But that means Britain effectively has an open border with the EU (which Brexiters don't like, and probably some Remainers don't like in the context of Brexit though they are happy with it with UK a full member of the EU with a say in union policy), or has an internal border between NI and the rest of the UK (which pretty much no one in the UK likes.) The EU has a similar problem with Ireland where the UK has NI.
Which is why this issue is intractable; it internally has no good solution on either side, even before the difficulty of getting agreement between the sides. This is worse on the UK side, because of the interaction with the Good Friday Accords; it's not just abstract political displeasure, it's potentially undermining an internal peace agreement.
The UK and Ireland do not want a hard border. That is a fact. They aren't going to enforce it.
It is irelevant to point out the consequences, because both sides have stated that they will never ever ever enforce a hard border.
The UK and Ireland would both be perfectly fine with not having a hard border. They have stated as such.
You can call it dumb or say that it undermines the purpose of brexit, but at the end of the day it doesn't matter. Both Ireland and the UK are willing to accept the consequences of not having a hard border no matter the consequences.
It's pretty relevant, because the UK government doesn't have Parliamentary support for either of the alternatives, given Brexit, to the the thing they say they won't do, and also seems (though surprises are possible) to be likely to prevent Brexit from being derailed even if they can't pass a Brexit deal. So it's quite likely that we’re heading to a Brexit with none of the choices regarding the Irish border being politically viable.
That political choice is "don't do anything about it, and leave it without a hard border". And this is the choice that both the UK and Ireland want to take.
That would be (from the UK side) the effective open border with the EU choice.
> And this is the choice that both the UK and Ireland want to take.
No, Brexit with the Irish border as an end-run around Britain’s new EU border is not a choice that has majority Parliamentary support in the UK.
For example, the US has, for years, refused to pass any kind of immigration reform, but until recently, also refused to comprehensively enforce the immigration laws already on the books because they were really awful and unfair in places. For another example, neither the People's Republic of China nor the Republic of China (effectively Taiwan) recognize each other, and yet Taiwanese businesses own tons of factories in mainland, PRC-controlled China.
I thought half the point of Brexit was so that the UK could secure it's borders.
And they are just going to leave their biggest land border wide open?
Hopefully yes. I don't want to eat some toxic food that nobody checked when it entered the EU.
IE, they would become the target of terrorist attacks. I doubt they would want this to happen to them.
The alternative isnfor the UK and ireland to simply refuse to enforcr a hard border and dare the EU to do it if they are so upset about customs.
What, is the EU going to station troops there, because of trade deals?
Neither Ireland or the UK are interested in enforcing any sort of hard border. It is instead the EU who would become unhappy about broken trade deals.