That study has been mentioned a few times in this thread already.Originally Posted by BonnieShels
i) https://foot.ie/threads/178393-Discu...=1#post1879265
ii) https://foot.ie/threads/178393-Discu...84#post1904784
ii) https://foot.ie/threads/178393-Discu...=1#post1912847
I twice misattributed it to Michael Burke rather than Professor Kurt Huebner, however.
Last edited by DannyInvincible; 21/12/2017 at 4:35 PM.
'Poll records another jump in support for Irish Unity': https://sluggerotoole.com/2017/12/28...r-irish-unity/
Aye, but there's the link again!That study has been mentioned a few times in this thread already.
i) https://foot.ie/threads/178393-Discu...=1#post1879265
ii) https://foot.ie/threads/178393-Discu...84#post1904784
ii) https://foot.ie/threads/178393-Discu...=1#post1912847
I twice misattributed it to Michael Burke rather than Professor Kurt Huebner, however.
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Only 9 billion? A steal!
DID YOU NOTICE A SIGN OUTSIDE MY HOUSE...?
Kevin Meagher has another piece in the Huffington Post today. I'm enjoying his contributions to the debate.
'A United Ireland Is Five Years Away. We Need To Start Planning For It Now': http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entr...b0df0de8b06eaf
I grudgingly admire his confidence. 5 years is a very short span to achieve a UI given that there's been effective stasis for nearly 100. He's not really debating though- it's a journalist's polemic that he's unlikely ever to have to justify. If there isn't full success by 2023 he can just laugh it off and kick further into the long grass.
There's quite likely to be no NIA election in 2022- the mothballs will be long gone by then. The only significant polls by then will be for Westminster. Nationalism won't get 50% or even 45% (less than 42% last year remember) . So no Referendum (which in any case Varadkar has strongly hinted there should be a 65% or 70% threshold for). No doubt you'll quote the 1998 Deal but it was always mainly about a Nationalist- Unionist settlement and that's over. Talking of which where stand you on the McElduff row- I'm pretty sure he was malicious not just a dimwit
The idea that a Labour govt would make much difference is fanciful. Corbyn isn't up to understanding the details of Brexit, can't see him forcing an end to the border.
A UI is a bit like Scotland qualifying for a major tournament. May well happen at some point just not anytime soon. What odds is your bookie giving KM's bold boast?
I grudgingly admire your confidence that Varadkar will still be in office in five years time.
I didn't suggest nor imply that he would be. The next FF Taoiseach (should s/he be in charge then) will face the same pressure and I guess will react in much the same way. Even an unlikely SF Taoiseach won't just nod through a UI
I know your post is to Danny GR, but I'll offer a response anyway...
I think the earliest a so-called border poll is likely to be called is 2023. The result of the next census will have been published and we should have seen the whites of Brexit's eyes by then.
What he expressed was merely his desire to see such an endorsement for a united Ireland in the North; in other words the more people that vote for it the better. You're grasping at straws if you think that sensible wish was code for having some sort of legal threshold or supermajority tied to the referendum before it could pass; which, as we all know, is code for a unionist veto.
It's 50% +1. There are no ifs, ands or buts about it.
I'm sensing more repartition talk.
I'm inclined to think he meant it too. If it was a mistake it contained the most extraordinary set of coincidences - like a kind of social media GUBU. When the furore arose McElduff could have defused it by not only apologising for any hurt or offence caused but, more importantly, by calling the Kingsmill massacre exactly what it was; cold-blooded, sectarian mass murder. Given that he didn't his apology became mostly worthless and this is what his defenders miss.
Last edited by The Fly; 12/01/2018 at 7:00 PM.
Not a chance he didn't mean it. He fancies himself a bit of a stand-up comedian as I understand, just a really crap one who doesn't understand the entire planet can see what's on your Twitter feed.
Author of Never Felt Better (History, Film Reviews).
More predictable, circular guff.
A UI will happen when the Brits ditch the North. The latter will have nowhere else to go.
And I'd expect a significant financial sweetener to do so.
Personally, I'd send in the UN/EU Army(?) to deal with some of the more extreme unionists.
