I thought the GFA allowed NI born residents to choose whether they identified primarily as Irish or British or both?
I meant in the sense that before the GFA, even the IRA gunmen were, AIUI, legally British citizens for the most part, so the GFA was fixing a problem caused by British citizens. Having said that ...
I found myself much less willing to criticize a theoretical Irish leave vote than I do the British one.
I think that's just a reasonable unwillingness to criticise groups you don't belong to, especially if they're the weaker partner.
I also have a sense that the GFA was largely solving a British problem - in the sense that most of the armed people involved were UK citizens even if they didn't want to be. So it would be easier for the Irish government to say ' Well screw you, we didn't create the conditions that made the GFA necessary.'
This doesn't quite make sense to me - it's sort of begging the question. The issue at stake is, in fact, whether this is a British problem or not. Throughout the 70s and 80s the UK indeed attempted to treat N.I. as an internal British problem, with mixed results. This wasn't entirely Westminster's fault - whenever they attempted to involve outside parties things seemed to go even worse (c.f. Sunningdale 1973, Anglo-Irish Agreement 1985). The GFA had relative success because it involved everyone acknowledging that it wasn't simply a British or an Irish problem but required the local communities, the British and Irish governments and the international community all to have an input.
To be honest, I'm not claiming to have a well-thought-out or reasoned argument here ... I'm just trying to rationalise why, instinctively, I tend to feel the same way as @GarethMoon about what would happen if Ireland had voted to leave instead of the UK.
A customs border in the Irish Sea doesn't affect any of the countries in the EU.
Is Ireland no longer in the EU? When did that come about?
When did Ireland get split by the Irish Sea?
Clearly you are not aware of all the things "in the Irish Sea" could mean, if you think it can only mean that.
@mousethief, the thread has been going along for a number of pages with various references to the Irish Sea. Media reports about this issue also regularly refer to the Irish Sea as the location of the customs barrier between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK.
Your sole contribution thus far has been to turn up and be a pedant while completely ignoring the context.
Did you actually read any of the rest of the thread first? Or did you just decide that I was an appropriate target for a bit of needless antagonism because the thread was at the top of Recent Discussions and you were bored?
And have you actually looked at an atlas, or even goddamn Wikipedia, to understand the difference between the Irish Sea and the Celtic Sea, or indeed any other body of water adjacent to Ireland?
I think@mousethief's point is that an Irish Sea border still affects Ireland in that it interferes with a.) the significant part of Ireland's economy that consists of exports to GB, and b.) the surprisingly large volume of Irish exports to continental Europe that are sent by lorry via GB.
I think@mousethief's point is that an Irish Sea border still affects Ireland in that it interferes with a.) the significant part of Ireland's economy that consists of exports to GB, and b.) the surprisingly large volume of Irish exports to continental Europe that are sent by lorry via GB.
Much of the traffic to the EU which formerly went via the UK is now going directly by ferry from the Republic of Ireland to France, thereby avoiding the extra cost/paperwork necessitated by Brexit. I guess it takes the lorries an extra couple of days, but it must be worth it...
Presumably, goods from the rest of the EU to RoI travel in the same manner!
Irish exports to/from the UK would be affected by a border, regardless of where that border is - trade with NI isn't affected if (as is the case under the agreement) there's no border in Ireland, but trade with the rest of the UK still needs to cross the border down the Irish Sea.
Again, trade through the UK wouldn't be impacted by whether the border is in Ireland or down the Irish Sea.
Any form of Brexit which took the UK out of the customs union and single market was going to interfere with trade between the UK and EU (including Ireland) and with trade between Ireland and the rest of the EU.
I think@mousethief's point is that an Irish Sea border still affects Ireland in that it interferes with a.) the significant part of Ireland's economy that consists of exports to GB, and b.) the surprisingly large volume of Irish exports to continental Europe that are sent by lorry via GB.
The fact that you have to guess, putting "think" in italics, does him no credit.
Personally I think your efforts to give his posts some meaning beyond another bout of pedantry (and possibly an erroneous belief that the Irish Sea surrounds Ireland) gives him too much credit.
Apart from that I agree with Alan: the current situation that especially affects trade between Northern Ireland the rest of the UK, which is (on the surface) causing the current fuss in Northern Ireland, doesn't really put any special burden on the Republic of Ireland, any more than it puts a special burden on the Netherlands.
