Transforming Ireland: The first step is to stop blaming each other…

An open letter to Andy Pollak.

Hi Andy,

I’m sure you must feel that “I am out to get you” with the number of OP’s and comments I have written which directly respond to yours. But blogging for me is primarily about starting or facilitating a conversation and you should take it as a compliment that I consider your contributions so important that they demand engagement on my part. Very few unionist commentators articulate unionist concerns as well as you do, and I know you are no unionist.

And as you know, I am no nationalist either and we share family histories of exposure to the dangers that extreme nationalism has visited on the European continent over the past few centuries. Where perhaps we differ is that even though I trained as a sociologist, I am much more cognisant of the economic underpinnings of statecraft. I would oppose any change to the current constitutional status quo unless I was convinced any proposed new arrangement would be to the economic benefit of the vast majority on this island.

With NI currently running at a net loss variously estimated at £10 to £15 billion per annum, there is no way Ireland could simply “take over” NI as is without severe financial and public service provision repercussions for everyone on this island. The longer unionists can continue to fool English taxpayers to underwrite their statelet, the better from this perspective, and I suspect this concern informs Irish governmental policy as well.

As you know, the central thesis of Sovereignty 2040 is that a British government, under severe budgetary pressure, will one day wake up to the reality that it can no longer afford to support NI to anything like the current degree. Cutting the NI Barnett subvention dramatically is the one saving they can make without severe political repercussions for a British government, as neither the Tories, Reform nor Labour have any votes to lose there.

With NI public health and education budgets exceeding £12 billion, you can imagine the devastation a major Barnett subvention cut would cause. No UK government would be so irresponsible as to cut these services, you might argue, and, in the past no Labour or Tory government has done so. But would a radical English nationalist led government in severe economic difficulty baulk at so radical a measure? I would put nothing past Nigel Farage.

This would create an existential problem for NI, but also for any Irish government. NI is uniquely dependent on public service expenditure and the problems created by mass redundancy, unemployment and social unrest and violence would likely spill over into the Republic.

Faced with the reality of inheriting all these problems, plus the likelihood of loyalist inspired violence, a majority in the south might very well turn down any proposal for a United Ireland that did not explicitly include a credible plan for the economic regeneration of the whole island that could absorb the loss of the Barnett subvention.

That would require massive investment, infrastructural development, and public service integration, harmonisation, overhead reduction, service productivity enhancements and efficiency improvements. Change on such a scale is difficult at the best of times – most of my work in Guinness was precisely on such an endeavour – but in a fraught social and political environment it could be lethal. Resistance would be just as fierce in the south as in the north, if not as violent.

If you combined that with an attempt to appease unionism by making the whole island feel much more British you would face an absolute revolt by all who are much more comfortable with the current status quo, as well as all the more usual radical elements. It would become a growing catastrophe that would make Brexit feel like a pleasant picnic at a country retreat.

Imagine if the North voted for re-unification and the south ended up saying no to whatever terms were on offer! Asking people in the south to take on a potential liability of £10 to £15 billion p.a., the threat of loyalist violence, and accepting changed flags, emblems, anthems, commonwealth membership and God knows what else, could well be a bridge too far.

All your posts seem to assume unionists will be in a strong bargaining position in the lead up to a border poll. That nationalist Ireland will have to make all sorts of concessions to obtain unionist support or at least tolerance of Dublin rule. But what if the boot is on the other foot? What if Ireland decides it has enough on its plate without taking on a potential £10 to £15 Billion liability, making all sorts of controversial changes to the symbols of its national identity, and is rewarded for its efforts by widespread Loyalist violence?

Nothing is more destructive of economic progress than widespread unrest and violence. That £10 to £15 Billion deficit could balloon to a much large figurer if there is severe social and economic disruption.

Don’t get me wrong, I am the perennial optimist, and I know from my experience in Guinness that such a level of change is manageable at least at a corporate level. It’s just that I doubt the imagination and capacity of the Irish and unionist political elites to achieve the required level of consensus, cohesion, and structural change. Far more likely is a collapse of political leadership, a reversion to political violence, and everyone retreating into their political bunkers.

So please forgive me if I am not a cheer leader for attempts at reconciliation which focus on flags and emblems and ignore underlying economic and political realities. There is no point in trying to cod anyone, north or south, that reunification wouldn’t come with considerable costs and challenges and that change wouldn’t be required of everyone. But that change isn’t about saluting a different flag – it is about working harder, smarter, more efficiently and more collaboratively with people you don’t necessarily like.

I think most people in the south have been incredibly tolerant and resilient and have embraced a level of change I don’t see in many other countries. I don’t think most in the north have even considered the possibility of an English financial withdrawal and what this would mean for their political aspirations. We can meet that challenge when it comes, but right now I don’t blame people for focusing on the challenges we already have.

Heather Humphries had little to contribute to those challenges and will now go to a well deserved retirement as a much loved local representative. Making her a martyr for Protestantism when she achieved a remarkable 30% of the vote and almost 60% in Cavan Monaghan serves no one except those who want to whip up sectarian tensions. I doubt she would have made it past the local council or perhaps back bench TD had she been a Catholic.

Protestants have nothing to fear and have generally done very well in the Republic. Some have retained a sense of entitlement that is not necessarily justified by their capabilities or work but that is not something to be encouraged. Some unionists may harbour an insecurity that they may not be able to hold their own in a society that doesn’t buttress and advantage their community and sense of identity. But unionists who emigrate abroad have generally done as well as their southern counterparts.