I doubt there would be any need whatsoever. The PSNI are more than capable of handling such a situation.
Bring Back Belfast Celtic F.C.
Really?
Don't forget hard core loyalists never 'decommissioned'...
Think the likely violent response to a British withdrawal is seriously underestimated.
Afternoon Fly- any and (almost) all responses welcome
1 I agree Brexit is a huge game-changer and may well result in a UI. I just don't see it happening as quickly as Meagher predicts and DI hopes. I doubt the next Census will up the Nationalist vote to anywhere near 50%
2 How am I grasping at straws? I've repeatedly said a UI is possible. Nor am I suggesting any code as you call it. It would make sense (from LV's POV) for there to be likely support of well over 50% before welcoming a Referendum in NI. We've seen over here what a cluster**** the Brexit Ref was and how poisonous the atmosphere has become since
3 Why must the UI poll be on the terms you demand? It's based on a 20 year old deal that has clearly failed
4 Again, I used no code. If there isn't widespread support (including from some Unionists) there's less likely to be a formal poll. When politics is dominated by 2 blocs both with 45%-ish support, they both have a veto of sorts
5 I wasn't thinking of any repartition- that idea is probably a dead duck now
6 I thought the boys were very dignified on the View last week as it goes. BME resigning as MP should calm things a bit. I doubt SF will lose the by-election...
Which points of mine aren't welcome, or are you referring to a certain howling poster from County Louth?
Apologies GR I picked you up wrong. I jumped straight to the poll itself whereas you were referring to the conditions required for one to be called in the first instance, yes?
It's on the terms that the majority of the people signed up to and the GFA was a bit more than a deal; it's quasi-constitutional in nature.
The source of the Assembly and the Executive, the GFA was designed not to engineer prosperity and efficient governance, but to facilitate a truce between the two factions and end the Troubles. You may describe it as a failure but it succeeded in its primary function. Effective government requires the consent of the governed' tacit or explicit. In NI that has obviously been complicated by the fact that the governed have been divided into two ethno-nationalist groups with different political identities and aspirations. The solution to this was the establishment of institutions with a series of significant safeguards built in to allow the majorities of both groups to feel secure and to “buy in” to the settlement.
These consociational ‘constitutional’ arrangements run counter to normative expectations of what good government looks like since there is a propensity to measure the effectiveness of the Stormont institutions through the lens of the more efficient constitutional arrangements in Westminster or the Dáil. So people must be careful of the metric they’re using as measurement of its fitness. As a rule a system with so many checks and balances and with so many actors having a role in shaping legislation and the performance of executive functions cannot be assessed in the same way as so-called normal style politics. It cannot be measured by the clarity or coherence of a singular vision for the future.
I'd argue that the principle problem in NI is that the politics and politicians haven't matured as quickly as many people hoped. But then there's a fundamental lack of honesty concerning history and NI itself so it's hardly surprising. All in all I would be very hesitant to lay the blame squarely at the framework.
As I said before, we have to wait and see the whites of Brexit's eyes. The two most recent polls have already shown an effect; both of which tally with my interaction with fellow nationalists any time the conversation comes up. I understand that's not what you're getting at but we'll just have to wait and see how the 'middle ground' reacts down the line.
If/when the time comes it'll certainly be interesting to see how much mention repartition gets. I think people will be surprised. It'll probably be less than the wistful mutterings around the concept of Joint-Authority though.5 I wasn't thinking of any repartition- that idea is probably a dead duck now
Yep, unless unionists come out en masse and vote for the SDLP's Daniel McCrossan.
Last edited by The Fly; 16/01/2018 at 1:26 AM.
@Fly
1 Yes, I was thinking of the conditions needed before any UI poll. If the predicted result is close to 50-50 then there are plenty of interests (including the bigger Southern parties as I said) who would likely prefer to wait
2 Even if the GFA was fully constitutional, so what? The 1930s version lasted 60 years despite its opening articles being largely nonsense: the Brits don't even have a single document; maybe more importantly, the 2 blocs in NI don't want to deal with each other, or in SF's case with the Brits at all
3 Afraid you lost me at consociational, normative and metric. If you mean as I suspect 'NI is a place apart' fair dos, but that's not a strong argument that we need to use the 1998 Deal forever. Note I've met you halfway by capitalising it...