Perhaps the clearest canary in the coalmine over the past few years has been Stormont, which became increasingly more fractious before grinding to a halt in January 2017. So for over four years there has been no devolved government in this supposedly devolved province.
I suggest therefore that the GFA was breaking down well before Brexit, although Brexit has greatly aggravated things.
Weirdly enough I think it was the personal chemistry between Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness (sometimes known as "the Chuckle Brothers" to amused/appalled onlookers) that made Stormont work reasonably well in the early days.
Barnabas62Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
The DUP wanted an open border with Eire and it also wanted the UK out of the EU Customs Union.
I saw and heard reasons as to why these positions were not mutually incompatible but they never convinced me.
I suspect the DUP believed there would have to be a hard border if the UK left the Customs Union. In which case, costs should fall on the UK government, not be a Northern Ireland authority cost. A kind of attempted buck pass of financial and political costs. The border down the Irish Sea was not properly seen as a way out the UK negotiators would end up accepting. (And way back in 2017 Bertie Ahern, ex leader of Eire, said there was “no way the Unionists would agree to it”. )
So the cost of an open border had to be either ditching the promise to the DUP re the border down the Irish Sea, or ditching the desire of Tory hardliners for freedom from the Customs Union.
Hence the present mess. The DUP had lost the balance of power in the Commons so they got let down. Realpolitik strikes again.
I suspect the DUP believed there would have to be a hard border if the UK left the Customs Union. In which case, costs should fall on the UK government, not be a Northern Ireland authority cost.
But the border would be required by the EU not the UK wouldn't it?
If you're worried about costs, and indeed loss of life for those manning the border, why not just do nothing if you are the UK gvt? They are generally very good at doing nothing when it's glaringly obvious that something has to be done.
I thought that during foot and mouth, Covid and anything else since the GFA it was always the Irish who manned/closed the border, not the British?
I get the argument that it was our fault so we should be morally obliged to pay for it, but from a practical stance why bother?
Stormont & Dublin would never pass the vote required to put a hard border in. I suppose the EU could insist and send French or German troops? Would the Republicans in NI attack them if they did?
Stormont & Dublin would never pass the vote required to put a hard border in. I suppose the EU could insist and send French or German troops? Would the Republicans in NI attack them if they did?
I think that republican violence in NI would begin long before that point, long before anyone brought anything to a vote - it would probably begin in earnest at the point where a hard border began to be seriously suggested as an option and it would be directed at British and Unionist targets.
The DUP wanted an open border with Eire and it also wanted the UK out of the EU Customs Union.
Disagree - the DUP would I believe have been very happy for the UK to stay in the Customs Union and probably happy enough to stay in the Single Market. What the DUP did not want was for NI to be treated differently from GB.
I.e. DUP would have been fine with a soft-to-moderate Brexit. I'm sure that was Theresa May's preferred solution and could have been sold to Arlene with no problem (well, perhaps with some grumbling for the audience). Unfortunately May had a vanishingly small majority so Conservative hardliners were able to nix this. Next best (for May) was to keep NI only in alignment with EU regulations - the infamous "backstop". This the DUP did not like and so they brought her down.
I suspect the DUP believed there would have to be a hard border if the UK left the Customs Union. In which case, costs should fall on the UK government, not be a Northern Ireland authority cost. A kind of attempted buck pass of financial and political costs. The border down the Irish Sea was not properly seen as a way out the UK negotiators would end up accepting. (And way back in 2017 Bertie Ahern, ex leader of Eire, said there was “no way the Unionists would agree to it”. )
So the cost of an open border had to be either ditching the promise to the DUP re the border down the Irish Sea, or ditching the desire of Tory hardliners for freedom from the Customs Union.
Hence the present mess. The DUP had lost the balance of power in the Commons so they got let down. Realpolitik strikes again.
Now this I totally agree with. The DUP have been forced to take from BoJo what they refused to accept from poor old Theresa May. Except more so.
If only TM had been more charismatic and won a thumping majority in 2017 things could have been a lot less painful.
It's hardly that much difference from a minority Conservative government propped up by the DUP. A record number of ministerial resignations, and repeated failure to get a Brexit Bill through Parliament.
