Londonderry to make its first appearance on Irish passports…
For years growing up and on our several times a year journey to stay with family in Donegal it used to bemuse me somewhat (Okay, I was a kid, and it was the 60s) that the buses on the way up to Derry all said Londonderry and the Lough Swilly Buses said Derry. Now it seems the Republic is offering one small step towards recognising the city in the north west as its official name on the passports of those who choose to call it Londonderry… Not much you might say… But it shows the degree to which the feelings of Derry protestants have largely been ignored within wider Irish nationalism. It’s unlikely to have many of them breaking for the south, but it is one more emotional barrier consigned to the past…
Mick, Now let me briefly get very technical here. The Londonderry and Lough Swilly Railway company (still the only railway company not actually to run a railway since 1949, but buses only), was owned by Sir Basil McFarland Bt,. when you were a kid and even earlier by his Dad Sir John, before partition. It plied a fairly rickety second hand fleet that I suspect would not be judged entirely roadworthy today. Many destination blinds proclaimed Londonderry, and some said Derry. The difference was created not out of sense of pluralism but by the width of the destination blind in the very mixed fleet. This was the position until quite recently ( by recently, I mean, when I last looked which was probably in the 1990s). The whole business about the name was treated with far more mutual tolerance in those distant days. Perhaps we are inching back to that, but for now ,I don’t want to attract an avalanche of stroking..
That’s tinkling a very distant bell… There was that old riddle too: ‘Londonderry, Cork and Kerry, now spell it’…
My how times have changed for Gregory Campbell.
A couple of years back he was campaigning for the automatic right of people born in the Republic but living in Northern Ireland to have a British passport.
He even set up a postcard campaign for all these southerners he claimed were dying to become British.
The cards would flow in from disillusioned and angry southerners, he claimed.
The years have rolled by but we have yet to see Mr Campbell furnish a single postcard to back up this rather odd claim and instead, in 2009, we see him now campaigning for the right of northerners to have the name Londonderry in their Irish passports.
“The fact that the government of the Irish Republic has abandoned the exclusionist nationalist agenda of forcing people to list their address as ‘Derry’, when they apply for a passport is indicative of new political realities,” Mr Campbell said.
“I have been active on the issue of passports for several years and I pay tribute to the persistence of a constituent who insisted over a number of years with my assistance in having this injustice rectified.”
They’ll still have the indignity of living with the Irish translation of Doire though.
Disgraceful that the Southern government will only use the proper name of the city in these very limited circumstances.
George,
I suspect that it’s a Derry/East Donegal thing. Hard to get your head around if you don’t come from there.
But note the penultimate para:
“British passports – with covers bearing the full national title of “United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland” – long have allowed Irish residents of Londonderry to register their home as ‘Derry’.”
to george msg 3. on radio ulcer this morning [ or radio foyle] campbell was on spouting his usual line, while failing to notice that the southern minister made a point of saying that officially nothing has changed. for the republic the city and county are still ‘derry’
in the early 80′s when the council name was changed, campbell organised a boycott of council meetings in protest, until some months later crawled back in after catching on that his voters looked on this as pure pointscoring and nothing else. also he organised a rally in the waterside at which 150 at most turned up. derry wans on either side are not so easily taken in
“Disgraceful that the Southern government will only use the proper name of the city in these very limited circumstances.”
How about dropping the name Derry and just use London…and dropping the name Northern Ireland and use Little Britain? Now wouldn’t that be ‘proper’?
eh?
“Disgraceful that the Southern government will only use the proper name of the city in these very limited circumstances. ”
A bit rich Willow, you can’t even bring yourself to call the Republic of Ireland by it’s proper name (is there a country called “South”????)
Wise up, FFS.
I’ve no issue with people referring to Derry casually – as I do myself. That is quite different to a refusal to acknowledge its formal name.
As for the Republic’s formal name: it is a misnomer and an ambiguous one at that.
The irony being of course, the vast majority of people who want to call it Londonderry won’t have an interest in an Irish passport. Jackie McDonald excepted of course.
They won’t have an interest in an Irish passport issued by Dublin. UK passports, though, are also Irish passports – representing as they do Northern Ireland.
Is it possible for the Northern Irish to possess both a British and Irish passport at the same time? Real question?
I’ll rephrase that. Is it legal?
