Rishi Sunak May Have Secured A New Brexit Deal, But Everyone Is Thinking About Boris Johnson

"Thoughts and prayers with Boris Johnson’s ambitions and narcissism at this difficult time."
Boris Johnson championed the NI Protocol back in 2019
Boris Johnson championed the NI Protocol back in 2019
Leon Neal via PA Wire/PA Images

Rishi Sunak re-negotiated the Northern Ireland Protocol last night, and the world of politics is reeling – but it’s unlikely everyone is happy.

The prime minister’s new Brexit arrangement, the Windsor Framework, keeps Northern Ireland inside the EU’s single market for goods, preventing friction on the Irish border.

It also creates a faster route for various British goods to reach the country without being weighed down by intense paperwork, which had under the previous deal creating serious trade delays.

So most people (Brexiteers included) are understandably delighted at the thought of the trickiest part of the Brexit deal being resolved.

But, as Twitter pointed out, the main person who seems to have mysteriously disappeared from the spotlight was the man who first created the NI Protocol – Boris Johnson.

Northern Ireland, as the only part of the UK which had a land border with the EU, was a massive problem when he come to power in July 2019.

His NI Protocol deal a couple of months later - which created a customs border in the Irish Sea - appeared to have "got Brexit done", and led to his landslide general election victory.

It’s not surprising then that it was assumed if Johnson was plotting a comeback for 2023, he would present himself as the only one who could fix the Brexit dramas.

But that was before Sunak’s new deal...

However, Sunak hasn’t escaped scot-free either.

People haven’t forgotten that he actually championed Johnson as Tory leader and prime minister.

Others – like Labour MP Chris Bryant – pointed out that Sunak was in government as a Tory minister when the NI Protocol was agreed.

Some people just pointed out that it was all feeling a little deja vu.

And finally, there were the people who just wished Brexit hadn’t happened in the first place...

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