If only TM had been more charismatic and won a thumping majority in 2017 things could have been a lot less painful.
It would have been even less painful had the Labour right not thrown their toys out of the pram and we'd had a Labour minority government.
How could we have had a Labour minority government. It would have lost every vote
I think you'd have found the SNP, Plaid and Caroline Lucas would have supported things on a case-by-case basis. Much better for our democracy than the Faustian pact with the DUP.
Hmmm. I find it very difficult indeed to visualise Ulster Unionism seeing Corbyn as anything other than Antichrist's dodgier uncle. The idea that he would have been able to mediate a better N.I. solution seems optimistic in the extreme.
I suppose a Corbyn-led Labour government would have gone for a soft Brexit. But although that would have suited unionists I think they would have been unable to swallow it coming from Corbyn.
Barnabas62Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
edited April 13
TurquoiseTastic
I did some backchecking and discovered that the DUP position was equivocal on the Customs Union. They did not want the EU to bully the UK to stay in. But you are right. They never ruled out staying in the CU if it was part of a deal that enabled the UK to leave the EU, kept the border open and the UK together. That became clear in 2019.
I suppose a Corbyn-led Labour government would have gone for a soft Brexit. But although that would have suited unionists I think they would have been unable to swallow it coming from Corbyn.
True, but when you don't need their parliamentary support that matters less. And I don't think people would riot over it.
I suppose a Corbyn-led Labour government would have gone for a soft Brexit. But although that would have suited unionists I think they would have been unable to swallow it coming from Corbyn.
True, but when you don't need their parliamentary support that matters less. And I don't think people would riot over it.
Maybe you're right. There would have been much grumpiness and the DUP would probably have chummed up with hard Brexiters on the opposition benches to say how terribly badly everything was going. It would indeed have been a sickening sight, but perhaps not as fundamentally problematic as the current situation.
Things kicking off once again on the Shankill Road and in Newtownards (I remember the big "Ulster Says No" banner pasted up in Ards for about a decade after 1985).
If only this were as important as the European Super League perhaps the government might pay some attention to it.
To atone for their significant recent error of judgement, the owners of the aborted breakaway teams should select one of their teams to relocate to Belfast. Its possibly the only way to get English Brexiteers thinking about Ireland.
Well it's not a bad idea to be fair. I think the "Belfast Giants" ice-hockey team has worked quite well in that regard. I just think that football is one of the sports with the most "baked-in" sectarianism (often you find that the shop supposedly selling Rangers memorabilia is really the local UVF/UDA merchandising outlet, for example) so I think it would take more than a new team to overcome that.
Comments
Clearly you are not aware of all the things "in the Irish Sea" could mean, if you think it can only mean that.
I meant in the sense that before the GFA, even the IRA gunmen were, AIUI, legally British citizens for the most part, so the GFA was fixing a problem caused by British citizens. Having said that ...
To be honest, I'm not claiming to have a well-thought-out or reasoned argument here ... I'm just trying to rationalise why, instinctively, I tend to feel the same way as @GarethMoon about what would happen if Ireland had voted to leave instead of the UK.
MT, are you making a joke here? If Ireland is in the Irish Sea, is Washington State in the Pacific Ocean?
@mousethief, the thread has been going along for a number of pages with various references to the Irish Sea. Media reports about this issue also regularly refer to the Irish Sea as the location of the customs barrier between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK.
Your sole contribution thus far has been to turn up and be a pedant while completely ignoring the context.
Did you actually read any of the rest of the thread first? Or did you just decide that I was an appropriate target for a bit of needless antagonism because the thread was at the top of Recent Discussions and you were bored?
And have you actually looked at an atlas, or even goddamn Wikipedia, to understand the difference between the Irish Sea and the Celtic Sea, or indeed any other body of water adjacent to Ireland?
Much of the traffic to the EU which formerly went via the UK is now going directly by ferry from the Republic of Ireland to France, thereby avoiding the extra cost/paperwork necessitated by Brexit. I guess it takes the lorries an extra couple of days, but it must be worth it...
Presumably, goods from the rest of the EU to RoI travel in the same manner!
Again, trade through the UK wouldn't be impacted by whether the border is in Ireland or down the Irish Sea.
