Irish Sea border: what has changed between Great Britain and Northern Ireland?

Sign up to our free Brexit and beyond email for the latest headlines on what Brexit is meaning for the UK Sign up to our Brexit email for the latest insight Sign up to our Brexit email for the latest insight SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy policy A customs barrier in the Irish Sea between Northern Ireland and Great Britain? By August 2020, her successor, Boris Johnson, was vowing: “There will be no border down the Irish Sea – over my dead body.” Even on New Year’s Day 2021, the Northern Ireland secretary was rebutting a BBC story that began: “The first goods have crossed the new trade border between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK.” Brandon Lewis insisted on Twitter: "There is no ‘Irish Sea Border’. “As we have seen today, the important preparations the Govt and businesses have taken to prepare for the end of the Transition Period are keeping goods flowing freely around the country, including between GB and NI.” Yet a customs and regulatory frontier between Northern Ireland and Great Britain, with is exactly what the government has established – complete with customs declarations and inspections, border control posts and officials checking that consignments are in line with European Union rules. But anyone seeking to exploit the absence of customs checks between the European Union and Northern Ireland and from there to Great Britain is warned against “Belfast bootlegging”.