Northern Ireland

Pastor in legal challenge to Northern Ireland Protocol

Clifford Peeples
Clifford Peeples Clifford Peeples

A BELFAST pastor involved in a legal challenge to the Northern Ireland Protocol is seeking full disclosure of advice from the UK Government's chief law officer on scrapping the post-Brexit trading arrangement.

Clifford Peeples' lawyer has applied to the Supreme Court for access to the opinion provided by Suella Braverman, the Attorney General for England and Wales.

Ms Braverman reportedly approved ripping up the Protocol, describing the Good Friday Agreement as having more importance and "primordial significance".

Her assessment contradicts the government's position in proceedings that the protocol does not undermine the 1998 peace treaty, according to Mr Peeples' legal representative.

Solicitor Ciaran O'Hare described his bid to have the attorney general's advice disclosed to him as pivotal in the ongoing court battle.

"The opinion has not been officially published and it has not been provided to my client, despite repeated requests in the context of his legal challenge," he said.

"That is why an application to the UK Supreme Court has been necessary."

Later this year justices in London will hear arguments in the separate legal campaigns mounted by Mr Peeples and a group of unionist politicians. They are appealing decisions reached by courts in Belfast that the protocol is lawful.

Implemented at the start of 2021 to prevent a hard Irish border, the trading arrangement means Northern Ireland remains in the EU single market for goods. Checks on produce entering the region from Britain has created a de facto customs border in the Irish Sea.

Amid widespread unionist opposition to the accord, a coalition involving TUV leader Jim Allister, Baroness Hoey and former Brexit Party MEP Ben Habib are seeking to have it declared unlawful.

Mr Peeples has also mounted an adjoining case, contending that it breaches the Good Friday Agreement.

Last year the High Court in Belfast found that the Withdrawal Agreement Act, which introduced the Protocol, conflicts with Article 6 of the Acts of Union 1800, drawn up to ensure equal trade footing between Britain and Ireland.

However, the court ruled that the new legislation overrides older law which cannot obstruct the clear specific will of parliament. Those findings were contested on the basis that the Acts of Union has legal

supremacy, with no power for the implied repeal of a constitutional statute.

But in March this year the Court of Appeal again held that the protocol was held to be lawfully enacted and must take precedence over the centuries-old legislative clause.

The new trade deal was said to subjugate part of the Acts of Union, based on the sovereign will of parliament.

However, it will now be subjected to further judicial scrutiny at the Supreme Court.

Citing a national newspaper report from May, Mr O'Hare claimed Ms Braverman provided the government with her opinion that the protocol undermines the Good Friday Agreement by creating a trade barrier in the Irish Sea and fuelling civil unrest.

He also referred to her alleged assessment of "societal unrest" and "increasing signs of violence in Northern Ireland - that can't be allowed to carry on".

Even though such opinion is normally legally protected from disclosure, the solicitor claimed it must have been leaked to the media from Ms Braverman's office.

He added: "Therefore any question of privilege has been waived and, in any event, no such claim of privilege has been made by the attorney general."