The Irish Backstop would “turn the Good Friday Agreement on its head”, says a Policy Exchange Briefing Note by Lord Bew of Donegore, a Crossbench peer and leading historian of Ireland.

Lord Bew writes that the “UK Government has allowed the Irish Government to weaponise the 1998 Good Friday Agreement in a way that prevents compromise on the Backstop”.

But he offers a way forward for the UK Government that, he argues, could “transform the terms of the debate around the Withdrawal Agreement” by making the Backstop temporary in “explicit and legally binding terms”.