Businesses in Northern Ireland will be required to fill out Brexit paperwork when sending their goods across the Irish Sea to Britain, Boris Johnson has conceded, a year after he told them they could put export forms in the bin.
The concession was made as part of a package of arrangements hammered out in the UK-EU joint committee in exchange for the UK dropping its law-breaking Brexit clauses in the internal market and taxation bills.
They will be unveiled in the House of Commons by the committee’s co-chair and cabinet minister Michael Gove later on Wednesday.
It is understood the paperwork will be minimal and involve simple exit declaration forms part of a safety and security certification system the EU requires for all goods leaving the bloc into a third country.
However it is represents a climbdown by Johnson who last year sought to reassure voters and businesses in Northern Ireland there would be unfettered access to markets in Great Britain. Johnson said any business asked to fill in such paperwork should telephone him “and I will direct them to throw that form in the bin”, he told them in an exchange caught on video.
Gove told the BBC on Wednesday that the prime minister was correct as under the deal “there wouldn’t be a need for customs declarations” on goods going from Northern Ireland to Britain.
Also to be revealed on Wednesday are big concessions for supermarkets, which are to be permitted to continue to supply Northern Ireland shops without special Brexit checks that kick in, deal or no deal, on 1 January.
Sainsbury’s, Marks & Spencer and Asda and other trusted traders in the food sector will be given a waiver potentially running to a number of months before checks kick in.
It means sausages, burgers and cheeses will not be examined individually at any ports, addressing recent declarations by Sainsbury’s that it would have to curb meat, dairy and fish supplies because of the Brexit checks.
There had been fears expressed by traders that every single item in a food truck would be subjected to checks with the example of a ham and cheese sandwich requiring two health certificates for each ingredient.
“There will be a grace period, trusted traders will not be subjected to the checks during a grace period,” said a government source. “It will not apply for very long but they won’t be required to do the full checks. The point is everyone has to comply with the sanitary and phytosanitary checks but we were determined to ensure food supplies were not interrupted and got this concession from the EU,” said the source.
There has also been a deal allowing 15 EU officials to be permanently based in offices in Belfast to help traders get to grips with the new system and monitor enforcement by UK officials.
Their presence represents a U-turn for the government coming months after they told Brussels they could not open an office in Belfast.
Gove told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that it was in fact “helpful Eurosceptics” who suggested “one way of resolving the difficult Northern Ireland issues would be precisely to have … EU officials visiting Northern Ireland, with an opportunity to watch UK officials making sure these checks are there”.
The officials will have access to all UK databases and controls will be able to take place at any time without any prior notification. They will not have a building but appropriate office space will be found, sources say.
A source said the negotiations around this had only been possible in the secrecy of the joint committee chaired by Gove and the European commission’s vice-president, Maros Šefčovič.
Of the four border control posts at Northern Ireland ports two are not yet fully completed and will function as temporary structures.
The UK will provide documents concerning the work schedule for completion of the control posts to the EU as part of the joint committee agreement which will all be inspected by the health directorate, DG Sante, which will oversee the sanitary and phytosanitary controls on agrifood arriving in Northern Ireland from Great Britain.
There has also been an agreement struck to determine what goods are “not at risk” of being smuggled over the border into the Irish Republic which will involve a trusted trader scheme for supermarkets.
This will obviate the need for tariffs to be paid on the goods trucks carry in a complicated pay-and-rebate system envisaged under a no-deal scenario.
This will be reviewed after 3 and a half years, six months before the end of the four-year period during which the Northern Ireland protocol applies.