Given Trevor Ringland’s comment (January 22) I thought he might consider a different view of the causes of partition.
All threat of civil war and Armageddon came from Ulster unionists who Trump-ishly refused to accept an all-island majority’s democratic entitlement to see a home rule parliament in Ireland.
Home rule, as envisaged by John Redmond and the British government, was to be firmly ensconced within the imperial order and more importantly there was to be no diminution of Westminster’s supremacy. Ulster unionists, however, would under no circumstances countenance any variant of home rule in which Catholics would be the pre-eminent power holders. Against this background, unionists demanded a framework of six counties, judged sufficiently Protestant enough, to meet their sectarian calculations, for the raising of a Protestant fiefdom. Downsizing the province of Ulster from nine to six counties required the abandoning of a substantial body of their own kith and kin to meet their sectarian need of ensuring a Protestant dominated framework was unassailable. The thorough Protestantisation of all the avenues of power and control were already blueprinted when Carson launched his strategy of orchestrated menace and armed muscle to resist parliamentary majorities and to turbo-charge their own democratic deficit in Ireland. With the Ulster Covenant in one hand and German rifle in the other, unionist enforced what Churchill correctly described as, ‘The bully’s veto’. The Orangefication of much of the state apparatus of their fiefdom was to assure the Catholic minority that there was no hope of deliverance from a future of Orange domination. So zealously did the Orange regime pursue the alienation of the minority, they succeeded in building a massive reservoir of disaffection, from which conflict was embraced by many as the only means to escape the egregious consequences of the Government of Ireland Act 1920 and its empowerment of a Williamite cult who proved themselves totally unfit to govern any fragment of Ireland.
J KAVANAGH
Dunmurry, Co Antrim
Who is to blame for new trade border?
It is interesting to note the frantic efforts of the SDLP, Alliance and Sinn Féin to blame all the repercussions of the NI Protocol on the DUP and government. Perhaps they fear the growing public realisation that the new trade border will have real long-term implications for the cost and range of goods available in Northern Ireland?
The trade organisations whose campaigning facilitated the Irish Sea Border are also likely to be arriving at similar conclusions.
It is entirely to be expected that the Irish government, SDLP and Sinn Féin would campaign for an Irish Sea Border – after all the same blinkered nationalist zeal condemned the good people of the Republic to decades of poverty and immigration. Indeed the Republic was only rescued from the nightmare of independence by joining the then European Economic Community. It remains to be seen if the European Union’s benevolence will continue with one of it’s main benefactors gone. However, the encouragement of the Irish Sea Border outcome by the Alliance Party and the various trade organisations, during the Brexit negotiations, is mystifying. Absolute denial by senior Alliance figures of any future negative impacts from any new checks on the Irish Sea route (NI’s main trade route) might suggest absolute naivety.
Statistics from recent elections would suggest that the weakening of the connection with the rest of the UK goes against the wishes of the huge majority of the people of NI. The Yes vote (to leave the UK) in Scotland’s referendum in 2016 was 45 per cent. This reflected the nationalist vote in the previous election. A border poll in Northern Ireland therefore could be expected to reflect the combined vote of the SDLP and Sinn Fein – 38 per cent in the last election. Although if pollsters are to be believed this figure is likely to exaggerate the pro-united Ireland vote. It is also worth noting that In the EU Referendum in NI the leave vote totalled 44 per cent.
It would appear that a greater percentage of voters wanted out of the EU than want in to a united Ireland.
JAMES MARTIN
Dromore, Co Down
Political delivery
It is interesting to note the frantic efforts of the SDLP, Alliance and Sinn Féin to blame all the repercussions of the NI Protocol on the DUP and government. Perhaps they fear the growing public realisation that the new trade border will have real long-term implications for the cost and range of goods available in Northern Ireland?
The trade organisations whose campaigning facilitated the Irish Sea Border are also likely to be arriving at similar conclusions.
It is entirely to be expected that the Irish government, SDLP and Sinn Féin would campaign for an Irish Sea Border – after all the same blinkered nationalist zeal condemned the good people of the Republic to decades of poverty and immigration. Indeed the Republic was only rescued from the nightmare of independence by joining the then European Economic Community. It remains to be seen if the European Union’s benevolence will continue with one of it’s main benefactors gone. However, the encouragement of the Irish Sea Border outcome by the Alliance Party and the various trade organisations, during the Brexit negotiations, is mystifying. Absolute denial by senior Alliance figures of any future negative impacts from any new checks on the Irish Sea route (NI’s main trade route) might suggest absolute naivety.
Statistics from recent elections would suggest that the weakening of the connection with the rest of the UK goes against the wishes of the huge majority of the people of NI. The Yes vote (to leave the UK) in Scotland’s referendum in 2016 was 45 per cent. This reflected the nationalist vote in the previous election. A border poll in Northern Ireland therefore could be expected to reflect the combined vote of the SDLP and Sinn Fein – 38 per cent in the last election. Although if pollsters are to be believed this figure is likely to exaggerate the pro-united Ireland vote. It is also worth noting that In the EU Referendum in NI the leave vote totalled 44 per cent.
It would appear that a greater percentage of voters wanted out of the EU than want in to a united Ireland.
JAMES MARTIN
Dromore, Co Down
Northern Ireland is a British colony
AS A former long distance lorry driver I can say that not in my living memory was soil (call it British if you like) allowed into Northern Ireland.
So-called ministry men operated at every dock and if soil was found on machinery lorry and driver were put back on the boat to be washed in Britain and the driver had to pay boat fare twice. Contributors to the BBC are copying Trump, using alternative facts claiming that the EU on Friday threatened to reintroduce the now redundant border the British put across Ireland by force and threats 100 years ago. This is not true. What they said was their fear was that the vaccine could be allowed into Northern Ireland and then moved on to Britain. Owing to the scarcity of vaccine in EU they were trying to protect EU life – that’s not a crime.
There was also a lot of hysteria from English flower growers and seed merchants that they cannot sell their goods to Northern Ireland because of the protocol and demands for it to removed. In short by voting for Brexit they have banned themselves from export to EU which Northern Ireland is still part of. Or put another way they shot themselves in the foot, and that is a fact. If truth be told Northern Ireland is a British colony and that is a fact.
PETER McEVOY
Banbridge, Co Down
