Liz Truss has told officials to be ready to trigger Article 16 from next week, in an attempt to force a quick deal with the EU over the Northern Ireland protocol.
The foreign secretary has “lost faith” in negotiations with the EU and wants Boris Johnson to warn the European Commission that Britain is ready to suspend parts of the protocol if a deal is not struck before elections in Northern Ireland in May.
The prime minister is understood to be ready to deliver such a warning, despite fears that a full-scale diplomatic row with the EU could fracture western unity against President Putin.
Some in Whitehall are said to want to kick the dispute “into the long grass” while the world deals with the situation is Ukraine but Truss is determined to force a resolution.
Talks have been dragging on for months over Britain’s demand to renegotiate the part of the original Brexit deal which in effect keeps Northern Ireland within the EU single market. The protocol was designed to prevent a hard border with the Republic of Ireland but means checks are made on goods crossing from Britain to Northern Ireland.
Advertisement
The British government wants to reduce such checks, allow goods that meet UK standards to be sold there even if they do not meet EU regulations, and to remove the role of the European Court of Justice in enforcing the protocol.
The devolved administration in Northern Ireland has collapsed over Unionist demands to scrap the protocol and government sources said the situation was “unbearable” and ministers “cannot wait any more”.
Truss fears that “the window is closing” to strike a deal before elections on May 5 and believes that waiting until afterwards would lead to unacceptable further delays.
Johnson is expected to speak to Ursula von der Leyen, head of the European Commission, on Monday to call for intense negotiations to find a solution and deliver a warning that Britain will trigger Article 16 if that does not happen.
Ministers had wanted to reach a solution by now before the pre-election “purdah” period at the end of the month but the timetable has slipped because of Ukraine.
Advertisement
The government fears that the EU now wants to wait until after May elections before negotiating seriously, a position officials insist is not good enough.
Sources said the EU was being “totally unreasonable and basically not moving on anything”, despite privately acknowledging that the protocol was causing practical problems in Northern Ireland.
“Liz has lost faith in the negotiations and wants the PM to tell VDL to force an intense period of negotiations or trigger Article 16 by May,” they said, adding that the aim was to “get the EU into a period of intense negotiations where it’s clear that we’ve given up and are ready to trigger Article 16 if they fail.”
Officials believe they have got the US to acknowledge the need for reform of the protocol, hoping to minimise the risk of blowback from Washington if Britain acts unilaterally.
Another source said that Truss was “very busy with Ukraine but has not forgotten Northern Ireland and is acutely aware of the problems there and very concerned if it is allowed to drift.” They said that the EU was “not engaging on a systematic enough level with the real underlying problems” in the protocol.
Advertisement
Article 16 is unlikely to be triggered next week, not least as President Biden is due to visit Brussels, but officials have been told to clear “bureaucratic hurdles” to implementing it at short notice.
A third government source acknowledged it would not be “ideal” to trigger a major diplomatic spat with the EU at the same time as a global crisis but insisted the prime minister was prepared to do it. “The PM is more hardline on this than Liz,” they said. “Ukraine has definitely not ruled this out. We will do what we need to.”
