Eamonn Toland

Can Northern Ireland learn anything from Belgium?

Eamonn Toland on September 5, 2024, 4:18 pm

| Readers 2228

white and brown concrete buildings near bodies of water

I have to admit, I know very little about Belgium. When I lived in London, I used to ask friends if they could name the Prime Minister of Belgium, but only if they were complaining about how parochial and uninformed many Americans are about their closest neighbours and allies. In fairness, most Belgians couldn’t have named their PM either a few years ago, when it took 541 days to form a post-election government, and the highly decentralised federal constitutional monarchy …

Brexiteers are the not the only Cakeists in town…

Eamonn Toland on December 1, 2022, 2:13 pm

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Forget Citizen’s Assemblies, productivity gaps, and subventions. The real litmus test for Irish reunification has to involve more than a technocratic plan. It has to include a vision for how a new Ireland will “unite all the people who share the territory of the island of Ireland, in all the diversity of their identities and traditions”. Copyright on Amhrán na bhFiann lapsed in 2012, which allowed Dunnes Stores, among others, to start printing the lyrics on t-shirts. Kathy Sheridan, in …

Would all nationalists vote for a new Ireland?

Eamonn Toland on March 30, 2020, 2:15 pm

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As discussion of a border poll has risen within the wider nationalist community, the debate about what would be needed to accommodate all identities in a new Ireland has barely begun. Ian Clarke’s thoughtful piece on Slugger about whether pro union voices were wanted threw the lack of engagement between nationalists and unionists into sharp relief. In a largely nationalist milieu, it’s easy to see how a new Ireland would look much like the current republic, but what if the proposals from …