THE views of the DUP and Boris Johnson will be crucial to the success of the new EU deal on Northern Ireland, according to former Brexit minister Jacob Rees-Mogg.

Mr Rees Mogg, who will make his broadcasting debut on GB News in a new show this evening, said: “It will all depend on the DUP, if the DUP are against it, I think there will be quite a significant number of Conservatives who are unhappy.

“The position of Boris Johnson is always important. He remains the biggest figure in UK politics and therefore his view will be of fundamental relevance to how this debate is carried out.”

Mr Rees-Mogg made the comments in a discussion during Breakfast with Eamonn Holmes and Isabel Webster.

Asked if he thought the deal was adequate, he said: “What I’ve heard is encouraging, it seems to be the case that there are some important concessions. There are two points that really matter.

“One is the reaction of the DUP, will this restore power sharing, because what Northern Ireland needs most of all, is its democratic institutions restored and that will only happen if there is cross community consent for the arrangements with the EU.

“And the second point is looking at the legal text. What does the detail say? Because we’ve found in the past with the EU, that it’s the detail that really matters, rather than the headline statements…

“So to have cross community consent to meet the test of the Good Friday Agreement, it needs the support of the DU, that is the basic situation in Northern Ireland.”

Asked about the role of the European Court of Justice, he said: “Again, this depends on the detail, if it means that they can opt out of EU laws and that therefore only law that is approved within Northern Ireland will remain or Northern Ireland, that’s actually fine.

“That would be a big step forward. If on the other hand, it’s merely a delay to an enforcement process that comes later, then that wouldn’t be fine.

“If they have the first, that would be better than Norway’s got, so that would be a real achievement if they have an absolute veto.

“We’ll have to see what the DUP does because the DUP are the key decision makers in this, it really needs to be something that gets them back to power sharing.”

Mr Rees-Mogg added: “My concern over all of this is that what sounds to be quite an achievement has been weakened by not consulting the DUP in the first place to ensure their support was on board before it was announced, rather than taking a punt that they may like it afterwards.

“I think that’s unfortunate. I think it hasn’t necessarily been handled successfully in terms of communication.

“You don’t necessarily need to run the negotiations with everybody included, but you need to be talking to the other sides to make sure that you know what they want, what their bottom line is, so they don’t feel surprised and bounced.”

He continued: “If you remember a week ago, we’re being told that there’ll be an announcement on Monday and a vote on Tuesday on a deal nobody knew anything about, quite understandably made the DUP feel they were being bounced into an agreement.

“You then heard there was going to be some great ceremony with the King, again, this seemed to be bouncing people and I think that was a mistake.”

Mr Rees-Mogg added: “The sovereign should only be involved when things have been completed and accepted. The King gives assent to acts of Parliament when Parliament has agreed, he doesn’t express his view on Acts of Parliament whilst they’re going through the process.

“And I think the same applies that His Majesty should not be involved until there is full support for this agreement.”