Pretty much everyone is shaping up to the Brexit negotiations with the Boris Johnson approach of trying to have their cake and eat it. But few have so many contradictions in their position as the DUP.
The DUP campaigned actively in favour of Brexit. It has also leaned towards a harder version of Brexit, saying, for example, that it is in favour of the Conservative vision of making “progress on new free trade deals with the rest of the world”.
This implies that the DUP favours leaving the EU Single Market and the Customs Union, which is the part of the Single Market which allows free trade in goods. This is the only way Britain can forge ahead and seek new trade deals on its own behalf with other countries.
But here is where it gets complicated. The DUP is also in favour of a “seamless and frictionless” Border between the North and the Republic, pointing to the strong trade and social links between both parts of the island.
However, if Britain leaves the Customs Union the only way that a Border on the island of Ireland could be avoided would be if there was one instead between the North and Britain. Otherwise goods could travel into the Republic under existing EU trade arrangements and onwards through the North to Britain. And the idea of a barrier between the North and Britain will be even less palatable to the DUP than one between the North and South.
There is no obvious way around this conundrum – and remember that a central political point for the DUP is to avoid any “special status” for the North, as Sinn Féin suggested.
The easiest way to square the circle for the DUP would be a soft Brexit. If Britain remained in the Customs Union it would go against the plan of opening up new trade routes elsewhere but would greatly simplify the issue of the Irish Border and dial down the risks to the North’s businesses.
How much influence the DUP will have in all this is questionable. Its priority may well be financial benefits for the North from the British exchequer but the only way to have Brexit and defuse the Border issue is for Britain to stay in the Customs Union, and ideally the Single Market.
