Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Windsor Framework which stipulates that food products moving from Great Britain to Northern Ireland will operate in the same way as food products from Scotland to England, what arrangements they have in place for a load moving to a regional distribution centre rather than directly to the point of sale.

The Windsor Framework establishes a new way to move prepacked retail goods from Great Britain into Northern Ireland with the ‘Northern Ireland Retail Movement Scheme going live on 1 October 2023.

Goods will move under a single General Certificate for eligible consignments, supported by a packing list.

All businesses responsible for selling or facilitating the movement of food for final consumption in Northern Ireland are eligible to benefit from these simplified arrangements. This includes retailers selling finished goods to end consumers, hospitality venues such as pubs and restaurants, those providing food to the public sector – for example schools, hospitals and prisons, wholesalers supplying smaller retail outlets, businesses operating factory canteens.

These arrangements will therefore apply to goods moving to regional distribution centres, as long as the final destination of the good is in Northern Ireland.

Guidance is available on gov.uk regarding the Scheme, with further guidance being published shortly.