Unionists in the Republic?

John Doe1 · 23-01-2012 05:11PM #1

Do you know anyone in the republic who suppports Ireland joining the uk. I know my college had a unionist society back in the day and I have a relative who expressed his annoyance that east donegal wasnt incorporated into the north once.

minidazzler · 23-01-2012 05:13PM

I think we should be, but I'm not a unionist, I just think they would do a better job than the people we elect because Irish people are incapable of electing good officials. We shouldn't be trusted with a vote.

davet82 · 23-01-2012 05:14PM

I couldnt see to many being in favour of that, more chance of people being in favour of a united ireland joining the commonwealth maybe?

KeithAFC · 23-01-2012 05:16PM

John Doe1 wrote: »

Do you know anyone in the republic who suppports Ireland joining the uk. I know my college had a unionist society back in the day and I have a relative who expressed his annoyance that east donegal wasnt incorporated into the north once.

The lost county is what we call it. Shame really. I think there is more Unionists in the Republic than some like to think.

Coriolanus · 23-01-2012 05:16PM

Westminster or Brussels, I don't particularly care who saves us from our own ineptitude but I hope it happens soon.

mikemac1 · 23-01-2012 05:16PM

John Doe1 wrote: »

have a relative who expressed his annoyance that east donegal wasnt incorporated into the north once.

That's what the Boundary Commission planned to do and counties would be split
Parts of Monaghan would be in NI but parts of Tyrone would not for example

But the plan was so radical it got rejected and they picked six counties

Tom · 23-01-2012 05:18PM

minidazzler wrote: »

I think we should be, but I'm not a unionist, I just think they would do a better job than the people we elect because Irish people are incapable of electing good officials. We shouldn't be trusted with a vote.

The grass is always greener....
I think you'll find many in the UK have reasons to complain about their own officials, the ones that they voted in. Being part of the UK would not guarantee better officials representing us in the south - if you have a strong opinion about how we are governed then do something about it - run yourself. Surrendering your democratic rights to another country is not the way to go.

sensibleken · 23-01-2012 05:19PM

minidazzler wrote: »

I think we should be, but I'm not a unionist, I just think they would do a better job than the people we elect because Irish people are incapable of electing good officials. We shouldn't be trusted with a vote.

have you seen the state of UK politics?

John Doe1 · 23-01-2012 05:20PM

mikemac1 wrote: »

That's what the Boundary Commission planned to do and counties would be split
Parts of Monaghan would be in NI but parts of Tyrone would not for example

But the plan was so radical it got rejected and they picked six counties

Yeah Derry city was meant to go to County Donegal and the town i live was going to be inside the ni border.

mikemac1 · 23-01-2012 05:21PM

Our leaders live in Dublin but claim milage expenses from their second home in Cork
Their leaders build houses for ducks and call it an expense

They're crooked all over the world

Fromthetrees · 23-01-2012 05:21PM

The felas Kevin Myers and David Norris are aren't they, I didn't think real people are unionist, what good would it actually do? We'd still have all the EU directives, we'd probably have a devolved parliament of some kind, the only thing I could see if we were back in the UK is that we couldn't keep our corporation tax and we'd be involved in deranged wars blowing up shepherds.

mikemac1 · 23-01-2012 05:25PM

Cork would be relegated to third city of Ireland:pac:

If you think they complain now they'd never shut up if this happened

ejmaztec · 23-01-2012 05:25PM

I'm not a Unionist and don't know anyone down here who is.

Perhaps it's a Boards phenomenon?:D

Auvers · 23-01-2012 05:26PM

Gay Byrne & Conor Cruise O'Brien are\where two high profile Catholics who supported the Unionists

mike65 · 23-01-2012 05:26PM

They are all in the offices of the Sindo!*

*there I saved you a post!

Doc Ruby · 23-01-2012 05:31PM

Splendid idea, I think they would benefit from mandatory Irish in their schools, although they'd need a hell of a landfill for all the union jacks. We'd probably have to share the revenue from England with France since it's basically a French colony, but all round I think suborning Westminster to the Dáil, giving them devolved powers, and hoisting the tricolour up there would be a real improvement for the average denizen of the UK. Lord knows they've only been on the downslope since we threw them out.

minidazzler wrote: »

I think we should be, but I'm not a unionist, I just think they would do a better job than the people we elect because Irish people are incapable of electing good officials. We shouldn't be trusted with a vote.