6Countyprod,
yes it is entirely legal and quite a common practise.
jackie mcdonald is by no means the only prominent loyalist/unionist to carry an irish passport. Also many ordinary protestants have one.
willow,
as usual your triumphalism comes through loud and clear. You want to be recognised as irish but subvert every formal symbol of irish nationalism. So just to sum up for you: if british passports are irish, let me remind you that the tricolour is also a northern irish flag, there are 400,000 upwards of irish passport holders in the north, the fai organised team is an all ireland team. we are not all irish but regional british you know, some of us are just irish. you beg a lot of understanding of your position. and you have it in spades. a smidgin of respect for irish nationalism from you would not go amiss.
willowfield, what is it with the desperate straining to be angey about this? As if you really care.
As a matter of interest have you ever been in the South? I only ask because even liberal, Alliance voting protestants I’ve met have been known to shudder at the thought to going to what they regard as a “priest-ridden” “foreign country”.
I guess they are entitled to hold that view but it is certainly not an accurate one.
Though you do make a serious point, even if you don’t realise it: what are Irish nationalists prepared to do to make an offer to their 800,000+ fellow Irish citizens to get them to consider unity.
Too often the deal is “take it or leave it” if you ask me.
DUB
The Tricolour is a northern Irish flag, only in the sense that it is the flag of Donegal.
I have expressed no disrespect to Irish nationalism, and I am not triumphant.
If you are uncomfortable with those who do not restrict their identity to a single dimenstion, I suggest that is your problem and not mine.
C S PARNELL
I’m afraid I don’t know what “angey” means and therefore cannot answer your question.
Have I ever been in the South? Yes.
“Is it possible for the Northern Irish to possess both a British and Irish passport at the same time?”
Of course it’s legal, it always has been, I have two passports and use them as and when I feel like it (and contrary to the usual myth I am not met with an open hearted grin and a thumbs up by foreigners when I use my Irish passport as opposed to the hostile scowls supposedly reserved for British passport holders). My children have three, perfectly legally.
As I have said before there are no fewer than three “official” names for the city on the southern end of Lough Foyle, in the first national language of Ireland it is “Doire”, in the second national language it is “Derry”, in the United Kingdom it is “Londonderry” although the UK authorities have no problem with anyone from that city using the second official Irish version.
In the Foyle Street bus station you will be greeted with Ulsterbuses going to Londonderry, L&LSR; Co. Buses going to “Derry” and CIE buses who travel to “Doire”, all having arrived at predisely the same location.
angey means I missed the key next to r on the keyboard.
When were you in the south and what did you do? Friendly question, honest
This from Wikipedia:
“People born in Northern Ireland are British citizens on the same basis as people born elsewhere in the United Kingdom. People In Northern Ireland can hold either a British Passport or an Irish Passport, or can hold both if they so choose.”
willow,
the Donegal ‘flag’ is a ‘bicolour’: yellow and green.
Just in from Republican Sinn Fein:
The announcement by the Dublin Administration that a false name for Derry can be listed as the county of birth on a Free State passport amounts to an assault on Irish national identity, a spokesman for Republican Sinn Féin has said.
“Are they now to allow the use of King’s County and Queen’s County to please their British masters, or are the people of County Derry to be singled out for this reprehensible treatment?” he asked.
“This decision makes about as much sense as allowing the former name for County Derry, i.e. County Coleraine, to be recorded on the passport,” he added.
“People born in Northern Ireland are British citizens on the same basis as people born elsewhere in the United Kingdom. People In Northern Ireland can hold either a British Passport or an Irish Passport, or can hold both if they so choose.”
Yes, something that some people working in the Belfast Passport Office don’t seem to know.
“A bit rich Willow, you can’t even bring yourself to call the Republic of Ireland by it’s proper name (is there a country called “South”????”
There is actually no state called the ‘Republic of Ireland’ – that is a football team.
In Irish law the name of the state in English is Éire and Ireland, either will suffice.
The name of the state in Irish in Éire.
The term Republic of Ireland comes from the 1948 Republic of Ireland Act which makes it clear that the state is a republic, Republic of Ireland is therefore merely the description of the state.
Politically I see no alternative for northerners, either nationalist or unionist but to describe the state below us as the South.
The fact that 26 counties of Ireland style themselves as Ireland is an insult to the people in this part of Ireland, no matter their politics.
As an northern nationalist, and an Irish passport holder, I resent the implication that I do not live in Ireland and resent the southern states styling of itself Ireland without qualification.
C S PARNELL
I’ve been in the South too many times to count: almost all for leisure purposes.
MICK FEALTY
the Donegal ‘flag’ is a ‘bicolour’: yellow and green.
