SmartBorder 2.1?

A new report from the European Research Group (ERG) a Tory Brexiteers group today published a report outlining a solution for the 310 mile border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland after Brexit, including extra customs declarations and declarations of origin as well as sanitary, phytosanitary and product compliance procedures.

Among the proposals put forward in the document to deal with these are:

Extra customs declarations should be incorporated into existing online system of VAT returns

Simplified customs procedures for the majority of cross-border trade

Trusted trader-type schemes for large companies

Equivalence of UK and EU regulations for agricultural produce

Declaring the island of Ireland a Common Biosecurity Zone

This is a very similar model that I suggested as Customs technical border proposal in the SmartBorder 2.0 report. This is the report I wrote for the European Parliaments Constitutional Committee.

The model presented on the ERG report is in my opinion a conceptual model – moving formalities away from the border to before and after – that indeed is doable, possible and in line with international standards. From a strictly technical Customs perspective.

However there are no discussions about how to identify transports at the border when needed, naturally due to the very sensitive security situation based on history around the border. This is certainly somethong that should not be underestimated. I believe that the SmartBorder 2.0 solutions can provide an alternative where Trusted Traders and Trusted Commercial Travellers could be using existing infrastructure of the mobile GSM/GPS technolgy and systems for the identification and when needed surveillance.

I am as always, not commenting if this politically possible, right or wrong. That is for others to judge.

Then the ERG report also include e.g stating in the VAT cooperstion naturally has consequences that need decidion based on political will.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-45495960

Source: BBC