EU – Page 31 – Slugger O'Toole

Active north-south cooperation would be the intelligent unionist response to Sinn Fein’s vision of unity out of Brexit

Brian Walker on August 10, 2017, 1:53 pm

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There has been a delayed reaction of critical comment on the Oireacthas report on the implementation of the Good Friday Agreement in the light of Brexit. The report called for special status for Northern Ireland within the EU but coupled it with a drive to work for unionist consent to a united Ireland. This would include a new New Ireland Forum of the type held in the early 1980s which recognised unionist Britishness but was repudiated by Fianna Fail and …

West Belfast Talks Back … without the DUP this year #feile17

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on August 9, 2017, 9:27 pm

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DUP ABSENCE changed the tone of the debate at the annual West Belfast Talks Back community hustings. Listen back to the evening which discussed world peace, Brexit, amnesties, free speech and Kevin Myers, a Sign Language Act and victims.

British position papers on customs union and Northern Ireland imminent – Politico website exclusive

Brian Walker on August 7, 2017, 9:19 am

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Britain is about to show its hand in Brexit negotiations in plans that reveal the U.K. wants a smooth route out of the European Union. The U.K. will seek a transitional customs agreement with the EU before moving to a new permanent relationship under plans sent to relevant members of Theresa May’s Cabinet for agreement before being published later this month, according to senior government officials. The proposal — if it is agreed politically — will be set out in an …

Leo Varadkar: “we need to build more bridges and fewer borders”

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on August 4, 2017, 5:38 pm

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LEO VARADKAR delivered a robust but polite lecture at Queen’s University Belfast this morning, his first public engagement in Northern Ireland in his new role as Taoiseach. The artfully crafted speech quoted local poets and Winston Churchill as well as ending with a positive story that echoed something he’d recently heard Jeffrey Donaldson say in Dublin. This was not a speech that intended to be divisive. It offered a partial policy framework, but very little in the way of absolute red lines or dogmatic solutions. However, they were definitely not the words of a political pushover.

Trouble with Referendums: who is accountable for its delivery?

Mick Fealty on August 4, 2017, 7:24 am

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Nick Cohen makes a point I shared privately with several Leave friends during the EU Referendum campaign last year: Vote Leave dissolved as soon as the contest was won. The referendum thus dispensed with the most basic democratic requirements. The winners were not accountable for the promises they made. In their history of the campaign, Jason Farrell and Paul Goldsmith quote the Leave campaigner Gisela Stuart saying that she thought the referendum was an ‘abuse of democracy’ because no one who …

Report examining Brexit and a United Ireland launched

David McCann on August 2, 2017, 5:07 pm

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The Joint Committee on the Implementation of the Good Friday Agreement launched a report today entitled Brexit and the Future of Ireland Uniting Ireland & Its People in Peace & Prosperity. The report examines issues around Brexit and the a United Ireland and is a lengthy document. Here are some of the key recommendations from the committee; On Brexit The Irish government must negotiate for Northern Ireland to be designated with special status within the EU and for the whole …

Redeeming ‘North-Southery’ from Complacency

Katy Hayward on July 31, 2017, 7:00 pm

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Complacency about the peace, about power-sharing, about cross-border cooperation, about, even, EU membership has allowed the unthinkable to happen. Such things that we have cherished and, indeed, brandished around the world as a sign of success have become playthings, tossed lightly up in the air in acts of outrageous political hubris. One after the other is falling to the ground and suddenly not only the future but the very present is characterised by uncertainty and instability. How can it be, …

A reply on Brexit to Nicholas Whyte

Brian Walker on July 30, 2017, 12:12 pm

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I don’t think I did leave out “the important dimension” of the Irish border, one of three issues identified by the EU before trade talks can begin. On this I agreed with the Brexit Secretary David Davis who asked how the border issue could possibly be settled in advance. A settlement on the Irish border has surely to be compatible with a wider deal and the EU I suspect will not allow an Irish tail to wag the EU dog. …

The looming ultimatum: Varadkar’s warning shot

Nicholas Whyte on July 29, 2017, 9:22 pm

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Many thanks to Brian Walker for his posts yesterday and today about the latest developments in the Irish angle to the Brexit negotiations. I think one important dimension has been missed, however. Progress on the Irish border is one of the three priority areas of discussion where sufficient progress needs to have been made by October to move to further talks over the future UK/EU relationship. The other two are the terms of the financial settlement for Brexit, and the …

Baroness Helena Kennedy QC on dreams, responsibilities, globalisation and value #JHISS

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on July 29, 2017, 7:53 pm

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LABOUR PEER Baroness Helena Kennedy QC opened the John Hewitt International Summer School last Monday morning with an eloquent lecture that looked at dreams, responsibilities, the challenge of globalisation, the need to look seriously at how we improve cross-border cooperation and recalibrate what we attach value to in society.

Sharper words from Varadakar but no change in substance. But here’s a new idea.

