Taoiseach Leo Varadkar and Tanáiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs this evening
This evening.
Government buildings.
Taoiseach Leo Varadkar said he is ‘surprised and disappointment’ with British government over failure to reach agreement in Brexit talks.
Varadkar says he agreed to a text this morning and that he was “surprised and disappointed” to hear that UK couldn’t agree to it later. Amazing that May didn’t consult the DUP.
— Scott (@scottsmith850) December 4, 2017
Earlier…
British Prime Minister Theresa May and President of the European Commission Jean Claude Juncker this afternoon
Podium outside Government Buildings for Varadkar’s 2:30pm speech has been dismantled
— Gavan Reilly (@gavreilly) December 4, 2017
British Prime Minister Theresa May said differences remain on some issues, which require further negotiation and consultation pic.twitter.com/Gf3tkJ4Cfw
— RTÉ News (@rtenews) December 4, 2017
DUP leader Arlene Foster has said that Northern Ireland must leave the EU on the same terms as the rest of the UK, and added that the DUP will not accept any regulatory divergence.
She said the Government is seeking to “unilaterally change the Belfast Agreement without our consent”.
Ms Foster added that “the economic and constitutional integrity of the UK must not be compromised in any way.”
No deal reached in Brexit talks between May and Juncker (RTÉ)
Earlier: ‘I Suspect It Will Look Very Like What It Looks Like Today’
No matter how this works out, it speeds up a United Ireland. Unionist businessmen won’t stand their profits being reduced. They’ll jettison their loyalist underlings. We’ll see a United Ireland in our time. Whether that’s a good thing or not is a different question. Sceal eile, as Arlene would put it.
A United Ireland will require a vote. It has no chance of happening anytime soon and I really fail to see why people are so eager for this to happen.
Delusional stuff
i for one would not like to see the DUP anywhere near legislation that affects me.
I for one welcome our new overlords.
Unionist farmers during the mad cow crisis in the UK were happy to claim they were British but their beef was Irish. Politics plays second fiddle to pockets.
Loyal to the ‘half crown’ as they say…
You’re delusional.
Even a majority of Catholics in the north don’t want a united Ireland in the short-term.
I know of few of my chums in the pub who contemplate joining up with the other mob ( Catholic and Protestant ) without a shudder and a grimace.
Don’t get me wrong – a majority of the rest of the UK people would really like you to have them all and the £10billion a year bill they cost.
But it ain’t gonna happen.
Speaking of the pub – is that the time ?
* hurriedly slams door on the way out *
Agree. But it’s certain in the mid-term (ie, our lifetime). Brexit has finished the Unionist connection.
The “Union” & the Jack is slowly heading for an inexorable separation. Soon enough the capital of Ireland will be Dublin.
“Even a majority of Catholics in the north don’t want a united Ireland in the short term”
Eh, I think you’ll find that’s the same down here.
I couldn’t bear the thought of sharing nationality with the likes of the DUP.
Unless there’d be forced repatriation… would there?
There’s nothing to suggest that the majority in the Republic would like to take the tribalist, fundamentalist zealots into the fold.
Hard border in the Irish Sea with special status for Northern Ireland is the more likely solution. That’s what was proposed today and they have a few days now to point out some simple truths to the DUP before going back to the table.
Opinion poll after opinion poll show people in the Republic want a United Ireland. Whether’s that’s good or not, different issue.
The last major opinion poll carried out.
You’re talking out of your mandate.
http://www.rte.ie/news/2015/1105/739708-cross-border-survey/
Lolz, fact checked!
66% of respondents in the Republic answered Yes. Can’t you not read?
we can’t run the republic, let alone another 6 counties on top. nowhere near competent enough for it. if anything, we should do what i reckon Varadkar secretly wants… BRITS IN! just give ireland back to them and let them run it. We tried, and clearly can’t handle it at all.
Punts not Politics used to be the old phrase in relation to Northern Ireland and it’s as true today as it was two decades ago. The reality is Ireland cannot afford a United Ireland. Taking on another 6 counties will never be a reality unless we get real politicians on both sides of the border who put the country first and not lining their own pockets. The huge grants NI gets from the UK for sports, education, community initiatives and security would never be matched by our government. A united Ireland is a pipe dream. Now if we had politicians with balls to take back control of our oil and fisheries reserves and got Apple to pay us the €13 Billion they owe us, we could be on to something.
A United British Isles would also make sense.
Aw! They can do a deal with everyone but themselves.:-(
You have to laugh
It is hilarious. Although, you do have to feel a bit sorry for the brexit fans who are on an emotional rollercoaster this past week, from THE INDIAN MAN WITH SOCKS IS GOING TO KILL US WITH IRAs to WE WON A BRILLIANT DEAL BY CONCEEDING ALL POINTS and finally, THEY’RE IRISH BUT THEY LIKE US BUT THEY WON’T LET US HAVE OUR VICTORY OVER EUSSR, INDIAN GENTLEMEN AND IRISH PEASANTS. THAT’S EVEN BETTER WINNING BY US.
