Rishi Sunak is making an attempt to strike a Brexit cope with the EU and finish the two-year stand-off over the Northern Ireland Protocol.
The Prime Minister flew to Belfast to attempt to persuade the DUP that the compromise meets their demands to return to the Stormont Assembly.
He held talks with Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, the unionist chief, on Friday morning, forward of a deliberate telephone name with Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Fee.
British and European officers have mentioned the settlement is anticipated to be unveiled on Tuesday, when Mr Sunak will transient his Cupboard on the small print.
However Sir Jeffrey signalled following the assembly that the DUP won’t compromise on its crimson strains, and that he’s “not targeted on timescales”.
Beneath the Protocol, which got here into power in January 2021, Northern Eire successfully remained within the Single Market and continues to comply with EU guidelines.
The answer averted a tough border with the Republic, however carried out checks on sure items travelling between Nice Britain and Northern Eire, creating a trade border in the Irish Sea.
Unionists say the brand new crimson tape between Nice Britain and the province has undermined their place within the UK and broken the financial system.
The deal instantly started to collapse, and two months after it got here into power the UK needed to step in to cease checks making use of to items like sausages.
Talks between No 10 and Brussels formally reopened in Autumn 2021 after the EU accepted the Protocol was inflicting severe issues in Northern Eire.
They broke down below Boris Johnson and have been frozen below Liz Truss, after eurocrats insisted the authorized textual content of the Protocol couldn’t be reopened.
However the arrival of Mr Sunak breathed recent life into negotiations and a brand new deal, taking the type of a declaration to take a seat alongside the Protocol, is now imminent.
Here’s what it’s anticipated to include.
Grocery store items
The primary promoting level of the deal would be the creation of a brand new inexperienced lane for the overwhelming majority of products being despatched from Nice Britain to Northern Eire.
Any merchandise which might be destined for the Northern Irish market solely can be exempted from all bodily checks and virtually all paperwork.
Solely these that are deemed to be at excessive danger of travelling onwards into the Republic and the EU market must bear additional crimson tape.
The entire system can be underpinned by a brand new trusted dealer scheme, which Northern Irish companies will be capable of signal as much as.
Officers in Brussels can even be capable of entry a real-time database on the motion of products to allow them to hold tabs on any danger of smuggling.
Animal merchandise
One space the place checks are anticipated to proceed is on shipments of reside animals and a few excessive danger animal merchandise.
The island of Eire varieties one complete animal and plant well being zone, separate to that of Nice Britain, that means that controls on what’s arriving are required.
Earlier than the UK left the EU, round one in 10 reside animal shipments have been bodily checked on the province’s ports, which rose to at least one in 5 post-Brexit.
However the deal can be anticipated to formally affirm {that a} “grace interval” permitting shipments of chilled meats throughout the Irish Sea is being made everlasting.
Brussels initially needed to ban the export of products like sausages and burgers from Nice Britain to Northern Eire on meals security grounds.
European courtroom
A controversial facet of the Protocol is that it made the European Court docket of Justice chargeable for policing the appliance of EU legal guidelines in Northern Eire.
Beneath the present system, if the Fee considers there to be a breach of the settlement it could actually file a case straight with its personal Luxembourg-based judges.
The brand new deal will say that disputes should first go earlier than a Northern Irish courtroom or an impartial panel, which might seek the advice of the ECJ on issues of EU legislation.
However crucially the European courtroom will hold its standing because the “last arbiter” of Brussels guidelines, that means any interpretation it palms right down to them can be binding.
It is usually anticipated that the EU will pledge that instances will solely go to the ECJ as a “final resort” after criticism it has been too set off pleased with its authorized motion over Brexit.
EU legal guidelines
Northern Eire has to use round 300 guidelines, largely masking items requirements, which the DUP has mentioned is undemocratic as Belfast has no say in them.
The scenario additionally creates a danger of divergence between the province and Nice Britain, because the UK Authorities adjustments its personal requirements after Brexit.
That might imply that over time increasingly more items which might be manufactured or accessible in England, Scotland and Wales are banned in Northern Eire.
No 10 proposed a “twin regulatory” system the place corporations in Northern Eire might select to comply with both UK or EU guidelines, however that was rejected by eurocrats.
Unionist pleas for a democratic lock – whereby Stormont must log off on legal guidelines made in Brussels, and will reject these it didn’t need – additionally look set to be rebuffed.
State assist
In addition to requirements on items, Northern Eire additionally has to comply with the EU’s competitors guidelines, together with these governing state assist spending.
That implies that the Fee has to offer the inexperienced gentle to main spending initiatives the UK Authorities needs to hold out within the province.
Critics have warned that Brussels might additionally attempt to “attain again” and restrict how No 10 spends money in Nice Britain, the place corporations in Northern Eire could profit consequently.
As with the appliance of different EU legal guidelines, the deal isn’t anticipated to instantly tackle state assist, as a result of doing so would require a rewriting of the Protocol.
However the two sides have come to an understanding that, following Covid and the Ukraine conflict, the Fee will take a light-touch strategy.