When Boris Johnson’s UK government “got Brexit done”, a number of things were agreed upon as part of the Northern Ireland Protocol but British union leaders have been opposed to many of the planned checks of goods going from the rest of the UK into Northern Ireland. As a result many of these have simply not been carried out, leading to the UK government deciding unilaterally to write the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill. This Bill gives UK government ministers power to alter or scrap controls on such goods, and if it were to pass into law would break the EU Withdrawal Agreement Northern Ireland trade protocol.
The EU has reacted by blocking the coordination and discussion of issues surrounding digital policy, which could be crucial to both the UK and the EU. Examples of this are the safeguarding of individuals’ online data, something that we are always concerned about here at Smart Thinking.
The European Commission has initiated several legal procedures relating to the Northern Ireland Protocol, alleging UK failure to execute the agreed checks, customs, VAT and alcohol duty laws, as well as UK failure to provide the EU with information concerning exports from Northern Ireland to the rest of the UK. In fact, the EU claims the UK government has now violated the trade deal in seven different ways.
Not being able to share information about e.g limiting the powers of the big tech companies and ensuring that private data remains private is a major concern. EU and UK officials were able to discuss these issues and share information freely before this current block, but such formal contact is no longer permitted. Apparently there is still some informal contact, but this is inadequate in our view. For more information please see our source: European Commission bans official coordination with UK on key data issues, report (computing.co.uk)
Diana Catton MBA – by line and other articles
