Brexit checks on food and farm products entering Northern Ireland from Great Britain must continue pending a judicial review of the order made by Stormont’s agriculture minister, Edwin Poots, the high court in Belfast has ruled.
Mr Justice Colton said he was “suspending the order or the instruction given by the minister of agriculture until the further order of this court”.
At the same he granted leave for an application for judicial reviews against the minister’s decision.
“There shouldn’t be any confusion hanging over those in the civil service, so I am persuaded this is a case where there should be interim relief.
“I therefore make the order to suspend the instruction given by the minister for agriculture until further order of this court.”
Poots took the unilateral decision to order officials to halt all checks on Wednesday after taking legal advice from the former attorney general John Larkin. However, it emerged during the hearing that these checks were due to continue until noon next Monday.
Colton made no comment on whether the Poots move was lawful or not but said the issues were important enough to proceed to judicial review.
His ruling means the Brexit checks will continue until at least 7 March when the next hearing on the matter will take place.
It transpired that a similar case was already pending for that date after an anonymised individual launched a legal challenge against Poots’s predecessor, Gordon Lyons.
Ciaran O’Hare, of the law practice McIvor Farrell, which is acting for the anonymised member of the public, said the case was a “matter of urgency” as civil servants charged with the orders needed “certainty”.
The decision by Poots to halt the checks was part of a wider DUP protest against the Brexit checks, which also led to the first minister, Paul Givan, resigning from his post at Stormont.
