Member's statement: Brexit: 10th Anniversary

Member's statement by Mr David Honeyford on 23 June 2026.

MLA

Mr David Honeyford

Party at the time

Alliance Party

Date

23 June 2026

Type

Member's statement

Business

Members' Statements

Heading

Brexit: 10th Anniversary

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5636747

Read the official Assembly record

Text

Ten years ago, the UK voted to leave the EU, and Northern Ireland was removed from the EU against its will. People will have voted for many reasons, but people were lied to. They were lied to in that referendum, and, no matter what way people voted, everybody can agree that the decade that followed has been an absolute disaster: a complete act of self-harm; a decade of a failing UK economy; £90 billion of tax revenues that have not been collected and that have come straight off health and education; and ordinary people being hit in their pockets with higher taxation. There has been next-to-no economic growth on a UK scale, so ordinary people are poorer, and we have seen the rise — a real, worrying rise— of the far right and populism in our communities, dividing our communities. The biggest cost of Brexit has been instability, which scares off investment. Since the Brexit referendum, the UK has had seven Prime Ministers, and we have had the Assembly collapse twice. Political uncertainty has become normal. However, when politics becomes unstable, ordinary people pay the price. Ordinary people are paying the price for the Brexit parties' decisions in the House, and those parties have been willing to let ordinary people pay ever since. Every decision that has come to the House that has involved any form of collaboration or the benefits that we can gain from having dual market access has been voted down by the DUP, the Ulster Unionists and the TUV. Many families have spent the past decade worse off, and the loudest supporters of Brexit have punished them, while we have the likes of Farage appearing to be prospering personally. Ten years on, the question is not whether Brexit was right or wrong, because the evidence is clear for everyone to see. Rather, the question is how we move forward, because we find ourselves in a unique position, with dual market access, to both the UK and EU markets, and the opportunity to sell the region that we all enjoy. We need to maximise that opportunity as best we can for our people. Members, do not tell me that you want Northern Ireland to work and then do everything that you can to stop that from being the case. We need more North/South collaboration. We need to see more happening, because east-west collaboration is already happening. We need more collaboration to grow our economy further, but talk is cheap. People say such lines on the news but then come to the Chamber and vote against collaboration. The lesson must be that we need less division, more stability and more collaboration. We need to grow our economy, create opportunities for ordinary people and put more money back into their pockets. We need to focus on them, not on ideology.

471 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 16:07 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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