EU Commissioner Mairead McGuinness has warned that there are "voices" in Northern Ireland who “don’t want a Protocol - they want trouble.”
Commenting on the UK’s unilateral move to extend a grace period for post-Brexit checks on some goods entering Northern Ireland from Britain, Ms McGuinness told RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland that trust was required in talks, but that was difficult when one party left the room “to do their own thing.”
Ms McGuinness said that the UK was negotiating with itself rather than with the EU and there needed to be respect on both sides.
Businesses in Northern Ireland needed solutions, “we’re working on it,” she said.
The UK’s behaviour was not appropriate and had to be “called out”, it would also raise questions about global Britain and how they would behave in the future with other global partners she added.
The EU Commissioner for Financial Stability said an agreement for an extension had been reached last December after lengthy negotiations, but there were voices in Northern Ireland who didn't want a solution.
We will never get the right solution if the two parties don’t agree on a way forward.
“They want trouble,” she said, adding the Commission wanted to address the problems, which had been created by Brexit.
“We’re trying to resolve a problem we didn’t create, it was caused by Brexit.”
The political realities of the UK’s unilateral action will have to be separated from the practical realities being faced on the ground by Northern Ireland businesses, she Ms McGuinness said.
“We will never get the right solution if the two parties don’t agree on a way forward.”
Talks would continue, as there was no way that they could not, she added, but the atmosphere was going to be very different now.
“We will be the adults in the room.”
'Where the UK is driving us'
Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney has said that he “strongly advised” Northern Ireland Secretary Brandon Lewis against the UK’s decision, saying if the UK could not be trusted to stick to an agreement and instead took unilateral action then the EU was left with no option but to take legal action.
Speaking to the same programme, Mr Coveney said: “It’s not what we want, but it is where the UK is driving us.”
Mr Coveney added that before David Frost, who has taken over from Michael Gove as lead negotiator for the UK, even had his first meeting with Maros Sefcovic, the EU’s lead negotiator, the UK government had made the announcement.
“To say this was disrespectful is an understatement,” Mr Coveney said.
For Mr Sefcovic to be “undermined” in this way was “deeply unhelpful,” he added.
The UK was making decisions based on the politics of Westminster and had acted unilaterally in what was clearly a breach of protocol, the Minister said.
Ten days ago the UK had committed to implementing the Protocol, but now there was a new person in charge and had taken a different direction, leaving the EU with no option but to look at their legal options, he said.
“That is why the EU is now looking at legal options and legal action which means a much more formalised and rigid negotiation process as opposed to a process of partnership where you try to solve the problems together.”
UK prime minister Boris Johnson had outlined his concern about the trading of certain products between Britain and Northern Ireland in a telephone conversation with the Taoiseach earlier this week about the World Cup, but Mr Coveney said he was not aware of Mr Johnson giving any indication of the unilateral action.