When I joined Guinness in 1979, it operated a caste system. English Oxbridge graduates became Brewers and were immediately inducted into senior management. Protestant school leavers joined the No.1 staff and could aspire to promotion anywhere. Catholic school leavers joined the No. 2 staff and could aspire to work just in the lab. All craft and manual workers were catholic and could rarely aspire to rise above shop floor foreman or supervisor. Each group had its own separate dining facilities, reward packages and medical benefits.

I was part of a very small intake of three protestants with Irish degrees. (John Robbie was subsequently let go when he joined a British and Lion’s rugby tour to Apartheid South Africa which embarrassed Guinness as it had several Breweries in black African countries.) Later on, quite a few other professionally qualified people were recruited in marketing, finance and engineering without regard to religion and many are now in senior positions.

But when I joined only two Catholics had risen from the shop floor to become Senior Managers. I was privileged to work for both, and they did everything they could to further my career. One, Finbarr Flood, became Managing Director and led the planning, organisational change and investment which ultimately saved the Dublin Brewery from closure. The London Brewery in Park Royal was closed instead.

He was ousted only when Irish management rebelled against heavy handed bullying by British HQ management (remember Ernest Saunders?) who sought to impose their incompetent decision making on Dublin. He went on to become Chairman of the Labour Court, Head of the Government Decentralisation Programme, Chairman of Shelbourne Football club and numerous community regeneration and voluntary associations.

Not bad for a boy without secondary education who joined Guiness as a 14 year old and whose first job was to wear a military style tunic turning the pages while the head Brewer read the brewing reports. I became his chief speech writer, video producer, policy advisor and research assistant and moved into IT only when he was ousted, and British global management gained more direct control.

But my larger point is that he completely transformed Guinness in Dublin, saving it from closure, and ensuring all the management, unions and staff association bought into the process. Individual staff members who lost their jobs in the reorganisation were properly compensated and looked after. Reward systems were harmonised between all the afore mentioned groups and all the separate dining rooms were replaced by one “single status” self-service dining complex. Early retirees retained access to the medical centre, swimming pool, gym, and dining facilities. They didn’t have to lose their social support networks as well as their jobs.

Yes, it all cost a lot of money, but that was more than compensated for by the huge savings in overheads and increased productivity levels. From being one of the most expensive and inefficient Breweries in the world, it became a leading edge, modern and efficient plant without losing the human touch which had always made it a unique place to work.

The strikes which had resulted in disastrous loss of market share when all the social status divisions were in place became a thing of the past. The brand has since gone from strength to strength, requiring the building of a new brewery in County Kildare to meet the increased worldwide demand mainly due to the successful rollout of the “Irish Pub” concept worldwide.

Running a country is a lot more complex than running a global multi-national business, but you might be surprised at the intensity of the conflicts between Irish and global managements, and within Irish management itself – while presenting a unified face to the world. But those conflicts were recognised and managed by ensuring there were evidence based conflict resolution processes in place.

A collaborative “Brewery Council” was developed so that all the internal stakeholders felt they had a positive contribution to make and a stake in the success of the business going forward. New technology was embraced even though some people had to retrain or lose their jobs after the implementation process was completed. Computerisation and automation which had previously impacted mainly manual jobs began to reach further and further upwards into professional and managerial roles as well.

Now the entire island economy faces the challenges of digitisation, robotisation and AI transforming lives and workplaces. Many are being left behind and feel increasingly resentful – blaming immigrants or whoever else represents a handy or vulnerable target. It is not hard to imagine all those societal challenges feeding into sectarian and political conflicts as well. People are more loyal to their brands and local communities than to their countries sometimes. As a small open economy, Ireland is more exposed to those winds of change than many other countries.

Most of these challenges have little enough to do with whether you identify as British or Irish or neither, Protestant, Catholic or other. But resource and opportunity conflicts have a way of being refracted through existing cleavages in society. Those who oppose any change, constitutional or other, will have little difficulty finding opportunities to cause havoc. Social media enhance the reach of those who foment conflicts rather than the boring work of bridging divides and building consensus and communities.

You have a distinguished track record in helping to build the latter. Your advocacy on behalf of your mother’s people is indispensable even when it is not appreciated by either” side”. Your main charge against the Irish people is that they are not ready for the challenges that re-unification might bring. I actually think you underestimate some of those challenges. changing flags, emblems or anthems is the least of our problems. Changing attitudes and behaviours is harder, especially when people feel threatened and are looking for somebody else to blame.

But at the moment, Ireland faces different challenges – changes to the global world order, the decline of “the West”, war in Europe, chronic infrastructural deficits in the face of a rapidly rising population, and global warming and climate instability. The old certainties – support from the British or American empires – are increasingly uncertain. We have to look for new allies, but most of all, we have to look to ourselves for solutions to the problems we face.

The first step is to stop blaming each other and learn to work collaboratively with people who might have been seen as our traditional enemies. Thankfully, that is happening more and more at all levels of our society and economy. As is often the case, our political classes and structures are lagging behind. Leadership is in short supply. Your continued willingness to stand above the parapet is much appreciated even by those who differ from you in small ways. Please let our dialogue continue.