How can we integrate Unionism into a possible United Ireland?

This is your usual dog with a bone, tunnel vison way of scaremongering, pension discussions will be part of wider negotiations and will not, either here or in Scotland be negotiated in isolation.

If the UK decide to welch on the national insurance contributions made to them that will affect wider agreement on a settlement. I would expect a mutually beneficial outcome on all this stuff. Here's an article, noticeably not trying to scare, that weighs up the pros and cons fairly.

Who pays the State Pension in an independent Scotland? | FAI (fraserofallander.org)

Again, you are misunderstanding the point.

There are now two funds - a NI fund and a GB fund. The treasury doesn't need to grant-aid the NI fund because the GB fund does it for them.

The transfer from the GB fund to the NI fund was in the order of £660m. We don't have that to hand.

Why are you repeatedly making a fool of yourself?

Go down to page 21 and look at the table to Note 3.

See the bit at the top of the numbered columns - it reads £000 not £.

That means the 564,400 figure isn't 500k, but 564m. This is basic stuff.

Blanch, there will be a negotiated settlement on these things, which as my link says are 'complex' and not really for randomers trying to score political points on a forum.

Why you want to now characterise the British as people who welch on pensions while tomorrow you will be imploring us to accept that they are morally upstanding, eludes me.

You read a Tory scaremongering and jumped to the keyboard.

P.S. I have no idea of the figures and wouldn't waste my time concerning myself about them, I just compared the figure mentioned to what the taxpayer gives to a single TV programme.

The Parades commission cleaned up loyalist/unionist 'culture'. (still a ways to go)

The point being, you can march, and burn if you want as long as it is where it is wanted and within the law.

Exactly the problem I pointed out earlier. Your community will never move on and address its sectarianism until you recognise there is a problem. Most (not all) unionists except we have still more to do to deal with prejudice, sectarianism, etc within. Most nationalists have still to get to square one in this regard. There are deep reasons for this including that they don’t want to face up to the fact that the ira was primarily a sectarian terrorist machine. SF can’t break free from them but are also a reminder of their horrible past (and current).

Here is just a wee local example of the first three posts I find today when I search Facebook for me local Sinn Fein branch

here is my MLA

Here is my MP

And here is the branch local sf post

Bear in mind these are all remembering members of the local group who murdered the Protestant community and terrorised their own community- ‘remembered with pride’

this would be a starting point to welcome unionists into a UI - stop voting for sf until they move into the 21st century

NB you can check the credibility of what I am saying. Search ‘south down Sinn Fein’ on Facebook and see what my small terrorised unionist community is represented by politically. Bit of work to do guys to welcome us

Said this many times.

Everyone in Ireland has to have a conversation about how their dead are remembered and celebrated/commemorated. This is a divided post conflict society after all. There will be 'two' sides for a long time to come and ways have to be found to acknowledge and deal with that.

I suggest we don't listen to or tolerate those who only want to point fingers hypocritically on these issues to begin with.

I.E. Those who will glorify/celebrate Michael Collins or Connolly or the beginings of this state...nor those who glorify what the British did...nor those who point the finger at nationalists while portraying racists and bigots on bonfires as misguided young 'barstewards' or taunting/intimidating parading as their 'culture' or who will try to dilute what happened on Bloody Sunday etc. The list goes on and nationalists have to address these issues to.

The point here is, this is an issue to be addressed by the entire people of Ireland, this is not something that is only deliverable to Unionists. Unionists have much to do in this regard as well.

Respect and tolerance can be given to respectful and non confrontational remembrance. Far as I can see it is the only way forward and a healthy way forward.

I linked you to an article that rationally states that this is more complex than taking the word of a Tory minister you aligned yourself with.

Again...I wasn't 'out' by anything, I merely compared a figure mentioned to a taxpayer subsidy to an RTE programme.

And finally, the poster who loves the high moral ground would say that about the British reneging (welching) on their responsibilities. Your form of words is just another way of saying it.

Nonsense, we don't need to stop celebrating/commemorating all those who fought for Irish freedom the last few hundred years, Unionists will just have to accept that they are part of our history like most countries celebrate those who fought for their independence.

The four points are correct, but there's a couple of important comments that need to be added in order to avoid a possibly misleading impression.

With regard to point 4, "there is no legal obligation to continue this subsidy in the event of a United Ireland" is true but trivial. There is no legal obligation to do anything in the event of a United Ireland; laws to effect the unification of Ireland and address its consequences have yet to be enacted by either the UK or Ireland. If there is going to be a united Ireland the necessary laws will have to be enacted, and this is one of the many, many questions they will have to address. The fact that they don't already address it tell us precisely zero about how they will address it, if and when they are enacted.

So, basically, I'd leave point 4 out of this list. It really doesn't add any meaningful information, and risks creating a seriously misleading impression.

On point 3, the NI fund is subsidised by the UK fund now, but that doesn't tell us anything immutable or eternal about any subsidy that might be required in the future. NI's story for the past hundred years - since the foundation of the statelet, in fact - has been one of steady economic decline, relative both to Ireland and to GB. NI's current inability to finance its own pension obligations is not unrelated to its dismal economic performance, and its dismal economic performance is not unrelated to the effects of partition, which has left NI with all the economic disadvantages both of a frontier region (borders are economically depressing things) and of being the most remote region of the state to which it belongs.

I'm not suggesting that NI will miraculously become an economic powerhouse a week after reunification, but we certainly can't assume that the £660m transfer that the national insurance fund currently requires will continue indefinitely, even when NI's economic situation is altered by the end of partition.

That is the salient point that blanch on a new hobbyhorse is refusing to grasp, or willfully refusing to grasp.

What will emerge will be a negotiated settlement of pensions and other financial issues - all of them interconnected and complex as a result.

He'll pre-empt it all with scaremongering and soapboxing though.

Wonder what the breakdown of voting intentions of pensioners are in the polls? I suspect they already are worried.

You better get on with the detailed discussion then...with those who will negotiate these and agree these things.

It's the kind of thing that can backfire badly too and the British would know this only too well. I'd imagine a lot of ex-pats or those intending to be and their unions might be very interested.

Be good to hear Unionists on this, would a refusal to pay their pensions be seen as a repudiation of their Britishness?

I am not talking about the average person. I am talking about union leaders and opposition MP's.

And I agree, there is little point trying to pre-empt these discussions until they happen. It is far more complex than a bit of partitionist scaremongering on foot of reading a bit of Tory bullying.

I normally inform myself before making a comment blanch. Trade Unions are involved in state pension discussions. What 'personal insult'?

CONFERENCE ON THE STATE PENSION - Early Day Motions - UK Parliament