations and a good deal for Northern Ireland – Scotsman comment

As Rishi Sunak and EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen proudly announced the “Windsor Framework” – a deal designed to fix the problems with Boris Johnson’s Northern Ireland Protocol – their warm words and body language delivered another important message.

Here were two “allies, trading partners and friends” – as Sunak put it – and not the participants in a bitter spat bordering on a mutually destructive trade war as a real war rages on the same continent. Finally, it seems, the UK and EU have woken up to the fact that, in an uncertain and dangerous world, they must work together.

While the deal’s details will be pored over for some time to come, the early signs were encouraging. The Northern Ireland Protocol was a botched job that created ridiculous situations and put too many barriers between Northern Ireland and mainland Britain.

The new deal includes a customs “green lane” for goods going from Britain to Northern Ireland that will no longer require associated paperwork and checks, with a “red lane” for goods “at risk” of moving on into the EU. It also introduces a “Stormont brake” covering the EU legislation that will still apply in Northern Ireland, enabling its Assembly to object to a new rule.

Whether this will satisfy the Democratic Unionist Party, allowing the restoration of power-sharing at Stormont, remains to be seen. However, if there is supposed to be a hard border between the UK and EU, but also no hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic, as well as Northern Ireland and Britain, then any deal necessarily has to be a diplomatic fudge.

There will always be reasons to object and inconsistencies to point out, but will the people of Northern Ireland be able to get anything better? And they should be able to benefit from the best of both worlds: being inside both the EU and UK single markets. Sunak’s deal seems to have the wind at its back and the DUP and hardline Brexiteers in the Conservative party could suffer political damage if they are seen to prolong the current unsatisfactory situation.

As liberal democracies, the UK and EU are natural allies. Hopefully, the Windsor Framework will now put an end to almost a decade of rancour and prove a decisive turning point in relations.