“Now is the time to renew our commitment to building a truly shared future. To redouble our efforts to build connections and trust between traditions on this island so that in each area of the Good Friday Agreement we make tangible progress on reconciliation”. So said An Taoiseach Micheál Martin in an address to an online audience about his vision for the new Shared Island Unit.
His speech was very much in the tradition of past taoisigh, like Sean Lemass, Garret FitzGerald and Bertie Ahern. He was reaching out across divisions and outlined a framework for the practicalities of making life better for everyone in Ireland. There was no sloganising or meaningless rhetoric. This was a mature politician with a measured message.
Sometimes there are those within northern unionism who have had the nous to listen to such words and reciprocate with an appropriate generosity of spirit. Other times these words fall on stony ground drowned out by the loudest voices on the loyalist fringes.
These are such times. The sectarian dog whistle is never too far away from the armoury of certain unionist politicians. They are all too ready to throw some red meat to their more rapacious followers.
Which is why it is good to see the return of former DUP leader Peter Robinson to public life as a commentator in the News Letter. His is a timely intervention against what he calls “border poll deniers”. He is both gracious and generous in his descriptive term. Luddites would be more appropriate.
Robinson calls upon unionists to logically and economically make their case for the Union. He realises it will take more than a Union Flag and a verse of Rule Britannia to sell the benefits of remaining within the UK to nationalists, never non aligned.
Always pragmatic, he also knows success depends on “winning over voters who do not vote for parties with unionist in the title and indeed non voters”. His task will not be easy whilst the current Tory party remains in power and because Scotland is teetering on the brink of independence. Selling the benefits of the union whilst English nationalism prevails is a Herculean task and that is before a hard Brexit comes into play. But ultimately Robinson understands the future of Northern Ireland will boil down to a numbers game and he wants unionism to be on the front foot.
The taoiseach also knows any future vote on unity will come down to numbers. The Good Friday Agreement is crystal clear that only a majority vote is required and no amount of well meaning waffle about weighted majorities will dilute this.
But the taoiseach correctly wants to end the nauseating fixation of some about an imminent need for a border poll. He wants to build up “connections and trust”. Some of those connections make sense economically such as the A5 to Derry and a better rail service between Dublin and Belfast. The Narrow Water Bridge was mentioned too and apart from tourism - such a bridge could be as symbolic as the Peace Bridge in Derry.
If Covid has taught us anything, it is about the need for North/South collaboration in the area of health. Such a template exists in the successful establishment of the all-island children’s cardiac service based at the Our Lady’s Children’s Hospital in Dublin. The taoiseach wants connectivity in terms of meeting the needs of the north and the south. These connections are being backed up with a kitty of £500m in addition to existing financial commitments.
The real challenge for Micheál Martin is in establishing trust across the traditions on the island and the integration of new communities too. Trust is in short supply at the moment in both coalitions on the island. Yet if anyone is capable of creating the conditions for such a new atmosphere of trust; it is the patient man of Irish politics - An Taoiseach.
