Tag Archives: The Irish World

From top: Irish and UK passports; Adrian O’Neil, Irish Ambassador to the UK

Living in Britain?

Read on.

Bernard Purcell, London-based editor of The Irish World, writes:

This Friday at 11pm local time the UK will formally leave the EU. The next 12 months will be a transition period during which time EU law and regulations will still be in force here.

So too, will current rights enjoyed as EU citizens, such as free movement.

Ireland’s Ambassador to the UK Adrian O’Neill and the Embassy of Ireland have this week issued updated information on just what the transition period, and the days that follow, will mean for Irish citizens here in the UK and British citizens in Ireland.

In short, they say, the Common Travel Area means that Irish citizens living in the UK (and vice versa) will continue to be able to travel freely, live, work and access education and social services as before.

The Irish World asked Adrian O’Neill (Ireland’s Ambassador to the UK) to further clarify…

Will I still be able to travel freely between the UK and Ireland after Brexit?

“Yes. Irish citizens can continue to travel freely between the UK and Ireland in the same manner as before. Don’t forget your passport (or other valid I.D. depending on how you are travelling)! And if your passport is out of date, the fastest way to renew it is online.”

Can I still study in the UK?

“Yes, Irish citizens can still study in the UK on the same basis as British citizens.”

What does the CTA mean for further and higher education fees for Irish citizens studying in the UK?

“Your fees will be set at the EU level for 2019/ 2020 academic year, and will continue on that basis for the duration of the programme for which you have registered. The CTA means Ireland and the UK will take steps to ensure Irish and British citizens can continue to access further and higher education on the same fee basis into the future, including after Brexit.”

Can I still rent a place to live or access social housing supports in the UK as an Irish citizen?

“Yes, you can still rent a place to live and you continue to have a right to access social housing supports, including supported housing and homeless assistance, on the same basis as British citizens.”

Can I still vote in the UK as an Irish citizen?

“Yes, Irish citizens resident in the United Kingdom, and British citizens resident in Ireland, have the right to vote in local and national parliamentary elections. The right to vote at local and national parliamentary elections will remain subject to Irish and British citizens having reached the established voting age and having registered on the electoral roll in their respective jurisdictions.”

What social welfare entitlements will I continue to have under the CTA?

“Irish citizens and British citizens in each other’s State have the right to access social security benefits on the same basis as citizens of that State. This includes arrangements for Social Insurance schemes, Social Assistance schemes and Child Benefit.”

What about healthcare?

“The CTA also applies to healthcare so Irish citizens in Britain can continue to access healthcare as they do now, on the same basis as British citizens.”

Can I use my Irish driving license in the UK?

“Yes. The UK Government’s stated position is that, post Brexit, arrangements for EU licence holders who are visiting or living in the UK would not change. Visitors to the UK, with driving licences from EU Member States, will enjoy the same arrangements as today.”

What about if I’m travelling to Ireland on a UK driving licence?

“Visitors to Ireland with a UK driving licence will still be able to drive in Ireland on holidays.”

And can I bring my UK registered car?

“Yes, if you are travelling in 2020. It is possible there may be changes in 2021 after the end of the transition period.”

Yesterday: Ode To Joy

The Irish World

Pics: PA/ Irish Embassy London

From top: British Prime Minister Theresa May surrounded by Brexit covers of ‘The Irish World’ newspaper from the past two years; Bernard Purcell

If we have learned anything since 2016 it is that Theresa May – the worst and most charmless consensus builder since Ceausescu – will say, promise, and do anything just to get through the day.

She brought with her from the Home Office a bunker or silo mentality that had no truck with managing expectations or triangulating agreement.

She sowed the seeds for the utterly shaming scandal of the Windrush affair, exposed last year, as the architect of the ‘hostile environment’ for immigrants.

The sole prism through which she regarded Northern Ireland while Home Secretary – and subsequently – was one of containing a potential security threat, certainly nothing ambitious or aspirational.

That fairly low bar was lowered even further when she came to depend on the DUP for a Commons majority.

Today she is in the unusual position of getting mainly positive headlines for once, cheering on her Commons ‘victory’ – the one in which she urged MPs to vote against her own negotiated agreement, the one containing the red lines upon which she insisted – on the advice of her now discredited advisor Nick Timothy, the person who helped her lose the 2017 snap general election.

Her dependence on a small cohort of advisors – the most trusted of whom, and the last remaining, is her financier husband Philip – actively excluded sound, professional advice from experienced and competent diplomats whose careers were damaged if they told the truth.

But today, Mrs May, who had to date achieved her last stay of execution by promising not to lead her party into another General Election, is still in Downing Street having pandered to her party’s hard right Brexiteers, the European ‘Research’ Group and the DUP and this country is closer to either crashing out of the EU with no deal, or the sub-optimal deal she has already agreed with a couple of add-ons.

Given how MPs so singly failed to take control of the Brexit process last night despite a brief hope that they would – save for a non-binding resolution to avoid no deal – the third and fourth options that existed until this week, the prospect of another referendum or general election, appear rather less likely.

In the run-up to it we saw an intensification of the attempts to pin the blame for the mess in which the British government finds itself over Brexit on everybody else, not least Ireland and the rest of the EU.

If one had only the reporting of the main British news outlets to go by, for instance the BBC, or some of its newspapers, one would be left with the impression that Ireland and the EU are imposing the so-called back- stop on the UK.

The backstop, in plain English, is a binding requirement to keep Britain – originally it was just Northern Ireland – in customs and regulatory alignment with with the EU until a better way is found to avoid customs checks on the only land border with the UK.