Any form of Brexit which took the UK out of the customs union and single market was going to interfere with trade between the UK and EU (including Ireland) and with trade between Ireland and the rest of the EU.
The fact that you have to guess, putting "think" in italics, does him no credit.
Personally I think your efforts to give his posts some meaning beyond another bout of pedantry (and possibly an erroneous belief that the Irish Sea surrounds Ireland) gives him too much credit.
Apart from that I agree with Alan: the current situation that especially affects trade between Northern Ireland the rest of the UK, which is (on the surface) causing the current fuss in Northern Ireland, doesn't really put any special burden on the Republic of Ireland, any more than it puts a special burden on the Netherlands.
I suggest therefore that the GFA was breaking down well before Brexit, although Brexit has greatly aggravated things.
Weirdly enough I think it was the personal chemistry between Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness (sometimes known as "the Chuckle Brothers" to amused/appalled onlookers) that made Stormont work reasonably well in the early days.
I saw and heard reasons as to why these positions were not mutually incompatible but they never convinced me.
I suspect the DUP believed there would have to be a hard border if the UK left the Customs Union. In which case, costs should fall on the UK government, not be a Northern Ireland authority cost. A kind of attempted buck pass of financial and political costs. The border down the Irish Sea was not properly seen as a way out the UK negotiators would end up accepting. (And way back in 2017 Bertie Ahern, ex leader of Eire, said there was “no way the Unionists would agree to it”. )
So the cost of an open border had to be either ditching the promise to the DUP re the border down the Irish Sea, or ditching the desire of Tory hardliners for freedom from the Customs Union.
Hence the present mess. The DUP had lost the balance of power in the Commons so they got let down. Realpolitik strikes again.
But the border would be required by the EU not the UK wouldn't it?
If you're worried about costs, and indeed loss of life for those manning the border, why not just do nothing if you are the UK gvt? They are generally very good at doing nothing when it's glaringly obvious that something has to be done.
I thought that during foot and mouth, Covid and anything else since the GFA it was always the Irish who manned/closed the border, not the British?
I get the argument that it was our fault so we should be morally obliged to pay for it, but from a practical stance why bother?
Stormont & Dublin would never pass the vote required to put a hard border in. I suppose the EU could insist and send French or German troops? Would the Republicans in NI attack them if they did?
Disagree - the DUP would I believe have been very happy for the UK to stay in the Customs Union and probably happy enough to stay in the Single Market. What the DUP did not want was for NI to be treated differently from GB.
I.e. DUP would have been fine with a soft-to-moderate Brexit. I'm sure that was Theresa May's preferred solution and could have been sold to Arlene with no problem (well, perhaps with some grumbling for the audience). Unfortunately May had a vanishingly small majority so Conservative hardliners were able to nix this. Next best (for May) was to keep NI only in alignment with EU regulations - the infamous "backstop". This the DUP did not like and so they brought her down.
Typical Unionism - cunning short-term tactics, strategically inept. Because...
Now this I totally agree with. The DUP have been forced to take from BoJo what they refused to accept from poor old Theresa May. Except more so.
If only TM had been more charismatic and won a thumping majority in 2017 things could have been a lot less painful.
It would have been even less painful had the Labour right not thrown their toys out of the pram and we'd had a Labour minority government.
How could we have had a Labour minority government. It would have lost every vote
I suspect
I think you'd have found the SNP, Plaid and Caroline Lucas would have supported things on a case-by-case basis. Much better for our democracy than the Faustian pact with the DUP.
I did some backchecking and discovered that the DUP position was equivocal on the Customs Union. They did not want the EU to bully the UK to stay in. But you are right. They never ruled out staying in the CU if it was part of a deal that enabled the UK to leave the EU, kept the border open and the UK together. That became clear in 2019.
True, but when you don't need their parliamentary support that matters less. And I don't think people would riot over it.
Maybe you're right. There would have been much grumpiness and the DUP would probably have chummed up with hard Brexiters on the opposition benches to say how terribly badly everything was going. It would indeed have been a sickening sight, but perhaps not as fundamentally problematic as the current situation.
If only this were as important as the European Super League perhaps the government might pay some attention to it.
ahhh! Could the Belfast Hotspurs provide a unifying force? I suppose it would just bring two packs of men together for fights. *sigh*