Irish unity – Page 3 – Slugger O'Toole

Border poll ferment hits a high spot in the Euros exit poll

Brian Walker on May 25, 2019, 8:18 pm

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The Red C exit poll records an astounding result on Irish Unity – so amazing that it’s presented as tucked in after another positive result on the Irish language, as if they don’t quite believe it. Newton tweets Support for a united Ireland rises as support for Sinn Fein falls. Perhaps the southern electorate is more sophisticated on this point than it gets credit for. What’s happening to them down there, so drunk with euphoria about what a terrific …

Future Ireland / How will the PUL be accommodated in a United Ireland?

Soapbox on January 11, 2019, 8:30 am

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This week, we’re featuring submissions from readers on the theme of ‘Future Ireland: Alternative Conversations about Unity and the Union’. Competition winners will be published on Saturday. By ‘Danny Boy’. According to the demographics, there could be a nationalist majority within Northern Ireland in the not-too distant future, which some think will automatically lead to the re-unification of this island. So what will happen to all those people living within Northern Ireland who class themselves as being from the PUL …

Future Ireland / Unity: Telling a Different Story

Damien Mullan on November 3, 2018, 9:00 am

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“There was never any moment in our history when slavery was not a sleeping serpent. It lay coiled up under the table during the deliberations of the Constitutional Convention. Owing to the cotton gin it was more than half awake. Thereafter, it was on everyone’s mind though not always on his tongue.” – John Jay Chapman. THE QUESTION The ‘national question is insolvable’, according to Fintan O’Toole. What O’Toole is referring to is the prevalence of irritants and grievances, imagined …

Future Ireland / Does motherhood unite or divide us?

Elizabeth Nelson on October 27, 2018, 9:02 am

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Most mothers have more pressing things to think about than constitutional arrangements. While there are some differences in the lived experiences of mothers in the UK and Ireland, they are small. In fact, our struggles are pretty much the same across national borders. Beyond the obvious, that all mothers want the best for their children (and often disagree on what that is and how to achieve it), we are united in our systematic disadvantage by the states in which we …

Future Ireland / Irish Unification: An Evangelical View

David Millen on October 13, 2018, 8:34 am

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The Unification Agenda At the time of writing, questions about unification are more topical than ever. Brexit has polarised our population, and this in its turn has added significant impetus to the unity debate. Supporters of unification have rightly read this as an opportunity, and proposals for border polls abound. Emotions across the population run high, with most people seeming to sit on either extreme of a continuum that runs between elation and dread. So how do we pick our …

Future Ireland: Where Can The North Thrive?

Claire Mitchell on September 4, 2018, 12:01 pm

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For some masochistic reason, I feel umbilically connected to the soil and the soul of this island. Especially this messed up northern corner of it. But there is no point in drawing borders in the soil, and driving flags into it, when it only has 60 more years of harvests left to give. It occurred to me recently that the best case scenario for Northern Ireland, as things stand, is to have a mediocre Brexit, for Stormont to limp back, for orange …

Unionists could lose out if they don’t talk about a united Ireland

Sarah Creighton on August 1, 2018, 9:18 am

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Many unionists have been given a ‘lundy bollocking’ over the past few years but it’s bizarre to see it happen to Peter Robinson. Robinson’s crime was to suggest that unionists should prepare for a united Ireland. He said, “I don’t expect my own house to burn down but I still insure it because it could happen.” Robinson’s words have generated outrage with unionists like Sammy Wilson and Reg Empey lining up to tell the former First Minister to put a …

Would a United Ireland be affordable?

Peter Donaghy (Salmon of Data) on July 22, 2018, 1:44 pm

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Given recent polling that suggests that a border poll on the question of Northern Ireland joining a unified Irish state could be a close contest, there has been a renewed focus on the question of whether a unified Irish state would be affordable. There is a gap of roughly £10bn between tax revenues and public expenditure in Northern Ireland, an effective subsidy from Great Britain to Northern Ireland that is often referred to as the “subvention” or the “block grant”. …

Perspectives on Change from a Dublin-dwelling northern Prod

Soapbox on July 11, 2018, 8:41 am

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I am a Northern Irish Protestant who has lived in Dublin for the past twenty five years. I am proud to be from the Protestant community and proud to be from Northern Ireland. But I have never been so proud to be part of a society, as I have been to be part of the Republic of Ireland in recent years. A society that voted, myself included, in favour of marriage equality and a woman’s right to choose. I have a friend …

Tell me how Alex. Please

Soapbox on May 8, 2018, 11:05 am

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John MacManus is a History Teacher in Northern Ireland “So, the continuing ‘rise and rise’ of Sinn Fein is not unstoppable. Irish unity is not inevitable. That won’t, of course, stop Sinn Fein’s relentless propaganda and repositioning. And nor should it stop unionism from relentless deconstruction of Sinn Fein’s arguments; or of kick-starting their own major, thought-through, broad-based, pro-Union campaign. Put bluntly, stop whingeing about Sinn Fein and, instead, counter their various strategies, policies and narratives.” So concludes Alex Kane …

