Reacting to the leak of Treasury documents about the impact of the Withdrawal Agreement on Northern Ireland, Ulster Unionist Party leader, Steve Aiken OBE MLA said:

“The information contained in the leak from the Treasury comes as no surprise as our analysis of the Withdrawal Agreement since it first appeared in December 2017 was that this would be the inevitably grim outcome for Northern Ireland. What has been published should appal anyone who has Northern Ireland`s best interests at heart.

“The fact that this identifies that Northern Ireland`s SME`s will be likely to struggle to bear the cost should set alarm bells ringing in all sections of the business community and beyond.

“The focus until now has been almost exclusively on cross border trade and now we face the situation where we are on the brink of being torn away from our biggest market with totally ruinous consequences.

“This has come about as a result of the UK Government being negligent in their responsibilities to Northern Ireland in the negotiations, propped up by the DUP who paved the way for this by agreeing to a regulatory border in the Irish Sea on the 2nd October. They have proved themselves totally inept in looking after the interests of Northern Ireland, its people and the Union. DUP influence in Westminster has delivered a border in the Irish Sea.

“Even HM Treasury says that Northern Ireland will be symbolically separated from the Union and our economic Union would be undermined. Furthermore the statement that the Withdrawal Agreement has the potential to separate Northern Ireland in practice from whole swathes of the UK`s internal market shows why this deal must be stopped.”