This week the Prime Minister blasted into Belfast and straight to a Coca-Cola bottling plant to serve up the Windsor Framework – the suite of documents that sets out how Northern Ireland might advance forward from protocol problems.
Possibly jacked up on sugar and caffeine (as a self-confessed Coke addict) Sunak stood in front of the cameras and gave an effervescent performance calling Northern Ireland “the most exciting economic zone in the world”. Genetically, such as we are in Northern Ireland, our ability to deal with the gushing praise made us all blush a little. We’ll take it nonetheless.
After several days, however, the fizz seems to have gone out of things a little with the DUP serving up an ice-cold response.
Billed as giving the party some time to digest the text, the clock is now ticking for the leader of the DUP. Members of his own party have already told the media that the Framework does not “cut the mustard” and that the proposals have been “oversold”, whilst the representatives of the Loyalist community have shut it down quick, despite admitting they have not read all the information yet.
The mechanism through which a halt can be placed on EU legislation being implemented in Northern Ireland called the ‘Stormont Brake’ continues to be a point of focus. The newsrooms are asking how it will work in practice, notable academics are having a good go at mapping it out in critical path diagrams. The Northern Ireland Secretary of State, Chris Heaton-Harris, told the BBC this morning that to avoid any ongoing confusion, “the brake’ will be codified within days”.
Despite all these shenanigans, the question that remains unanswered is the possible return of the Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive. We live in hope that if the DUP’s seven tests against the validity of the Windsor Framework are met, that this might pave the way for the resurrection of Stormont. One of our prominent newspaper editors in Belfast reckons only two have been achieved. We can’t get our hopes up too early and it is wise to decouple both matters for the time being.
The local business community and their public affairs teams have shouldered much of the labour in deciphering what it all means and what it means for the sectors they represent, whilst at the same time helping the PM, the Northern Ireland Office and even the EU in pushing for an outcome.
One thing in certain, there is a nervous energy about the place. Giddy excitement gets replaced by anticipation, which gives way to anxiety. Sometimes it feels like we are Waiting for Godot.