By Elishya Perera
BRUSSELS, Belgium (CU)_The European Union on Monday (15 March) launched legal action against Britain over the London’s unilateral decision to extend the grace period before checks are to be carried out on goods arriving in Northern Ireland from other parts of the United Kingdom.
Brussels says the move is in breach of the Brexit divorce deal agreed with London last year, and has therefore sent a letter of formal notice which will launch an “infringement procedure”.
Although this could lead to EU’s top court imposing fines on Britain, however, it would take at least a year for a ruling to be given, which leaves time for the parties to agree on a solution.
The Northern Ireland Protocol in the Brexit withdrawal agreement was designed to ensure an open border was maintained on the island of Ireland following Brexit. However, this meant that Northern Ireland would align to various EU rules, including the introduction of checks on certain goods travelling between the region and Great Britain.
Although some of those checks were meant to start when the grace period expires at the end of this month, however, Britain says it intends to extend this unilaterally until 1 October.
This is what prompted the bloc to launch a legal case, as the Brussels demands that London reverses this decision. EU’s top official in charge of UK relations, Maros Sefcovic, also previously sent a letter to his British counterpart and Chief Negotiator of Task Force Europe, David Frost, seeking talks in good faith to resolve the matter this month.
Yet, Britain says it has not violated the agreement and therefore intends to reply to the legal action “in due course”.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Monday that the decision to extend the grace period was simply a technical one which was aimed at being fair.
“That’s all we’re trying to sort out with some temporary and technical measures which we think are very sensible, but obviously we’ll look forward to our discussions with our EU friends and see where we get to,” he said.