Probably hanging on to mark the 96th anniversary of the creation of the border, which falls on Wednesday.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Irish_Treaty
Northern Ireland has regulatory divergence from the rest of the UK on corporation tax, abortion and same sex marriage. Neither Arleen Foster nor the DUP speak for the majority in Northern Ireland. In fact the DUP do not represent a single border constituency. With the continuing stand off over the Irish language act there is no government in Northern Ireland so she is just a party leader, not the First Minister.
Despite her statement, we have not yet been told that the EU/UK border is one of the areas where there are still differences between the EU and UK.
Spot on Bertie. The DUP have always had an à la carte approach to British culture. You have a bizarre situation up north where Irish republicans argue for consistency across the UK on those issues and the DUP refuses to budge. It just turns into a twilight zone when they get involved.
She is propping up the government though, which gives her some leverage
I feel somewhat sorry for Theresa. It would be hard enough brokering a national deal she doesn’t agree with… without the Irish equivalent of the Amish holding a gun to her head.
If she hadn’t brought it on herself by calling the election, and then running a disastrous campaign, maybe!
So we know how far May is willing to go.
As for Arlene’s so-called concern about the GFA being changed without her consent she was only telling us a few weeks ago the DUP didn’t sign up to the internationally agreed GFA so they didn’t have to implement the Irish language act. Which is it?
Leo and Simon jumped. All set for a horrray and a big announcement. The rug pulled from under them. Actually the podium was. In their hurry for kudos they again are the laughing stock of the EU.
The fact you can look at this situation and think that Leo and Simon are the laughing stock says a lot about your biases rather than anything else.
Wouldn’t you think they’d learn not to act like two school kids on tour and be a bit more professional? Whatever about Varadkar I’m surprised at Coveney. Brexit is far too important to be playing with it for optics. They’d be better off, as would the other participants, keeping it professional and not a circus.
Yesterday they started ramping up to some big announcement This morning and up to the news at one the media were trying to build up some excitement and some sort of deal. What did we get? Zilch.
Yes because apparently Ms May didn’t check the deal with the DUP who promptly torpedoed it.
Leo and Simon were merely ‘being politicians’ like all the rest of the EU and expecting that a deal brought to the table by the UK would be acceptable to the UK.
It’s Foster and May who look like spare tools here.
Did you deliberately misunderstand the situation or are you not capable of overcoming your biases ?
How in the name of Jaysus did you come to that conclusion?
BBC political editor Laura Kuenssberg tweeting that May rang Foster who said no way and that scuppered the deal. I guess the Brexit bill is about to get a little bigger as they’ll have to bribe the DUP.
A period of a few years where the North is in a transitionary state of not quite being separate but being somewhat removed from Britain could do it a world of good. Might help to get its house in order.
That Went Well 2.0
Makes his #Marian performance look good!
Although I’ve never done social media I tend to follow the Twitter account of Sir Christopher Meyer,a legendary British diplomat and former UK Ambassador to the USA who combines decades of diplomatic experience with a great deal of common sense.
” If I were negotiating, I’d see a clear distinction between no regulatory divergence and regulatory alignment, the latter meaning two autonomous objects moving closely in parallel. It’s the difference between singing in unison and singing in harmony. But that’s just my view… ”
https://twitter.com/SirSocks?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
Also Tom Newton-Dunn.
Despite being the Sun’s Pol Corr he has great contacts in the higher echelons of the British government.
https://twitter.com/tnewtondunn/status/937740696756289536
Chris Meyer opposed Brexit
May;
“It was like this. Regulatory divergence and regulatory alignment could almost mean exactly the same thing. It just depended which side you were looking at it from. The secret was to persuade the divergers that you weren’t aligning and the aligners you weren’t diverging by drafting something that was equally open to misinterpretation by both. “Whatever,” Juncker had yawned.“
(Guardian)
very very weird
Look. Nobody gives a flying fiddlers about this topic. Just hurry up and agree the breakup so we can buy booze and fags duty free on Aer Lingus Dublin London flights again. Brits OUT as fast as we can please. Before Xmas.
As comics go….. you’ll probably make good hairdresser.
Oh my god… I hadn’t thought of that.
HARD BREXIT NAWWWWUUUUUUWWWYYY!
DUP don’t want differences between UK mainland and NI yet continue to block abortion rights in NI that would bring it in line with the rest of Britain, blocked gay marriage at every turn and NI continues to have different tax rates (corporation)… what a load of old cod!
I’ve decided to be a tad circumspect on it, as a New Year thing. However, it’s still this year – the most annoying thing about Brexit is the sound of anyone from the DUP speaking, I did enjoy the days of The Stormont Assembly in absentia, and mute. Jesus, all of a sudden, there they are, centre stage, making fools of themselves. “The tail wagging the dog”- if I hear that one more time, I swear!