Nowhere would it be made clear that it was drawn up entirely at the request of Theresa May’s government – as proof of London’s bona fides over Northern Ireland – and endorsed by the cabinet including those who are among its most vocal critics today.

Or, to quote the EU’s deputy chief negotiator Sabine Weyand’s remarks in Brussels this week:

“The result of the negotiation has been very much shaped by the UK negotiators, much more than they actually get credit for. This is a bit like snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. The backstop was very much shaped by UK.”

But that same Withdrawal Agreement drawn up in a tight, secret circle by Theresa May was rejected by a crushing two-thirds majority.

The new unspecified alternative – to placate the ERG and DUP – calls for the backstop to be replaced by unspecified, time limited alternative arrangements that either rely on non-existent technology or allow London to walk away from the commitment unilaterally.

Ms Weyand has said the EU would certainly be prepared to consider “alternative arrangements” on their merits if Downing Street was prepared to suggest them.

As Ms Weyand put it:

“We looked at every border on this earth, every border EU has with a third country – there’s simply no way you can do away with checks and controls. The negotiators have not been able to explain them to us and that’s not their fault; it’s because they don’t exist.”

Mrs May has thrown her lot in with narrow-minded, xenophobic, deluded English nationalists who have weaponised the ignorance of their voters and supporters – some of them in pursuit of high office, others in pursuit of the fortunes to be had from deregulation and disaster capitalism.

And make no mistake, Jeremy Corbyn shows no appearance of coming to the rescue – just as, in these last years of the second decade of the 21st century Tory Brexiteers are wedded to a 19th century fantasy of British exceptionalism and international power, Mr Corbyn is wedded to 19th century understanding of Marxism and economics.

In the EU it appears to be recognised, for now at least, that between reopening the Withdrawal Agreement and a hard Brexit – both of which come at significant political, economic and opportunity cost – a hard Brexit is the lesser of two evils.

That makes it less likely that Ireland will be thrown under the bus.

But if ever there was a time for as many as possible of Ireland’s politicians, north and south, to speak with one voice it is now.

Ireland and the EU will weather it, but it is getting a lot colder over here.

Bernard Purcell is editor of the London-based The Irish World

Theresa May pic: Rollingnews

Last night: Border! Border!

Ultimate responsibility for the very shabby treatment of the thousand or so ticketholders rests with RTÉ and The Late Late Show not the UK company they engaged and clearly did not properly brief.

Its [UK company’s] employees, while demonstrably out of their depth, were unfailingly polite. From observation, that could not be said of some RTÉ staff there on the night.

‘…The sense of entitlement and self-selecting ‘superiority’ so often attributed to RTÉ and its stars by its critics was also demonstrated by Mr Tubridy when – during an ad break – he sought to put an overexcited heckler in his place by telling him he was clearly his social inferior due to the fact that he was in the worst seats in the house, the gallery with most of the audience because he ‘clearly didn’t know the right people’.

A withering editorial in this morning’s London-based The Irish World newspaper apologising for its role in promoting last Friday’s shambolic Late Late Show London event.

The Irish World

Earlier: De Tuesday Papers

Saturday: Balls It Up There, Colette

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London-based The Irish World, on sale tomorrow

 

Of their cover story, Irish World editor Bernard Purcell writes:

We know how necessary creative ambivalence and polite fictions have been to the peace process/political process and it is clear that a great many people – if by no means all – have made their accommodation, or peace, with that.

But when we tried to get a straightforward answer – yes or no, or yes and no – to two simple questions posed by email and by telephone to their respective press departments: Is the IRA intact and still active? Does it pose a threat to people in the UK and Ireland? we found that not one single agency or participant in the process – of the handful who did reply – could give us an answer.

We asked Downing Street, the Home Office, MI5, the Northern Ireland Office, the Department of Foreign Affairs, the Metropolitan Police, the US Embassy, an Garda Siochana, the Police Service of Northern Ireland, the All–Party Parliamentary Group on Irish in Britain and…Sinn Féin.

Those who did reply were Foreign Affairs, PSNI, US Consulate General in Belfast and the Gardai. The Gardai and the US Consulate told us it was a matter for the local police, the PSNI.

Foreign Affairs gave, understandably and predictably, a lengthy nuanced reply which did not actually answer the question with a ‘yes’ or ‘no’.

That evening, after a day of trying to get a response from the NIO, North Secretary Theresa Villiers, backing her PSNI Chief Constable’s nuanced, balanced take on recent events affected to be not at all surprised the IRA still exists and is active – albeit in a non-terrorist capacity.

Still haven’t head from Sinn Féin…or the MPs whose all-party committee purports to represent Irish people in Britain….

The Irish World

irishworld

London-based ‘The Irish World’

The London County Board and its consultant engineers, Tobin Consulting UK Ltd, will this week be forced to put back work by at least a year while they look for contractors who can stick to its original budget [€4.17 million].

The new stadium, which has been many years in development, was supposed to open by May next year and to be a showpiece, county-level ground for the Irish community in London and in Britain.County London GAA.

It had been hoped that London would have its new stand and ground in time for next year’s 29 May Connacht Senior Football Championship clash with Mayo.

The London County Board has received a commitment of £1.3 million from Croke Park and £500,000 from Ireland’s Department of foreign Affairs and Trade and raised £500,000 itself.

London GAA’s Ruislip development postponed (The Irish World)

Anon writes:

This follows the fiasco of New Eltham [former ground sold to developers] and will be used by some within the [London GAA] Board as a stick to beat those who are trying to welcome a team from the Irish Guards….

Fight!