BREXIT AND ThE STATE

Three new bodies were created as a consequence of Brexit: • The Independent Monitoring Authority for the Citizens Rights Agreements (IMA) – a UK-wide body established initially for eight years to oversee the implementation of the citizens’ rights agreements in the Withdrawal Agreement and with the EEA. The IMA is sponsored by the Ministry of Justice and operates across the UK. [...] The Office for the Internal Market – also part of the CMA – advises governments on the working of the internal market, and the implications of internal divergence for the operation of intra-UK trade. [...] While it is up to the UK government, subject to any complaints to the WTO, to decide how to manage the GB border for goods coming in from the EU, it is under obligations agreed with the EU on how to manage the border between GB and Northern Ireland. [...] It also led to a severe estrangement between the UK and the Irish government, which had played a strong and decisive role in the early stages of the development of the EU’s negotiating position. [...] But if the UK government was to reject a call to act from unionists in Northern Ireland, that could expose the Stormont Brake as falling well short of the promises the Prime Minister made about addressing the ‘democratic deficit’ created by the Protocol, and exacerbate instability in the governance of Northern Ireland.