4 Aye, we need to wait for the scoreboard- and as I mentioned, there won't be one probably until the next WM election, when the Centre will be squeezed. Meanwhile and anecdotally, I'm not hearing any present Unionist voters (of any age) saying they'll go SF in BT North. After all they can still buy a Southern passport regardless of how they vote
5 A problem for SDLP in the WT by election is that some of their voters will move to SF rather than side with Unionists. Who'll probably have a previously non-party and maybe past victim candidate to pressure SF, rather than 2 candidates to get all their 35% out
I get what you mean but if polls start to show those sorts of figures consistently then the calls for a referendum within broader nationalism would become incessant and hard to resist.
Unionism needs to get at least 60% in any referendum otherwise we're into a kind of perpetual polling on this at least every 7 years. The problem for unionism is that I doubt that can be achieved now as a result of Brexit.
Perhaps you can outline this new arrangement you have in mind then and explain why nationalists should or would sign up to it?
Well NI, evidently, is a place apart and has been for nearly all of its existence but I was referring to the framework generally. If the Assembly has failed to achieve its kite mark in the last decade, it is because its members have too often reverted to type. The disinterest that Britain has always shown towards NI coupled with its comparatively deep pockets are also a significant factor. Politicians here aren't forced to make the place function better than it does because of the financial doping it receives in the form of the block grant.
I meant more by word of mouth, as opposed to openly declaring their intentions...which is nearly impossible to do nowadays anyway because of social media.
I don't agree with this politicisation of victims in the first place and I'd ask the simple question of both unionist parties - what extra political capital do you expect to make out of fielding such a candidate and what would be the gain for unionism in general? It would just recycle the problems for even longer imo.
Last edited by The Fly; 16/01/2018 at 3:04 PM.
@Fly
1 If Nationalism gets 45% in a 2022 GE (say), then 49% in another in 2027, why not just wait another few years until you have 55%? Then there'll be a UI, fair enough. But if on the other hand all those results stay below 50%, we're no further forward. The onus is on Nationalism to up their vote more than on Unionism to get back to a notional 60%. And to do that Nats need to sell the UI to a lot of current non-Nats
2 The only real change I expect soon is direct rule by Karen Bradley. I don't expect Northern Nationalism to do much more than blame Bradley for everything, and local govt to stagnate further
3 I don't want to see either a 'Victims' candidate nor indeed the field narrowed generally. If I lived in Omagh I'd want to vote Green.
4 The gain (I guess) for the Unionist Parties would be little more than a go at taking the high ground briefly. On the usual zero-sum game that anything good for us is bad for themuns and vv
Nationalists don't really need to sell a UI atm; Brexit is doing it for them because it has moved the discussion into a geo-political and civic sphere. It's those who occupy the so-called middle ground, the Alliance/Green/Other voter, who will prove decisive in any unity referendum in the short to medium term.
I can't see the Assembly returning any time soon either. It's hard to predict exactly when but my guess would be after the Brexit process is complete.
I can imagine there's an instinct there to do just that but I'd counsel the unionist parties against it. It would be easily, and rightly, characterised as political game playing over such a sensitive subject.
It'll be interesting to see how much SF's share of the vote declines though.
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What new arrangement do you have in mind btw?
Last edited by The Fly; 16/01/2018 at 4:29 PM.
The Fly well ahead on points currently.
A UI will happen, just a question of when.
Though actually I think a reduced SF input could help long-term.
I just wish nationalists had more of proper choice at elections. SF are now the largest party within broader nationalism primarily because they exist in a vacuum of choice. I still vote SDLP but I do so knowing that it amounts, more or less, to a wasted vote. It’s simply not possible for them to compete anymore because they're not an all-island party. Until FF and FG come up here to contest elections then nobody should expect any change.
SF are definitely a huge stumbling block when it comes to securing even a measure of cross community support for this New Ireland, but then you can hardly blame them for having their core belief front and centre.
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