I think you’re probably referring to flags used by followers of Donegal GAA, which is not a flag of Donegal, but a flag of Donegal GAA. I was referring to the Southern Tricolour, which represents the Republic of Ireland, of which Donegal is a part.
GAEL GAN NIRE
There is actually no state called the ‘Republic of Ireland’
There is one “described” as “Republic of Ireland”, though.
The fact that 26 counties of Ireland style themselves as Ireland is an insult to the people in this part of Ireland, no matter their politics.
Absolutely correct.
As an northern nationalist, and an Irish passport holder, I resent the implication that I do not live in Ireland and resent the southern states styling of itself Ireland without qualification.
The same sentiments apply equally to unionists.
For RSF to denounce this move as an ‘assault on Irish national identity’ is quite laughable. There never was a County Derry. That county, regardless of what you want you want to call it, was a creation of the British government, so for RSF to even recognize its existence is surely a concession to British imperialism. If the RSF were logically consistent they would be calling for an abolition of all counties; the concept of a county is foreign to the Gaelic order and were a British imposition. Alternatively they could just shut up.
“I resent the implication that I do not live in Ireland and resent the southern states styling of itself Ireland without qualification.”
Resenting reality and demanding that people acknowledge your fantasy as an alternative reality isn’t conducive to mental well-being.
You don’t live in Ireland, you live in Her Majesty’s sovereign jurisdiction of Northern Ireland, part of the United Kingdom. Article 5 of Bunreacht na hÉireann declares that “Ireland is a sovereign, independent, democratic state.” Northern Ireland is not.
You are confusing living in Ireland (Article 5) with living “in the island of Ireland” (Article 2). The “island” of Ireland contains two separate sovereign jurisdictions with two separate claims to national self-determination (Ireland and Northern Ireland), whereas the “state” of Ireland does not.
Article 1 of Bunreacht na hÉireann declares “The Irish nation hereby affirms its inalienable, indefeasible, and sovereign right to choose its own form of Government, to determine its relations with other nations, and to develop its life, political, economic and cultural, in accordance with its own genius and traditions.” That is the right that you renounced when you signed the GFA. You no longer have the right to national self-determination as a member of “the Irish nation.” Instead, you now have a right to self-determination as a member the Northern Irish nation (an artificially engineered nation that is a merger to two different nations).
Article 2 of Bunreacht na hÉireann declares “It is the entitlement and birthright of every person born in the island of Ireland, which includes its islands and seas, to be part of the Irish Nation.” This does not declare that a person born in Her Majesty’s sovereign jurisdiction of Northern Ireland is born as a member of the Irish nation. Instead, it declares that a person born there has the right to join the Irish nation (subject to the discretion of those who granted them that right, i.e. the Irish nation via their constitution). The “birthright” is not Irish nationality but rather the right to apply for Irish nationality. Your actual birthright is British nationality, since you were born in Her Majesty’s sovereign jurisdiction. A birthright requires no action on your part, since it is, by definition, the default position.
If one states Londonderry on the passport form, what will the Irish translation say? Londaindhoire?
“If one states Londonderry on the passport form, what will the Irish translation say?”
Same as they do now presumably; “Doire”.
You don’t live in Ireland, you live in Her Majesty’s sovereign jurisdiction of Northern Ireland, part of the United Kingdom.
When Southern-chauvinist Irish-nationalists resort to the absurd nonsense of telling people living in Ireland that they do not, in fact, live in Ireland, they merely serve to highlight the misnomer that is the “official name” of the Southern state.
Article 5 of Bunreacht na hÉireann declares that “Ireland is a sovereign, independent, democratic state.” Northern Ireland is not.
Article 5 of the Southern constitution can declare what it likes. In the physical reality of the real world, Ireland is an island, of which Northern Ireland is a part.
The fact that the Southern state has chosen the name of the island as its name does not mean that the island ceases to be known as Ireland, nor that people living on the island, but outside the Southern state, no longer live in Ireland.
As for self-determination: such a right is not possessed by states, but by peoples. (As a consequence of exercising said right, however, a state may result.)
“Nations” are not states and states are not “nations”. It is nonsense for the Southern state to declare itself a “nation”. It is political bluster: essentially meaningless. At most, it is the political manifestation of a “nation”. If people wish to believe themselves to belong to the “Irish nation”, that is their right – regardless of whether or not they live within the legal jurisdiction of the Southern Irish state.
