Far too much attention has been paid to this issue, for example from The Sun:
The issue of the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic has been a stumbling block to Brexit talks
The whole thing is nuts. The underlying logic is that any country with a land border with an EU Member State must also be or become an EU Member State to avoid the 'hard border' issue.
I don't see why the Irish-Irish border is of any more significance that the Swedish-Norwegian border, or the German-, Austrian-, Italian- and French-Swiss borders.
Put it another way, just imagine The Republic of Ireland had only recently become an EU Member State and the UK never had been - whose problem is it to sort it out?
Monday, 23 July 2018
The Irish border - tail wagging the dog.
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10 comments:
Quite agree. But Barnier and the Irish elite are smart enough to know that 90% of the population fall for any old fatuous argument, so that's why the push that argument. Or perhaps they're so dim they actually believe that argument.
It's a bit like conflating anti-semitism with disapproval of Isreal's harsh treatment of Palestinians: Jews are smart - they know 90% of the population will "conflate". So Jews scream "antisemitism" every time anyone criticises them for poor treatment of Palestinians.
It isn't a problem at all. And as Ralphy ses above.
It's only a problem because the current government is propped up by the DUP.
Isn't it a problem for the EU rather than us if we're out of 'the union' in that they don't want nasty tariff free goods 'n' services leaking in via NI?
Not sure if this is right but I read a while back that because there is no deepwater container port in the south the Irish rely on UK for pretty much all their imports, both from inside & outside the EU which travel by road and then ferry..... stand to be corrected though.
The EU's hard border is a problem all the way from the Arctic to the Black Sea.
It interferes with a natural flow of trade.
RM, good example.
L, ta for back up.
B, good point. But if avoiding a 'hard border' were so important to the DUP, wouldn't they be calling for re-unification... oh, I see.
Sh, correct. A border can be porous in one direction and hard in the other (see East-West German border pre-1990). I've checked on Irish container ports and they seem to have plenty.
Ph, also correct. Hard borders are an EU invention. Unless we are talking about the bleeding heart German government and people from the 'Muslim world'.
"I don't see why the Irish-Irish border is of any more significance that the Swedish-Norwegian border, or the German-, Austrian-, Italian- and French-Swiss borders."
Probably because there is no significant group that wants to void altogether any of those borders, in the way that Sinn Féin/IRA wants to void the inter-Irish border? This is perhaps also why the inter-Irish border has never been "hard" for people – note the Common Travel Area, which cannot survive Brexit (unless the Republic of Ireland leaves the EU too, but that isn't going to happen).
As long as there is no physical border on the island of Ireland, Sinn Féin (and others loyal to the Irish Republic declared in 1916) can pretend that the Stormont administration and the 26-county Republic of Ireland are de facto just devolved administrations within the Irish Republic.
By the way, I suspect the DUP do want a hard border, but they don't dare admit it as a hard border is overwhelmingly unpopular with the people of Northern Ireland.
@GC
"a hard border is overwhelmingly unpopular with the people of Northern Ireland" So why don't the people of NI secede from the roUK..... oh, yeah got it now... nutters with guns.
But as nobody ever admits, isn't this the real threat from the Irish then? "Stay in the EU or we unleash the nutters...."
GC, fair points. SF/IRA have their agenda and the DUP theirs, but it's mainstream RoI doing the most whining.
Sh, correct. Veiled threats. That said, the UK has always treated RoI citizens as equals, free to move here, can vote in our elections etc. This is presumably a throwback to Irish declaration of independence, which the UK govt sort of pretended never happened.
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