Northern Ireland's Democratic Unionist Party has announced that it will vote against the new Brexit deal which was brokered by the EU and Rishi Sunak's government.
The party's leader, Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, said DUP officers met on Monday morning and unanimously agreed to vote against the first aspect of the Windsor Framework, the Stormont brake.
The brake allows a key part of an agreement that enables Britain to stop new European Union laws from applying to goods in Northern Ireland if so requested by a third of lawmakers in the province's devolved parliament.
Sir Jeffrey said that while the the deal represented “significant progress” in addressing concerns with the Northern Ireland Protocol, he said it does not deal with some of the “fundamental problems at the heart of our current difficulties”.
“It is our party view that there remain key areas of concern which require further clarification, re-working and change as well as seeing further legal text,” the DUP leader said.
The first House of Commons vote on the EU/UK agreement on trading arrangements for Northern Ireland will take place on Wednesday.
The DUP's opposition is a setback to Mr Sunak and could boost opposition to the deal by sceptical members of his own Conservative Party.
But Wednesday's vote is likely to pass as the opposition Labour Party supports the overall agreement.
The DUP is currently blocking devolution at Stormont in protest at the terms of the post-Brexit Northern Ireland Protocol.
The protocol was designed to prevent a hardening of the land border on the island of Ireland and moved regulatory and customs checks to the Irish Sea, creating economic barriers on the movement of goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
The UK and EU agreed the framework as a way to cut the red tape created by the protocol.
What is the Windsor Framework?
Earlier, DUP MP Ian Paisely Jnr announced that he would be voting against the deal and said he expected other members of his party to do the same.
Mr Paisley has been one of the most outspoken critics of the framework.
Sir Jeffrey Donaldson said the framework does not deal with some of the “fundamental problems at the heart of our current difficulties”.
“There is no doubt it is vital that the Northern Ireland Assembly must have at its disposal democratic mechanisms that are effective in law and which underscore the role of the locally elected representatives of the people of Northern Ireland to determine whether amended or new laws are implemented.
“Notwithstanding the issues and conditions which have to be met to make the brake work, it remains the case that the brake is not designed for, and therefore cannot apply, to the EU law which is already in place and for which no consent has been given for its application.
“Whilst representing real progress, the brake does not deal with the fundamental issue which is the imposition of EU law by the protocol.”