As for Dave’s (aka the Dubliner’s) reading of Article 2, it is in error. While he is correct to observe that it does not declare that a person born in Northern Ireland is born as a member of the “Irish nation”. He omits to say that neither does it declare that a person born in Southern Ireland is born as a member of the “Irish nation”. Article 2 applies equally to “every person born in the island of Ireland” – including those born in the South, which means that people born in the South, too, only have the right to join the Irish nation.
There is no requirement for anyone to apply for so-called “Irish nationality”. Anyone born in Ireland may be considered an “Irish national”, and may be so considered at birth. No action is required. There is no need for any “application”. (Prior to 2001, people born in NI had to apply to become an “Irish citizen”, but not anymore.)
Dave,
interesting the way you bring up Article 1 of the Bunreacht. I have been musing over its possible future significance.
The Irish nation affirms its inalienable, indefeasible, and sovereign right to choose its own form of Government.
It is also the entitlement and birthright of every person born in the island of Ireland, which includes its islands and seas, to be part of the Irish Nation.
Therefore, if you are part of the Irish nation and on the island of Ireland you have an inalienable, indefeasible, and sovereign right to choose your own form of Government.
By the way, I think you are misinterpreting Article 2.
It does not differentiate between those born north or south of the border despite your talk of birthright. The same discretions apply to all.
the thing that pissed me off most about my latest Irish Passport is them stating i’m born in Co.Antrim just because I was born in Belfast.. Meh.. I was going to write to Áras an Uachtaráin to let them know about my great displeasure calling me an Antrim man..
how any ecent person, let alone a loyalist or a prodestant could use an irish passport is beyond me.
you may as well be sporting a nazi armband.
ireland has a history of lies, cowardice, discrimination against non catholics and of course thier reintroduction of slavery through the magdelene laundries.
id rather climb inside the wheelwell of a plane in future if the alternative was to use that toiletpaper.
GEORGE
Therefore, if you are part of the Irish nation and on the island of Ireland you have an inalienable, indefeasible, and sovereign right to choose your own form of Government.
I think Article 3 covers that with respect to those who are “part of the Irish nation” but outside the state.
And I already told Dave about his misinterpretation of Article 2.
willowfield,
Article 3 talks of “firm will” of the Irish nation while Article 1 “affirms” what it calls a “sovereign right”.
In other words, a united Ireland by consent is merely a firm desire of the Irish nation, sovereignty for the nation and its members is an inalienable right.
Nowhere in the Bunreacht is there an internal Irish border set to where this inalienable right applies.
The question has to be asked why the weaker word “will” was used as this makes it an aspiration not a prerequisite.
willow,
Thankyou oh thankyou for your peerless riposte to Dave aka the Dubliner above. He talks shite constantly. Your post above is the first one you have ever posted which i agree with word for word 100 percent.
Now in relation to 2 dimensional irishness and one dimensional it is you who seems to have the problem with the one dimensional variety.
Also the tricolour IS a northern irish flag becuase thousands and thousands of people up there regard it as their flag. There is no legal flag for ni itself at the moment so the tricolour is as good as any other.
You get caught up in legalisms about ni but not about the republic. You are right to do so in relation to the latter, you could extend this wisdom to the former subject as well!
The Dubliner,
Perhaps you could point out for us ignorant people exactly where on the current irish passport application form for those who live outside the jurisdiction where it asks people born in ni to make any form of declaration in relation to their nationality?
You might also care to explain what is meant on the form by the word “Ireland”? You might care to notice that it does NOT refer to the 26 county entity.
You might care to enlighten us as to in what way NI constitutes a “State”?
You might clarify as to when northern nationalists “signed” the gfa?
You might learn that when the Dublin govt talks about the Irish people they are and always have meant all the people on this island. It is they who have the right to self determination. What has been changed with the gfa is that the Dublin govt recognised that majority consent required a lcoal majority in the territory known as Northern Ireland as well as an overall majority in the island.
When you have done all that you might just fuck the hell off and never come back here again with your disgusting anti Irish bigotry.
I’m an Irish Republican and from what I have read from willowfield, for the first time, i agree 100% with him.
to dud
its hardly anti irish bigotry, when there is morethan enough reasons to be disgusted at the irish state.
since its inception it has been a disgrace to europe. and while it might refer to everyone on this island as irish,
what it really wants to do is remove to the prodestant population or at the very least treat it as lower than the precious catholics.
it has consistantly treated us as second class citizens and expresses no sorrow about it.
in short hating the irish state is logical, fair and decent. it is only your desperate bigotry that makes you defend it.
GEORGE
Sorry, I was referring particularly to the second part of Article 3(1), not the bit about the “firm will”. That is, I think, where the “internal border” is drawn.
