Latest trade issue highlights lack of contacts between Dublin and London following Brexit
SO, Micheál Martin gave it a bit of “ole, ole, ole” on the phone with Boris Johnson on Tuesday as the two leaders talked up prospects of a joint British-Irish bid for the 2030 soccer World Cup.
Then, on Wednesday, the Taoiseach learned Mr Johnson was about to unilaterally flout Northern Ireland’s post-Brexit EU trade status.
It was yet another, unneeded reminder that English Tories are among the most insular and parochial political groups in this part of the world. They know little enough about Ireland, and not much more about Scotland or Wales, and do not care much about these places which happen to share the same two islands.
The week’s Brexit events yet again posed the question: How can Dublin replace the day-to-day easy and equal contacts between Ireland and the United Kingdom in a postBrexit world?
It is utterly pointless to blame Micheál Martin and his officials. They have been working on the case as best they can since taking office.
John Bruton, former Taoiseach and several times a member of the government, pointed out some years ago it took Ireland’s entry into the forerunner of the EU to cause a serving British prime minister to make an official visit to Dublin. That milestone came in September 1973 when Ted Heath met Liam Cosgrave at Baldonnell airfield outside Dublin for talks which helped the 1974 Sunningdale agreement, and first but failed attempts at power-sharing in the North and cross-Border official contacts.
British-Irish contacts grew organically since the two became EU member states on January 1, 1973. The shared language and a broadly similar approach to most policy issues – bar agriculture where Britain had long opposed the Common Agricultural Policy – forged relationships which often had little to do with the benighted and atrophied question of Irish partition.
The two new member states’
European journeys were vastly differentiated over time. Ireland was so busy advancing from being a poor and under-developed country that it scarcely noticed the spin-off dividend of a greater equality in the relationship.
The unhealthy dependence of up to 80pc of trade with Britain continued to be dialled down and down. A signal moment came in 1979 when Ireland broke its currency links with the pound sterling to join the EU’s currency grid.
Ireland enthusiastically joined plans for the common single currency, which made its debut on international money markets in 1999. When the notes and coins became a reality in Irish purses and pockets in 2002, there was scarcely a murmur of regret for the passing of the national currency.
The EU helped hugely with the many peace efforts which led to the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. In January 1993, the last vestiges of the customs controls on the Border had vanished, thanks to the EU single market.
It is now a simple matter of public record that neither of the key Brexit advocates, the English Conservatives and the Democratic Unionist Party, had given a smidgeon of thought to the implications for the Border.
Many in Belfast believe the DUP felt Brexit would lose; Boris Johnson was early on blithely saying the UK could at all events stay within the EU single market and customs union.
Brexit was a muddleheaded fiasco which has brought political and economic havoc in its wake for Ireland north and south, and for all sorts of relationships in these islands. In the midst of all that, the Government can hardly be blamed for failing to get more attention in London.
But it does not mean the Taoiseach and his colleagues can stop battling.
The most important thing – upon which the Government has rightly placed most emphasis – is maintaining its relationships with the rest of the EU member governments.
Last Wednesday, EU affairs minister Thomas Byrne got agreement from his counterparts in several member states to reach out informally to Northern Ireland in the coming months. Those involved include Portugal and Finland and it has important symbolism.
The Good Friday Agreement for cross-Border contacts between Dublin and Belfast have been called into question.
The other structure under the agreement, the British-Irish Council, has some potential. But for the most part, even in times of better relationships, the London government has only sent junior politicians, indicating a lack of interest.