Llywydd, this is a bad deal for Wales and a bad deal for the United Kingdom as a whole. It is a bad deal for Wales because it would clearly damage our economy, above all our manufacturing and agri-food sectors. It would see new, significant non-tariff barriers to trade, even if tariffs themselves were ultimately avoided. Now, we have not seen the UK Government's economic impact analysis, but their previous modelling, in line with many other serious economic analyses, suggested such an outcome would lead to a shortfall in gross domestic product of around 6.7 per cent over a 15-year period when compared to what would occur if we were to remain within the European Union—an outcome, in other words, Llywydd, more than twice as bad as Theresa May's deal, and an outcome that would make us all poorer and cost jobs and investment right across Wales. It's a bad deal for Wales, Llywydd, because there are no legally binding commitments to maintaining employment, environmental and consumer rights and protections, simply an aspiration in the political declaration from which this UK Government could simply walk away.

It's a bad deal because it would not put an end to uncertainty—the nonsense that is talked about just getting Brexit done, as if this agreement was somehow the end of the road rather than simply the beginning. As some of the European Research Group, seduced to give up their principles and support this agreement, have themselves claimed, it is quite possible that at the end of the transition period, only 14 short months away, we could still end up leaving with no deal at all, or rather Great Britain could end up leaving with no deal, because Northern Ireland's long-term relationship with the EU is firmly set, at least until 2024, and in practice almost certainly indefinitely.

Now, Llywydd, I don't come here this afternoon to criticise the Northern Ireland protocol. It serves its purpose—the red line set out at the start of the negotiations by the European Union of ensuring that there is no hard border on the island of Ireland. For us, preventing the return of violence in Northern Ireland must always come first, but we cannot neglect the impact of these proposals on our ports here in Wales, serious as we believe those to be, or the barriers which this agreement puts in the path of Welsh businesses. And that is doubly the case, Llywydd, because whereas the protocol previously was a backstop that both the EU 27 and the UK were committed to trying to avoid coming into existence, what is now proposed is a permanent arrangement that puts Northern Ireland in a different economic zone to Great Britain, with a hard border in the Irish sea—something that the Prime Minister claimed as recently as 2 July that no Conservative Prime Minister would ever agree to.