Have you considered repeatedly running at the wall head first, might jolt loose a few neurons.

TheZohanS · 23-01-2012 05:36PM

John Doe1 wrote: »

Do you know anyone in the republic who suppports Ireland joining the uk. I know my college had a unionist society back in the day and I have a relative who expressed his annoyance that east donegal wasnt incorporated into the north once.

Joining the UK would be a bad idea. I'm all for closer ties, but if we were to join the UK we'd lose out on a lot of investment as I could see the UK politicians wanting as much investment for "the mainland" as possible to keep the majority of the voters happy. We'd be treated like a second class province just like Northern Ireland is by the UK. Sure the Republic is financing a lot of the infrastructure in NI.

hooradiation · 23-01-2012 05:42PM

mikemac1 wrote: »

Cork would be relegated to third city of Ireland:pac:

If you think they complain now they'd never shut up if this happened

This is the best argument for joining the UK.

mike65 · 23-01-2012 05:43PM

TheZohan wrote: »

Joining the UK would be a bad idea. I'm all for closer ties, but if we were to join the UK we'd lose out on a lot of investment as I could see the UK politicians wanting as much investment for "the mainland" as possible to keep the majority of the voters happy. We'd be treated like a second class province just like Northern Ireland is by the UK. Sure the Republic is financing a lot of the infrastructure in NI.

LOL, they are on the British pigs back! Billions every year keeping half the adult population in cushy public sector employment, as for ROI financing a lot of infrastructure, its one road basically. The one from Dublin to Derry.

Toby Take a Bow · 23-01-2012 05:44PM

minidazzler wrote: »

I think we should be, but I'm not a unionist, I just think they would do a better job than the people we elect because Irish people are incapable of electing good officials. We shouldn't be trusted with a vote.

Let's see: Margaret Thatcher, Tony Blair (AKA Bertie Ahern), Gordon Brown (AKA Brian Cowen), Major, Cameron, etc etc. They also had the IMF in before we ever did (as far as I know).

There are a fair few unionists up in Donegal (and by fair few, I mean relative to how many you'd think there are). I was passing through a tiny little town and we stopped in at a pub, which turned out to be the 'protestant' pub. Talking to the owner, lovely guy but realised quite quickly that he was very, very pro-unionist.

Fairly sure there are a couple of orange order lodges up there too.

livinonaprayer · 23-01-2012 05:46PM

I am astounded that any Irish citizen today would wish to give up the freedom which their forefathers fought and died for. The people of Ireland should be proud of their heritage and thankful for their freedom and independence.

Ireland is a great country and although things aren't great economically at the moment, we will come through this as we have in the past. The world hasn't collapsed in on itself and we're all still here after all.

If Ireland were to join the union, could you imagine the devestating effect it would have on tourism? Of course the Euro has damaged tourism pretty badly, but I think we all know we would get screwed sideways by Westminster if we were foolish enough to rejoin the union. At a time when much of the world detests the British government, surely it is incomprehensible that anyone would advocate such a move?

Mr.Biscuits · 23-01-2012 05:50PM

I know an orange couple alright but not sure what their political stance is with regards to NI - just wish they'd lay off the tanning beds.

TheZohanS · 23-01-2012 05:51PM

mike65 wrote: »

LOL, they are on the British pigs back! Billions every year keeping half the adult population in cushy public sector employment, as for ROI financing a lot of infrastructure, its one road basically. The one from Dublin to Derry.

And if we joined the UK do you think we'd be administered from Dublin?

biko · 23-01-2012 05:52PM

Galway says No!

Doc Ruby · 23-01-2012 05:54PM

livinonaprayer wrote: »

At a time when much of the world detests the British government, surely it is incomprehensible that anyone would advocate such a move?

I'd say a lot of the last dregs of unionist sentiment, rare as it is, will die out with the older generation over the next 10-20 years, those who grew up when the UK was still in the last spasms of "empire". People growing up these days would be more embarrassed by the idea than anything else.

mike65 · 23-01-2012 05:58PM

TheZohan wrote: »

And if we joined the UK do you think we'd be administered from Dublin?

What's that got to do with anything I said?, I never advocated turning the clock back, anyway Ireland is already a second class country (looks to Berlin/Paris). You were factually wrong and I pulled you up on it.

markesmith · 23-01-2012 06:00PM

livinonaprayer wrote: »

I am astounded that any Irish citizen today would wish to give up the freedom which their forefathers fought and died for. The people of Ireland should be proud of their heritage and thankful for their freedom and independence.

