London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Friday, Sep 19, 2025

Opposition MPs demand full legal advice on Northern Ireland protocol bill

Lib Dems say failure to provide it would look like ‘yet another attempt to cover up Boris Johnson’s repeated lies and law-breaking’
Opposition parties have demanded ministers release their full legal advice over a bill to unilaterally amend the Northern Ireland protocol that is expected imminently in the Commons, saying refusing to do so risked accusations of a cover-up.

The bill, which sets the UK on a potential collision course with the EU and which critics see as Boris Johnson’s latest attempt to mollify rebellious backbenchers and reassert his authority, is scheduled to be published on Monday afternoon.

Downing Street officials said the government had received full advice on whether a one-sided attempt to change the deal risked breaching international law, but that it only planned to publish a summary.

The Northern Ireland secretary, Brandon Lewis, said the bill was intended to protect the integrity of the Good Friday peace agreement and that when people saw the legislation they would understand it did not contravene international law.

Asked whether the full advice would be published, he told Sky News’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday show only that the government would be “outlining our legal position”.

Quizzed three times about whether Sir James Eadie, the senior barrister whose role as first Treasury counsel involves giving ministers independent legal advice, had been asked about the bill, Lewis declined to say.

“I’m not going to get into the internals of government advice,” he said. Pressed further, he said: “The government lawyers are very clear that we are working within the law. The attorney general will be setting out the government’s position on that tomorrow.”

The shadow Northern Ireland secretary, Peter Kyle, said the bill had “potential for malicious and rogue governments to interpret it as a green light for unilateral action against international treaties to which they are bound”.

He added: “Given this, it is incumbent on ministers to release the maximum possible legal advice from the start, so the legal basis upon which they make their case to parliament can be judged.”

The Lib Dems’ spokesperson on Northern Ireland, Alistair Carmichael, said: “The refusal to publish this legal advice looks like yet another attempt to cover up Boris Johnson’s repeated lies and law-breaking.

“The government must come clean and publish what legal advice was received and who from in full.

“The public deserves full transparency over the legality of plans to rip up the Northern Ireland protocol and risk a trade war with our closest neighbours. If Conservative ministers have nothing to fear, they have nothing to hide.”

The bill will unilaterally override elements of the post-Brexit protocol with the EU to try to make trade easier between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK, something Brussels has said could spark retaliation.

The hardline Eurosceptic right of the Tory party have put ministers under pressure to take tough action, with MPs having held meetings with the foreign secretary, Liz Truss.

Johnson is seen as more amenable to their message as he tries to court backbenchers after last Monday’s confidence vote in which 41% of his MPs tried to oust him.

Lewis said: “What we’re looking to do is to fix the problems we’ve seen with the protocol. It’s about how the protocol has been implemented, the lack of flexibility we’ve seen from the EU over the last year and a half.”

But the Sinn Féin leader, Mary Lou McDonald, said a significant majority of Northern Ireland assembly members elected in May backed the protocol, and that it was clear ministers in Westminster intended to break the law.

“The protocol is working,” she told Ridge’s show. “The protocol is the mechanism that gives the north, uniquely, unfettered access to the European market. That is why we see in the north of Ireland, in contrast with Britain, with the exception of the City of London, the economy is strong.

“What the Tory government is proposing to do in breaching international law is to create huge, huge damage to the northern economy, to the Irish economy.”

The shadow chancellor, Rachel Reeves, told Ridge she was concerned the plan would contravene international law.

“We haven’t seen the legislation yet, but it does look like the government plans to break international law,” she said. “This government seems to be developing a record for law-breaking, and it’s not one that the Labour party can support.

