Tánaiste says British stance on Protocol is moving border vote closer
MOMENTUM for a border poll will increase as a result of the British government’s behaviour over the Northern Ireland Protocol according to Tánaiste Leo Varadkar who said the British approach will ‘drive more people towards nationalism’.
The Fine Gael leader gave a harsh assessment of the intention of Boris Johnson’s government to legislate to scrap parts of the Protocol, warning of ‘consequences for the union’.
Only last week Mr Varadkar said he was ‘not convinced’ a referendum on Irish unity was any closer following Sinn Féin’s landmark win to become the largest party in the North.
But the Tánaiste’s tune has changed after a week in which London threatened to tear up parts of the postBrexit agreement.
And the Fine Gael leader’s party colleague, Neale Richmond, is now calling for an Oireachtas committee on Irish unity to be established, saying it’s ‘now very conceivable’ a border poll could be called within a decade.
Speaking on RTÉ’s Today with Claire Byrne, Mr Varadkar said that 59 of the Stormont Assembly’s 90 MLAs do not want to disapply the Protocol.
He said: ‘If they keep trying to impose on Northern Ireland things that Northern Ireland doesn’t want, that drives more people towards nationalism and away from support for the Union. And it just seems a bit puzzling.’
‘Any modification of the Protocol we can discuss,’ Mr Varadkar added, but ruled out removing it entirely.
He said a trusted trader system ‘is a possibility’, but added that there are ‘risks’ to that proposal.
The Tánaiste said: ‘On the upside, it would allow more products going to Northern Ireland from Britain without any checks and I think that would help resolve some of the objections from the unionist community, but there is a risk, of course, of products going south. That’s something we’d have to bear in mind.’
In a speech at an event in Westminster last night, Mr Richmond said that it was ‘now very conceivable’ that a border poll could be called in the next ten years. The Dublin Rathdown TD said it was the Government’s duty to ensure Ireland is ‘best prepared as possible’ if a referendum was called.
‘That is why I am calling for the establishment of an all-party Special Oireachtas Committee to be established to look at the challenges and opportunities that Irish unity presents,’ he said.
Meanwhile, the North’s First Minister Michelle O’Neill has said the public should be given clarity on the criteria for calling a poll on Irish unification.
The Sinn Féin vice president said there was a need to fill in the ‘grey’ area of the Good Friday Agreement on the circumstances for holding a referendum on constitutional change.
Under the terms of the 1998 agreement, a vote should be triggered if the secretary of state for the North believes that a majority would back constitutional change.
‘Drives people towards nationalism’