Fianna Fail going North would be a game changer. It implies an electoral pact with Sinn Fein in a bid to out poll unionists and lead a southern coalition towards unity

Brian Walker on April 4, 2018, 9:19 pm

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Poor old SDLP! What’s the point of voting in council elections next year for a party that says it may go out of business not now but maybe later? If Fianna Fail enter the lists, it has to be big, it has to be about more than rescuing the anti- Sinn Fein tradition of northern nationalism. It can only be to rob Sinn Fein of its role as the pacemaker for a united Ireland. Who ought to be better placed …

This cannot simply be a numbers game. Unity will only occur peacefully through dialogue and co-operation with both nationalists and unionists

Soapbox on March 15, 2018, 3:06 pm

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Cathal Haughey is Dublin Organizer of Ógra Fianna Fáil and committee member of DCU4UNITY From the 7th-9th of March, Dublin City University students voted overwhelmingly in favor (76%) for their Students’ Union to support Irish reunification. The campaign was run by ‘DCU4Unity’ and had cross-party support from the DCU branches of Ógra Fhianna Fáil, Ógra Shinn Féin and Labour Youth. I was delighted to be appointed to the committee of the campaign as chair of the DCU Ógra Fhianna Fail. …

Poll records another jump in support for Irish Unity

David McCann on December 28, 2017, 10:28 am

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A new poll out today conducted by Ireland Thinks for the Irish Daily Mail has recorded a jump in support in voters in the South f0r Irish Unity. Ireland Thinks interviewed a random sample of 1,144 adults aged 18+ by telephone between Thursday 14th December and Friday 22nd December 2017. This group carried out a similar poll in March this year. Respondents were asked the following question; If it cost the Irish government €9 billion per annum for Northern Ireland …

Lucid Talk poll shows support for special status & strong support for the DUP & Sinn Fein

David McCann on December 7, 2017, 4:13 pm

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Lucid Talk released a poll today (commissioned by the GUE/NGL group in the EU Parliament). They have some really interesting findings. Broken down into those who identify as Unionist or Nationalists; Another interesting statistic from the poll is the current levels of party support in Northern Ireland (Good news for the DUP & Sinn Fein); Some Thoughts Obviously it’s one poll and the usual caveats apply about a simple snap shot in time. The level of support for Irish reunification …

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 …

Time for unity among those advocating Unity

Soapbox on June 14, 2017, 6:30 pm

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Matt Carthy is a Sinn Fein MEP for the Ireland Midlands-North West constituency Something big is happening. Brexit has simply accelerated a debate on Irish Unity that was inevitably going to happen anyway. Irish Unity featured during the recent Westminster election campaign in a way in which it hasn’t in living memory. That is simply a reflection of what is occurring in communities, within civic society and among members and supporters of all the main political parties North & South …

A response to Sinn Fein’s “Towards a United Ireland” document

David McCann on November 29, 2016, 8:46 am

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Sinn Fein have launched a discussion paper titled “Towards a United Ireland” The document is available in both English and Irish with each translation coming to roughly 28 pages each. If you want to read it for yourself, here is the full version. In this post, I want to highlight some of the key passages and how I feel they could be improved in creating a more coherent offering for a United Ireland that has been lacking within mainstream Nationalism …

A time to press for Irish unity or a time to stay cool?

Brian Walker on September 14, 2016, 12:18 pm

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In contrast with Chris Donnelly’s reasoned case and the speculation that Fianna Fail may at last organise in the North, herewith Newton Emerson’s latest in the Irish Times The Troubles generation was marked by an almost total collapse in the unionist sense of Irishness, which is usually explained as a reaction to republican violence. However, I do not believe this alone can account for the extent to which I do not feel Irish in the slightest. I think it is …

Kenny tells EU to prepare for prospect of a Border Poll

David McCann on July 18, 2016, 8:02 pm

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Just in from the Irish Independent; #BREAKING Taoiseach Enda Kenny has said the Government and the EU must prepare seriously for the prospect of a border poll. More to follow — Independent.ie (@Independent_ie) July 18, 2016 Quotes from Enda; The discussion and negotiations that take place over the next period should take into account the possibility, however far out it might be, that the clause in the Good Friday Agreement might be triggered and that if there is a clear …

Eastwood: The inevitability of reconciled political unity is no more.

David McCann on June 21, 2016, 4:45 pm

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Colum Eastwood spoke at the SDLP Youth Conference last Saturday with some interesting comments about Nationalism and Irish unity. I have bolded some of the more noteworthy references. Beginning by referencing the poor Nationalist result last month he said; The recent election also threw up questions beyond, what can at times, be the bubble of life at Stormont. The decline of the Nationalist turnout by 5% must be a source of considerable concern to those of us who profess to …