“We helped bring in the Good Friday agreement. We are deeply, passionately committed to it.”
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Massive Strikes in France Pressure Macron and New PM on Austerity Proposals
Trump Seeks Supreme Court Permission to Remove Fed Governor Lisa Cook
Hillary Clinton’s Reckless Rhetoric Fuels Division After Charlie Kirk’s Assassination
NASDAQ Rises to Record as Intel Soars More Than 20%, Nvidia Gains 3%
Nvidia’s $5 Billion Bet on Intel Reshapes AI Hardware Landscape
Trump and Starmer Clash Over UK Recognition of Palestinian State Amid State Visit
Trump’s Quip on Biden and Google Lawsuit Revives Debate Over Antitrust Legacy
Macron and his wife to provide 'scientific photographic evidence' that she is a real woman
US Tech Giants Pledge Billions to UK AI Infrastructure Following Starmer's Call
Saudi Arabia cracks down on music ‘lounges’ after conservative backlash
DeepMind and OpenAI Achieve Gold at ‘Coding Olympics’ in AI Milestone
SEC Allows Public Companies to Block Investors from Class-Action Lawsuits
Saudi Arabia Signs ‘Strategic Mutual Defence’ Pact with Pakistan, Marking First Arab State to Gain Indirect Access to Nuclear Strike Capabilities in the Region
Federal Reserve Cuts Rates by Quarter Point and Signals More to Come
Effective and Impressive Generation Z Protest: Images from the Riots in Nepal
European manufacturers against ban on polluting cars: "The industry may collapse"
Sam Altman sells the 'Wedding Estate' in Hawaii for 49 million dollars
Trump: Cancel quarterly company reports and settle for reporting once every six months
Turkish car manufacturer Togg Enters German Market with 5-Star Electric Sedan and SUV to Challenge European EV Brands
US Launches New Pilot Program to Accelerate eVTOL Air Taxi Deployment
Christian Brueckner Released from German Prison after Serving Unrelated Sentence
World’s Longest Direct Flight China Eastern to Launch 29-Hour Shanghai–Buenos Aires Direct Flight via Auckland in December
New OpenAI Study Finds Majority of ChatGPT Use Is Personal, Not Professional
Hong Kong Industry Group Calls for HK$20 Billion Support Fund to Ease Property Market Stress
Joe Biden’s Post-Presidency Speaking Fees Face Weak Demand amid Corporate Reluctance
Charlie Kirk's murder will break the left's hateful cancel tactics
Kash Patel erupts at ‘buffoon’ Sen. Adam Schiff over Russiagate: ‘You are the biggest fraud’
Homeland Security says Emmy speech ‘fanning the flames of hatred’ after Einbinder’s ‘F— ICE’ remark
Charlie Kirk’s Alleged Assassin Tyler Robinson Faces Death Penalty as Charges Formally Announced
Actor, director, environmentalist Robert Redford dies at 89
The conservative right spreads westward: a huge achievement for 'Alternative for Germany' in local elections
JD Vance Says There Is “No Unity” with Those Who Celebrate Charlie Kirk’s Killing, and he is right!
Trump sues the 'New York Times' for an astronomical sum of 15 billion dollars
Florida Hospital Welcomes Its Largest-Ever Baby: Annan, Nearly Fourteen Pounds at Birth
U.S. and Britain Poised to Finalize Over $10 Billion in High-Tech, Nuclear and Defense Deals During Trump State Visit
China Finds Nvidia Violated Antitrust Laws in Mellanox Deal, Deepens Trade Tensions with US
US Air Force Begins Modifications on Qatar-Donated Jet Amid Plans to Use It as Air Force One
Pope Leo Warns of Societal Crisis Over Mega-CEO Pay, Citing Tesla’s Proposed Trillion-Dollar Package
Poland Green-Lights NATO Deployment in Response to Major Russian Drone Incursion
Elon Musk Retakes Lead as World’s Richest After Brief Ellison Surge
U.S. and China Agree on Framework to Shift TikTok to American Ownership
London Daily Podcast: London Massive Pro Democracy Rally, Musk Support, UK Economic Data and Premier League Results Mark Eventful Weekend
This Week in AI: Meta’s Superintelligence Push, xAI’s Ten Billion-Dollar Raise, Genesis AI’s Robotics Ambitions, Microsoft Restructuring, Amazon’s Million-Robot Milestone, and Google’s AlphaGenome Update
Le Pen Tightens the Pressure on Macron as France Edges Toward Political Breakdown
Musk calls for new UK government at huge pro-democracy rally in London, but Britons have been brainwashed to obey instead of fighting for their human rights
Elon Musk responds to post calling for the murder of Erika Kirk, widow of Charlie Kirk: 'Either we fight back or they will kill us'
Czech Republic signs €1.34 billion contract for Leopard 2A8 main battle tanks with delivery from 2028
USA: Office Depot Employees Refused to Print Poster in Memory of Charlie Kirk – and Were Fired
Proposed U.S. Bill Would Allow Civil Suits Against Judges Who Release Repeat Violent Offenders
Penske Media Sues Google Over “AI Overviews,” Claiming It Uses Journalism Without Consent and Destroys Traffic
×