Rishi Sunak has negotiated an agreement, in the form of the Windsor Framework, that has required the EU to give significant ground while getting nothing in return.
The DUP tail must not now be allowed to wag the government dog, and Brexiteer Tory MPs must resist the temptation to seek ideological purity on the single issue of the European Court of Justice’s jurisdiction.
To triumph electorally, the Tories must retain the support of significant numbers of Remain voters as well as Brexiteers, most of whom have no interest in the Northern Ireland Protocol. Swing voters, in particular, have other priorities, which the Government is rightly addressing. Mr Sunak is a formidable campaigner and an accomplished debater. He is now proving a successful Prime Minister, who will appeal across the political spectrum – if only his party can finally declare the Brexit debate closed.
Philip Duly
Haslemere, Surrey
SIR – Once again the Conservatives have betrayed their membership and the electorate. Instead of “getting Brexit done” they have allowed the EU to create a fudge that the ECJ will exploit.
Where can I go to voice my opposition? The Labour Party is full of Remainers, and the Liberal Democrats are the same. What happened to the bright hopes of a new, energised Britain trading across the globe?
John Neimer
Stoborough, Dorset
SIR – The Windsor Framework prompts me to ask: why did we leave the EU in the first place?
John Bayer
London N21
SIR – Having a foot in both the EU and UK markets represents a golden opportunity for Northern Ireland. All that is now required is some stability.
Yet the hard-line Unionists struggle to recognise a gift horse when they see one. They really are yesterday’s people, fighting yesterday’s battles, to the detriment of future generations.
Alan Law
Streatley, Berkshire
SIR – The EU’s overall objective to punish, humiliate and make things difficult for the UK is unlikely to have disappeared. It has acted in such bad faith for the past few years, with a successful track record in creating division among our political leaders, and I doubt it has changed its spots.
For all that is good about Rishi Sunak’s Windsor breakthrough, the EU still retains a right to interfere in the UK’s laws. This is intolerable.
Stuart Moore
Bramham, West Yorkshire
SIR – Sherelle Jacobs says Brexit has failed.
Unfortunately this plays into the hands of Remainers, who still maintain that Brexit has been a disaster and we should rejoin the EU – or, at the very least, shadow all of its rules as a vassal state. Like most Brexiteers, I would prefer that the EU court had no sway in Northern Ireland, but politics is the art of the possible: we do not live in an ideal world.
Rishi Sunak and his team have obtained the best possible result from the Northern Ireland Protocol fiasco. The limited remaining authority of the EU court is a fig leaf that allows the EU to save face, and will be quietly ignored. The most important thing that the new agreement has demonstrated is that the EU finally realises it can no longer push us around and expect us to cave in.
Alison Levinson
Hastings, East Sussex
SIR – “After briefly posing for the cameras, [Ursula von der Leyen and Rishi Sunak] got down to work jointly preparing for a press conference over a lunch of cucumber and coronation chicken sandwiches” (report, February 28).
Where did they get the cucumbers?
Geoff Cherry
Luton, Bedfordshire