Brexit Impact on Northern Ireland

How would a second referendum that rescinds the result of a first referendum be incendiary? If that is the case, we cannot have a border poll because a previous referendum in the 1970s rejected unification.

Or are you suggesting that there will be threats of violence and that we should cave in to those?

Which is all fine and dandy, but it is SF who are loudest in calls to begin the planning and consultative process immediately.

Now you truly are passing into the realms of the bizarre. The idea that FG or FF will not wholeheartedly embrace unity when the time comes is delusional. FG are clambouring onto to bandwagon as we speak trying to outdo the others.

Both of them will be frothing at the mouth to achieve unity. Also, the idea that it will be FF and FG who will be in power when a poll is called is looking less and less likely to many.

Micheál Martin has set up the much Unionist criticised Shared Island unit in his department and Varadkar frequently speaks on the pros of a UI, including at the much Unionist criticised Ireland's Future forum.

I don't think you can expect either party to be found wanting in backing a UI when the demographic conditions are universally judged to be right.

Don't forget, the very worst thing that could happen is for a referendum to be held and be lost. The DUP types would make sure there wouldn't be another poll for 30 or 40 years.

The ground is shifting. I recommend you read last weekend's interview with Martin very carefully.

I think the reality is, the longer the current situation/status quo goes on the less likely there is ever to have a United Ireland.

It is my belief that as time goes on, younger generations grow up and the population in both jurisdictions get more diverse, the amount of people that actually care either way gets severely reduced reducing the chances of a poll on either side coming out with the result SF and others want.

I wasn't giving out to you. Just pointing to the use of the Brexit comparison that some think is an edgy one to make. We have never done a referendum the way Brexit got done.

This is not what the GFA says.

A border poll in NI only is the start of the process. It's called by the SoS, and conducted in NI, and it must be called if it appears to the SoS that a majority in NI would vote to end partition. More than one border poll can be held, but not more than one every seven years. There's no reference anywhere here to anything at all being done in the Republic, or to the government of the Republic being involved in any way.

If the border poll passes then proposals for giving effect to reunification, agreed between the two government, have to be laid before the UK Parliament. (Why the UK Parliament? Because the GFA recognises UK as the sovereign power in NI. The UK will need to act in order to end partition - e.g. enacting legislation removing NI from the UK.)

Those proposals will have to include a mechanism by which the people of Ireland can democratically express consent, freely and concurrently, in both jurisdictions - the GFA requires this, as Chips points out.

The GFA doesn't say that consent in both jurisdictions must be expressed through a referendum — in theory, other democratic mechanisms could be considered. But a referendum will be necessary in the Republic, and for obvious reasons it's highly desireable that the same mechanism should be adopted in NI as in the Republic. There could, for example, be a referendum conducted North and South to adopt an appropriately modified version of Bunreacht na hÉireann as the constitution of (united) Ireland. Or it could be some other kind of referendum. But, realistically, I don't see unification being effected by any mechanism other than referendums conducted simultaneously in both jurisdictions. And the border poll contemplated by the GFA won't be the NI end of that referendum, because the border poll doesn't itself effect reunification; under the GFA it must be followed by the preparation and adoption of proposals for giving effect to the wish for reunification, which would be unnecessary if the border poll itself had given effect to them.

I think you're ignoring the reality here. The reality is that there has been a massive spanner thrown in the works of the status quo with Brexit. The current situation is the most unstable and tense in the last 20 years. With the NI border having more news headlines in the last few years than all the previous post GFA ones and the UK heading for it's longest recession on record, any talk of the status quo is pretty blind.

Considering the regularly changing nature of things with regards to Brexit and the NI Protocol, I think it's a pretty big stretch to describe it as the status quo, particularly in comparison to the much more stable 20 years that preceded it.

Folk are always very certain that their opinion reflects that of the majority; polling suggests that your statement about very few people caring is not correct. Whether people care enough to accept the consequences is debatable, but claiming that, 'very few people really care' is obvious hyperbole.

This sounds like yet another shrill 'that pesky Protocol' spoof more than anything. Have they heard of computers among the legal team?

Isn't it in fact ESTAs without the border control?

Problems happen at other borders too. That is the nature of international borders.