Brian Walker on July 29, 2017, 9:00 am

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It’s hardly a surprise that the Dublin government’s latest expressions of concern about Brexit are focused on Ireland. But why should the Irish expect greater clarity and urgency from London on the border when London has been so vague about everything else? By itself, lack of clarity needn’t be taken as a sign of indifference. Leo Varadkar’s comments may be a mite sharper than Enda Kenny’s, but in substance there is not an iota of difference between them. Mr Varadkar, …

Dominique Searle – The Garlic Wall – Gibraltar and Brexit #JHISS

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on July 28, 2017, 7:20 pm

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SHARING A LAND BORDER WITH EU? Dominique Searle spoke about Gibraltar’s land border with Spain and the impact of Brexit at the John Hewitt International Summer School in Armagh. The efficiency of border crossing is crucial.

A border down the Irish Sea is a straw man

Brian Walker on July 28, 2017, 11:15 am

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The Times of London lead “Irish want sea border after Brexit” is probably plugging a line from Dublin harder than it deserves, in claiming that the Irish government under new leadership is calling for an economic border down the Irish Sea as the only viable alternative to an unacceptable hardening of the land border. Sir Jeffrey immediately shot down that kite on behalf of the DUP on the Today programme, (although BBC NI’s habitually sleepy news website has yet to …

Dr Katy Hayward: The future of national borders across these islands #JHISS

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on July 26, 2017, 6:05 pm

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FLEXIBLE AND IMAGINATIVE – the qualities that might need to underpin any national borders across these islands post-Brexit, yet Dr Katy Hayward suggests that our difficulty in future-orientated thinking makes this an uphill struggle. Watch her talk at the John Hewitt International Summer School in Armagh.

Extradited Suspect Admits Role in 1996 Provisional IRA Mortar Attack in Germany

Pete Baker on July 26, 2017, 3:21 pm

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Unencumbered by the Belfast Agreement, ‘comfort’ letters, or any proposals on legacy issues, German authorities sought and, last year, secured the extradition of a suspect in the Provisional IRA mortar attack on a British army barracks near Osnabrück, Germany, in June 1996. James Anthony Oliver Albert Corry, from north Belfast, had been arrested in Killorglin, Co Kerry, in October 2015, on foot of a European Arrest Warrant issued by German authorities. At the start of his trial today in a court in the city …

Pressure on Sinn Fein to return to the Assembly was the message from the Dublin establishment at the Magill

Brian Walker on July 24, 2017, 11:45 am

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As the John Hewitt gets under way today, the summer school season had already been launched in Glenties. I spent a few days in the area the previous week so I missed out on this year’s Magill summer school which was as usual these days, highly political. On Brexit you can have too much of a good thing especially when Narin strand and Nancy’s bar down the road in Ardara are beckoning. The School will publish speakers’ papers shortly but …

A Passport to Nationalist Insurrection?

Shane Greer on July 20, 2017, 4:57 pm

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I recently discovered Jamie Bryson, and as with the discovery of any hidden gem, I’ll confess I’m rapt. It’s not yet clear to me whether Jamie believes everything he says or whether he’s simply realised that hyperbole is a sure fire path to notoriety. But after his latest offering, I’d have to say the balance of opinion has to come down to the latter view. In my dalliance with Jamie’s pontification on all matters unionist, nationalist and fantasist, it is …

“….a need to develop a coherent, clear and warm relationship between people in the two jurisdictions”

Mick Fealty on July 19, 2017, 10:07 pm

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As delivered by Fine Gael Minister Joe McHugh TD in Glenties tonight at the MacGill Summer School. Edwin Poots was in the audience (see Gerry Moriarty’s report tonight), with Mary Lou McDonald (abreviated), Katy Hayward, David Gavaghan and moderated by Denis Bradley: A few years ago I travelled to Stormont with around a dozen Fine Gael TDs for a meeting with the First and Deputy First Ministers Peter Robinson and Martin McGuinness. Peter Robinson stood up to speak. He began …

Stormont collapse ensures Northern Ireland cannot [further] exploit England’s Brexit difficulties…

Mick Fealty on July 14, 2017, 11:34 am

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It didn’t escape Nigel Farage or Michael Portillo’s notice last night that Michel Barnier was over pouring sweet nothings into the ears of anyone who could remotely cause Theresa May and the Tories a great deal of trouble. It’s an acute move on the part of the EU’s chief operator negotiator to exploit the post referendum splits within the UK and a perfect opportunity for him to take notes from the Leader of the Opposition as well as the First …

Conflicting Irish views on #Brexit, but right now there are no N/S meetings taking place..

Mick Fealty on July 13, 2017, 10:23 am

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If Theresa May made a political mistake (aside from reading the polls too literally) it was to ignore the narrow margin of victory for the Leave camp. Now she’s looking for help to navigate through some difficult, narrow and potentially treacherous waters. So what is Brexit, and what will it look like? Two things seem to be a given, which sit outwith the negotiation process: the UK will leave the single market and the customs union. Both pose big problems …