A delegation of Northern Ireland businesses were invited to Brussels today by Task Force 50 to meet to discuss their version of the Backstop and to have a technical conversation about what this means for businesses who trade throughout the UK, into the EU and internationally.

We had a good constructive conversation and TF50 were able to answer many of our questions. We left with some things to think about and challenged TF50 to look at certain areas.

We still await the UK’s version of the backstop and we welcome the opportunity to engage with both the UK government and NI representatives on this.

It is clear that No Deal is bad for NI businesses, consumers and future job creation. We need to see a deal in place and we urge the negotiators on both sides to use the limited time ahead to reach a deal that works not only for the EU and the UK but critically for Northern Ireland.

Businesses and business representative groups who met were from agri-food, manufacturing, retail, construction, pharma, freight and services.