Debate contribution: EU Office in Belfast

Debate contribution by Dr Steve Aiken OBE on 12 January 2026.

MLA

Dr Steve Aiken OBE

Party at the time

Ulster Unionist Party

Date

12 January 2026

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

EU Office in Belfast

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5312081

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I oppose the motion. There will be no surprise there. The motion not only flies in the face of the reality of the situation that affects our economy, our farmers and our consumers but seeks to reinforce the falsehood that the Windsor framework in some way affords us any advantages. I declare an interest: I sit on the Democratic Scrutiny Committee. After two years of being sentenced to sit on the most incurious Committee in the Assembly, I can categorically state, on the basis of the evidence that we see and the thousands of pages of EU regulations, directives, proposals, alignments, explanatory memorandums and all the rest, that the only thing that the Windsor framework facilitates is millions of pounds of additional bureaucratic burden. The costs are already close to £1 billion for Northern Ireland alone. The Windsor framework brings more, not less, regulation; more cost, not less: nothing that would be facilitated or ameliorated by having an EU office in Belfast, EU observer status or any other moves until a full, UK-EU reset is completed. The more observant among you will have noticed that the motion talks about "dual market access". That ignores — probably conveniently for the anti-Trump Sinn Féin — the fact that, with Northern Ireland being an integral part of the United Kingdom, we have advantageous tariff arrangements with the United States. Those tariff arrangements are more amenable for what is one of our largest markets, particularly for pharma, aerospace, defence and agribusiness. Arrangements —.

Of course I do. I do not think that that is any surprise to anybody —.

I get an extra minute, do I, Deputy Speaker? Thank you. It will be no surprise to people here that I voted to remain in the European Union. Brexit was an absolute disaster. It is what it is, however, and that is where we are. There is an opportunity, however, particularly with the US tariff deal. There are also opportunities with India and other markets. Given the present state of the world, those are areas with which we would not have had appropriate tariff deals had we not been outside the European Union. Going back to the US tariff deals, many of us will be aware that our friends in the Oireachtas see them as making the Republic of Ireland uncompetitive. It is nearly as if Sinn Féin, the SDLP and Alliance do not wish to acknowledge the real advantage: it comes with a lot less administrative and regulatory baggage than the Windsor framework. They also ignore our largest market: the rest of our nation. That market has been chilled by the Windsor framework. It cannot and will not ever be compared, in value and volume, with the short-term North/South trade distortions, many of which are due to the rerouting of logistics traffic and how it is managed. It is significant —.

No, I have given way once. It is significant that business organisations such as the FSB and the Northern Ireland Chamber of Commerce and Industry have recognised the reality of the situation. They are no longer saying that the Windsor framework is working whilst complaining privately to the Government and HMRC about the damage that it is doing to their businesses. They are now openly making their concerns heard. My noble friend Lord Murphy picked up on those concerns in his recent report on the workings of the framework.

No, I will not. I have given way once. Lord Murphy's recommendations have been accepted in full by Whitehall. Unsurprisingly, they do not include an impractical EU office in Belfast. Instead, the report recognises the very real difficulties that companies across the United Kingdom have in trading across our part of the Irish Sea. Lord Murphy proposed a multimillion pound clearing house facility to reduce the challenges presented by the Irish Sea border. That recommendation, and the push to do something practical about it, is what we should be debating. The motion tries to push dual market access while ignoring the benefits of the reduced tariffs that we achieve by being part of the United Kingdom; pushes for a nugatory EU quango office in Belfast, thereby failing to recognise the damages that trade divergence has created; and ignores the need for a more positive approach to reduce red tape in our internal market. Those are ample reasons for not supporting the motion.

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

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 14:17 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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