Ireland’s prime minister has told unionists in Northern Ireland that it will be easier to protect the union they support with Britain if the UK stays in the European single market.

The taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, said that rather than pressing the EU for special status for Northern Ireland post-Brexit, it would be better if the entire UK remained inside a customs union with Europe.

Speaking on his first official visit to Belfast on Friday, Varadkar also pointed out that after Brexit everyone in Northern Ireland entitled to an Irish passport would remain an EU citizen.

Unionists have opposed proposals from Sinn Féin and other nationalist parties for special status to be given to Northern Ireland in its relationship with the EU. The unionist parties fear that special status could decouple the region from the rest of the UK after Brexit.

Asked about demands for special status for the province, the taoiseach said: “What I would rather see, what I think would be the best outcome, is a very close relationship between the United Kingdom and the EU. We would only need a bespoke solution for Northern Ireland if Britain leaves the single market.

“If the entire United Kingdom stayed in then you don’t need special status for Northern Ireland. I hope the unionist parties, for example, who would be keen to protect and preserve the union, would see that it’s much easier to do that if the UK stays within the customs union and the single market. Because that would take away the need for any special arrangement or bespoke solution for Northern Ireland.”

Before a meeting with the Democratic Unionist party on Friday afternoon, Varadkar said Brexit had the potential to “drive a wedge” between Britain and Ireland.

The taoiseach told a press conference at Queen’s University Belfast that he was a realist about Brexit happening and was not operating on the basis that it was not going to come about or that there would be a second EU referendum in the UK.



Earlier during a speech at the university, he suggested the UK could enter into a “deep” free trade agreement with the EU when Britain leaves Europe.



He said: “For example if the United Kingdom does not want to stay in the customs union, perhaps there can be a EU-UK customs union. After all, we have one with Turkey. Surely we can have one with the United Kingdom?



“If the UK does not want to stay in the single market, perhaps it could enter into a deep free trade agreement with the EU and rejoin Efta [the European Free Trade Association] which it was a member prior to accession. And if this cannot be agreed now, then perhaps we have a transition period during which the UK stays in the single market and customs union while things are worked out,” Varadkar said.



He said no one on the island wanted to return to the days of a militarised, heavily policed border. “The border itself was a very different place, a place of bloodshed and violence, of checkpoints. A barrier to trade, prosperity and peace. A brutal physical manifestation of historic divisions and political failure,” he said.

Varadkar vowed that in Brexit negotiations he would seek to protect the benefits of the peace process for all the island’s people.



He ruled out a proposal from one of his Fine Gael party colleagues this week that a border could be redrawn in the Irish Sea rather than on the island itself. Varadkar said it was not his policy in relation to dealing with Northern Ireland. That proposal enraged unionists who saw it as a move to redraw the 1921 partition settlement on the island of Ireland.



On devolution and power sharing being restored in Northern Ireland, he said: “We need the executive, the assembly, the North South Ministerial Council and the British Irish Council up and running and acting in the interests of our peoples. We need that more than ever, and we need it now.”

After meeting the five main political parties represented in the Stormont assembly on Friday, the taoiseach will stay overnight in Belfast. He will then attend a breakfast on Saturday morning with gay rights campaigners ahead of the annual Pride demonstration in Belfast.



Varadkar again voiced his support for marriage equality in Northern Ireland. The region is the only part of the UK and Ireland where gay couples cannot legally marry, principally due to the opposition of the DUP in the Stormont assembly.