Stephen Collins: Steve Baker’s extraordinary Brexit apology opens door to closure

The extraordinary and unexpected apology to Ireland and the EU delivered by Brexiteer hard man Steve Baker this week has provided a glimmer of hope that the seemingly interminable haggling over Brexit may finally be coming to an end. Mind you nobody is counting their chickens just yet.

When I started work on a book about Ireland and Brexit two years ago, I did so on the assumption that the matter had been brought to a close with the departure of the UK from the EU in early 2021 following agreement on a Trade and Co-operation Agreement and the Northern Ireland protocol.

Instead, the wrangling that had characterised the Brexit talks between 2016 and 2020 carried on for another two years in a different form as British prime minister Boris Johnson tried every trick in the book to wriggle out of the agreement he had made with the then taoiseach Leo Varadkar at the Wirrall in 2019.

[ British minister apologises to Irish Government over Brexit negotiations ]

The approach adopted by the current prime minister, Liz Truss, during her period as foreign secretary in charge of the protocol negotiations, and particularly her sponsorship of the legislation giving the British government the power to set aside the international agreement, appeared to indicate that things could only get worse.

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Once she took over the leadership, though, the new prime minister adopted a more conciliatory tone, stressing that she wanted a negotiated settlement with the EU. When Taoiseach Micheál Martin met Truss in London during the funeral of Queen Elizabeth, the mood was distinctly more positive.

Baker’s apparent Damascene conversion was greeted with shock and a fair degree of cynicism by officials in Dublin

Still, Baker’s comments this week came as a bolt from the blue. Not only was he one of the fiercest proponents of leaving the EU, he was one of the leaders of the campaign to destroy the deal agreed by Theresa May, which undermined her premiership.

Baker, who is now a junior Northern Ireland minister, chose this week’s Conservative Party conference to announce his change of heart. “It’s with humility that I want to accept and acknowledge that I and others did not always behave in a way which encouraged Ireland and the European Union to trust us to accept that they have legitimate interests, legitimate interests that we’re willing to respect, because they do and we are willing to respect them.

“And I am sorry about that because relations with Ireland are not where they should be and we will need to work extremely hard to improve them and I know that we are doing so,” he said in an admission that stunned people on all sides of the argument.

[ Can new NI Secretary break Stormont deadlock? ]

Baker’s apparent Damascene conversion was greeted with shock and, it has to be said, a fair degree of cynicism by officials in Dublin. The Taoiseach, however, responded in characteristically optimistic fashion. “I think they were honest and very, very helpful and I look forward to continuing engagement with minister Baker and indeed others in the British government,” he said.

He made the point that while Brexit had fundamentally altered the relationship between Ireland and the UK, “we must never forget the breadth and depth of the British-Irish relationship. It is about trade, finance, investment, energy, agriculture and food. Equally, it is about culture and arts, geography and history, but most importantly, it is about enduring personal connections and family relationships.”

It is still too early to assume that all will be well. There have been many false dawns in the Brexit process over the past six years

The positive role played by the late queen and by King Charles during his long period as prince of Wales in promoting peace and reconciliation on the island of Ireland has had an undoubted impact in creating the political atmosphere for a compromise at this stage.

The strained relations between the Irish and British governments, generated by Brexit, have been damaging to both countries. It would be entirely appropriate if the queen’s funeral marked a turning point in that negative spiral and enabled the two countries to resume the friendly relations that had become the norm in recent decades.

It is still too early to assume that all will be well. There have been many false dawns in the Brexit process over the past six years but there is now an opportunity to bring some closure to the issue. After the political battering she has taken since the announcement of her budget, the last thing Truss needs is to continue the row with the EU.

Her decision to take part in the European Political Community conference in Prague, the brainchild of French president Emmanuel Macron, represented an olive branch to the UK’s former EU partners. It is hard to see a better opportunity for a compromise on the protocol.

The continued opposition of the Democratic Unionist Party to the protocol will be an obstacle to progress

Of course, a compromise will need some movement by both sides, or at least the appearance of movement. EU negotiator Maros Sefcovic has already shown that he is open to the most flexible interpretation of the protocol but he still constrained by the terms required to protect the single market.

The continued opposition of the Democratic Unionist Party to the protocol in any shape or form will be an obstacle to progress. But if the EU and the UK are willing to strike a deal, it is hard to imagine that they will allow a party which represents a minority in Northern Ireland to stand in the way of an agreement that is so important for the continent of Europe.

Ireland’s Call: Navigating Brexit by Stephen Collins is published by Orpen Press