DUB
Now in relation to 2 dimensional irishness and one dimensional it is you who seems to have the problem with the one dimensional variety.
Well, yes, I do in the sense that the attitudes of those unable to perceive more than a single dimension of identity tend to be rather more narrow-minded than those asserting a multi-dimensional identity.
An example is your ill-informed and insulting comments directed to me earlier in this thread.
Also the tricolour IS a northern irish flag becuase thousands and thousands of people up there regard it as their flag. There is no legal flag for ni itself at the moment so the tricolour is as good as any other.
Thousands of people may “regard it as their flag”, but that does not make it the flag of NI. It is the flag of Southern Ireland. The legal flag for NI is the Union Flag.
You might learn that when the Dublin govt talks about the Irish people they are and always have meant all the people on this island.
Not true. They often refer only to people in the South.
Willow,
The legal flag for NI is the Union Flag.
True. But the legal name of the southern state is Ireland. You can’t have it both ways. That’s why i suggested you drop the legalism only approach in relation to the north.
An example is your ill-informed and insulting comments directed to me earlier in this thread.
Which ones? If that is the case then i am sorry, i just find it puzzling the way you adopt legalism in relation to the north and not the south.
[i]the thing that pissed me off most about my latest Irish Passport is them stating i’m born in Co.Antrim just because I was born in Belfast.. Meh.. I was going to write to Áras an Uachtaráin to let them know about my great displeasure calling me an Antrim man..[/i]
You’d receive short thrift with An tUachtaráin agus a fear cheile, Martin, being the very proud Antrimites(?) that they are and all. Martin played for Antrim minors.
short shrift
Life gets teejus, don’t it?
(Take me away from all of this)
DUB
True. But the legal name of the southern state is Ireland.
I never claimed that the legal name was anything other than “Ireland”. As it is ambiguous, a misnomer, and offensive, however, I choose not to use it and prefer, instead, to refer to the South or, more formally, to use the legal description of Republic of Ireland.
You can’t have it both ways. That’s why i suggested you drop the legalism only approach in relation to the north.
The two matters are completely different. There is no ambiguity or offence in the name Londonderry. Nor is it a misnomer.
Which ones?
You accused me of “triumphalism” and of lacking respect for Irish nationalism. The tone of your first post also came across as mocking towards my identity.
If that is the case then i am sorry, i just find it puzzling the way you adopt legalism in relation to the north and not the south.
I didn’t adopt “legalism” in relation to either. I simply expressed my opinion about the disgraceful lack of respect shown by the Southern government in its refusal to recognise or use the name Londonderry.
How the hell has a thread on the fact that the Republic is allowing those who wish the name ‘Londonderry’ to be printed on their passport as their place of birth descended into another round of cyber-tribal whinging?
It’s bloody typical of this forum – unionists closing their eyes, covering their eyes and shouting “bla bla bla bla bla” in response to any attempt at rapprochement made by the Republic with republicans then biting the bait, closing their eyes, covering their eyes and shouting about how bad the British government has been to Irish Catholics over the past 800 years.
Constructive consensus-building debate my arse.
willowfield,
the second part is merely a rehash of what was in place in the old Article 3 when the constitutional claim was in place, namely until the “united Ireland” happens the State’s law stops at the border.
Also harmonious constitutional interpretation means the article has to be read as a whole.
In my view, the important part is the first half and that’s where the “firm will” section is. As I said, by using an aspirational wording as to how a “united Ireland” is to be achieved, this puts it below the inalienable rights of Article 1.
So what happens in the future if the inalienable rights of the nation and its members (soon there will be 600,000 of them in Northern Ireland) clash with its firmly willed aspirations regarding a “united Ireland”?
GEORGE
the second part is merely a rehash of what was in place in the old Article 3 when the constitutional claim was in place, namely until the “united Ireland” happens the State’s law stops at the border.
Yeah, but presumably it has the same effect now. Certainly that would have been the intention when the constitution was amended.
So what happens in the future if the inalienable rights of the nation and its members (soon there will be 600,000 of them in Northern Ireland) clash with its firmly willed aspirations regarding a “united Ireland”?
What circumstances do you envisage bringing about such a clash?
It would make more sense to officially (and constitutionally) change the name of the 26 counties to the “Republic of Ireland” instead of “Ireland”. Hell, it’s often referred to by its description instead of its name now anyway. I thikn FIFA lists it as the Republic of Ireland.
“Constructive consensus-building debate my arse. ”
Actually, I feel that nationalist and unionists have found some common cause on this one.