Strangely enough, sentiments like the above will get you flamed quickly enough on AH for being a fuddy-duddy.

quietriot · 23-01-2012 06:01PM

minidazzler wrote: »

I think we should be, but I'm not a unionist, I just think they would do a better job than the people we elect because Irish people are incapable of electing good officials. We shouldn't be trusted with a vote.

I somewhat agree. We elected FG and Lab in the last General Election, the big mistake being putting Labour into a coalition with the only party running that are capable of cleaning up the mess a generation of Irish people and FF made. Labour have held FG back and we've seen very little progress with the unions and public sector, whilst a complete abandonment of the issues they said they themselves would tackle - an example being third level fees.

I honestly do not understand what anyone voting for Labour was trying to achieve, but they've managed to once again do damage to the future of this country by doing so.

You are right in saying two things; we have a lack of high quality candidates, and an electorate who have very short memories and vote in a manner which they feel will personally affect them the least, or when it comes to their pockets, affect them the most. We saw this with the reign of FF, a sleuth of morons kept voting for them on the back of more money promised, despite a boat load of very well regarded economists shouting "DANGER WILL ROBINSON!DANGER!" from the sidelines at every opportunity. We then saw these voters switch and vote for Labour when it became apparent that we were in trouble and had very tough times ahead, because I'm sure they felt that Labour would implement the least "tough" measures for them...when in reality, Labour have caused a lot of the "tough" measures due to protecting our over-inflated PS.

With regards to the candidates themselves, well, what do you expect? We're electing people who trained as teachers specifically so they would have sufficient spare time to pursue a political life and were then put on a series of PR courses by their respective parties in order to talk the talk publicly. It's a popularity contest and the fiasco involving George Lee served as proof of this. The man had no experience in anything but talking, was put in by Fine Gael to secure a seat whilst ousting the opportunity from a few very credible candidates and the Irish public lapped it up and voted for him in their drones.

The big question is whether re-joining the UK would actually have an impact on any of this and to be honest, at this stage I don't think it would. I would like Ireland to rejoin the UK for a number of reasons, but the quality of UK politicians isn't one of them.

At this stage, we have a good solution in place - we have one party in Government that isn't afraid to make tough decisions that will ultimately cost them their place in Government in a few years time, and a host of foreign experts basically telling them what needs to be done. We'll be back to a FF government in a few years on the back of promises of less tough measures and more money for all, the Irish electorate have shown that they're quick to forget - almost a quarter are already supporting FF again due to their unhappiness with having measures imposed that are needed to get the country back on track.

All we can hope at this stage is that FG and the Europeans manage to implement enough measures to ensure we get out of the hole we're in, in a reasonable amount of time, before FF are re-elected.

For what it's worth, I wouldn't describe myself as a unionist, however I hold a sometimes unpopular view that we were better off in the UK and that overall the ruling by the UK was a positive thing for Ireland and its development.

Fenian Army · 23-01-2012 06:07PM

There are a few unfortunately, always has been.

Seems to be less outright Unionists these days, most seem contented with this "republic" (to the poster who said that they can't believe people would want to give away the freedom our forefathers died for - what we have, a gombeen republic, is sure as hell not what the likes of Connolly died for or what so many fought for in the war of independence, has anything in the democratic program of the first Dáil come about?)

There is still an annoying amount of west brits, but they generally don't go so far as to call for joining the UK. (no they are not one and the same)

And to those who spout sh!te like "we can't/don't deserve to govern ourselves" cop the **** on and stop being so pathetic and cringe-worthy. That kind of attitude disgusts me, people who spout that should get a good kick up the hole and cop on.

enfant terrible · 23-01-2012 06:07PM

mike65 wrote: »

anyway Ireland is already a second class country (looks to Berlin/Paris).

They are not so bad, they give us billions every year to keep the country running.

Nodin · 23-01-2012 06:08PM

quietriot wrote: »

...........

For what it's worth, I wouldn't describe myself as a unionist, however I hold a sometimes unpopular view that we were better off in the UK and that overall the ruling by the UK was a positive thing for Ireland and its development.

Aye. There's nothing like cultural genocide, state backed sectarianism and the privilege of inflicting the same on others. Glory days indeed.

Unionists in the Republic?

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