Only 22 Conservative MPs, including ex-Prime Ministers Liz Truss and Boris Johnson, voted against their successor’s Northern Ireland deal.
London. The days when the anti-European faction in the British Tories set the tone of day-to-day politics officially ended on Wednesday. The conservative hardliners suffered a defeat in the vote on the additional agreement to the Brexit Pact, which resolved the conflict with the EU over the rules of the game for Northern Ireland: Only a total of 29 MPs voted against the compromise negotiated under the aegis of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Wednesday afternoon , while 515 MPs voted yes.
And of those already sparse dissenting votes, one came from an independent MP and six from MPs from the Northern Ireland unionist party, the DUP, who rejected the bill. The fact that there was no rebellion against Sunak is all the more remarkable given that his two predecessors, Liz Truss and Boris Johnson, had previously announced that they would vote no.
Majority of Northern Irish want end of dispute with EU
The only drop of bitterness for the government camp: The number of abstentions in the Tory group in the House of Commons was around 60, which was above expectations – an indication that not all Conservatives are happy about the compromise with Brussels. On the other hand, the vote is entirely in the interests of those affected: According to a snap poll published by the Irish Times on Tuesday, only 17 percent of Northern Ireland were decidedly against the compromise, while 45 percent supported this “Windsor Framework Agreement”.
The EU exit agreement had caused problems in trade between Northern Ireland and Great Britain, because then Prime Minister Johnson left the province de facto in the EU internal market in order to speed up the exit negotiations. The Windsor Framework Agreement provides for simplifications in the controls on the movement of goods that have become necessary as a result, as well as more say for Northern Ireland.
(“Die Presse”, print edition, March 23, 2023)