What do people think is most likely to happen with the irish/UK Border Part 2.

[cathyclown]

OK I took it upon myself in my arrogance. Nah, just enjoyed all the views whether we agreed or not, it has been very interesting.

So carry on folks. Link below to the original thread.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/in_the_news/a3096781-What-do-people-think-is-most-likely-to-happen-with-the-Irish-UK-border?msgid=73760649#73760649

I think the Loyalist violence would involve a significant amount of infighting but also provocative terrorist attacks on 'non-combatant' NI citizens like schools or congregations, weddings, significant funerals, etc ('non-combatant' as opposed to attacks on paramilitaries on the other side) with the aim being to provoke the Provos into retaliation, or to provoke breakaway Republican paramilitaries into action, which might happen if the Provos don't bite.

I don't think Loyalists are smart enough to even think of tactics like that. They've never been known for having an actual 'plan'. Murderous, yes, but not with an actual goal.

Depressingly mathanxiety I have to agree with you.

The Loyalist violence would be on a scale never seen before - their definition of a 'legitimate' target was always much broader than the IRA's too. I read somewhere yesterday that the Loyalist organisations never actually decommissioned their weapons - 'they were put beyond the use of ordinary members'.

The nationalist paramilitary groups did tend to have better discipline than the Loyalist ones in the past but I would see some breakaway attacks from them too, as you say, but nothing like what the Catholic community would be receiving. People would be foolish to believe that the IRA don't have access to significant weapons anymore also.

In this scenario there would ultimately be some sort of united Ireland as there would be no other economic option that would work.

I am terrified that we will see an NI like Bosnia before it's over.

I also don't think that the Loyalist paramilitaries would confine their activities to Northern Ireland.

What I'm worried about is that a thread of Loyalist violence would have the inevitable result of "civil disobedience" - and might lead to a repeat of the "British army sent in to protection the population".

Anyone seen that before?

The day a British soldier sets foot in NI to keep the peace is the day we are back, straight away, to full out civil war

cathy: "I bet there is a plan." I admire your optimism, I have no belief in their being any sort of a plan apart from May announcing that the EU are blocking all movement on Brexit, blaming Ireland for it, and whipping up the Brexiters to believe that life would all be hunky dory if only the bullies would leave poor UK alone

I do have some hope that after 20 years of the GFA there will be so little support beyond a very few that it will be impossible for the paramilitaries to operate any kind of sustained campaign.

I do think violent attacks are likely though, however few, and that has a chilling effect on everyone and blights all of us even if we never witness one or grieve a direct loss.

May needs to face down the rabid brexiteers in her party and arrange to stay as part of the customs union. 80% of the country would be happy with that and no border would be needed. Long-term, I think a federal solution in inevitable for the UK and might offer a smoother transition to Iris reunification, should N.I ever agree to it.

Oh, federal UK is a good idea. How about we have a federal UK ruled from Edinburgh please.

Just wanted to say thanks to you all. I have learned a lot from the last thread. I can totally understand why a sea border would not be acceptable. I live in Cornwall and if I had to have a passport to cross into Devon and the rest of the UK I would go mental. Especially as passports are so expensive and I can't afford one.

Its actually an unsolvable situation, caused by us. Well it is solvable, by either cancelling brexit or keeping the UK in the single market etc, but the government are too rabid to consider it.

I also agree that the first past the post system has had its day. My vote would have been cast differently in the last election if we had PR and I suspect many others too. UK democracy is a shambles really.

Just wanted to say thank you all in Ireland N/S for keeping up the pressure. There are many in GB who seem to know or care little of what you people are facing due to Brexit.

I'm not sure Annandale I think certainly where I am and where we grew up faith in the GFA has slowly been eroded- I'm talking about people who supported to the GFA to the hilt, persuaded others to get out and vote, did their best for years to persuade people that actively taking part in their community and not knee jerking into violence was the best thing. They're fucked off, drifting into apathy and it's not just the disaster of Brexit, it's the lack of thought that some people have towards NI, it's the lack of movement and total disregard for the Irish Language Act, it's the careless language of people like Kate Hoey and that eejit John Taylor. People don't have to actively pursue a path to violence they just have to not care if others do. They're tired of fighting to care and listening to people refer to them in problematic language.

I think it's also the increased polarisation of voting, and the disappearance of the middle ground parties. Now in elections in NI (general elections certainly, and assembly elections to a lesser extent) everyone is forced to pick one extreme side or the other; the DUP or Sinn Fein. Any other vote is a wasted vote.

And then the DUP and SF can't even talk to each other enough to form an Assembly or set a budget. Personally I think their salaries should have been stalled from the day of the first meeting until they came to some sort of agreement - that might have focused them.

I blame Martin McGuinness - he resigned blaming Foster (and he certainly had a point) but he knew he was ill and was going to have to resign anyway, he just did it in the most disruptive way possible. That, added to the fiasco about the Irish language (I mean, in the greater scheme of things the Irish language is about the least important matter for a government to fall on), makes me think that they don't actually have any real desire to work together at all.

Add in the division over Brexit, and the fact that the DUP have for the first time ever got some real power (and it's going to their heads) doesn't bode well for a peaceful future in the North

The Irish Language problem is just a symptom of the underlying arrogance and dismissal of nationalist issues by the DUP though. Didn’t they agree to implement it during the last bloody Stormont walkout, as part of the agreement to get the assembly back on track?
Then, when asked to pay the piper they say no, and Nelson Bloody McCausland does his “curry my yoghurt” bullshit. Coupled with the fact that every time a non-unionist politician speaks Fleggory Campbell sits and laughs, like the ignorant arsehole that he is.
The disrespect from the DUP is blinding, they refuse to address their own inherent mendacity over the RHI/Redsky/NAMA scandals and then thon numpty Teresa May handed them huge political capital with her confidence and supply deal. They have their strut on and they are not willing to negotiate on anything other than their own terms. If I were in Sinn Fein I would walk away too. What is the point of trying with them?

Their constituents are heavily loaded in the North Antrim, farming, Bible Belt. They stand to lose heavily, possibly totally as a result of Brexit when the EU subsidies go south (literally), and yet the DUP are out tub-thumping about being the most loyal loyalists of all, Flegs and Queens and Britishness and fuck the economy, our livelihoods and our future chance of peace and quiet enjoyment of life. I have so many issues with Sinn Fein, but their exasperation at the DUP sneeringly refusing to honour the agreements that got the assembly back last time is honestly not one of them.

I don’t know. It’s fucking depressing is what it is. I moved away just after voting for the GFA, and when I came back a couple of years later Belfast was a completely different place. As Eddie Izzard once said “You’re building in glass now!”. We could see the future. Christmas markets (without flag protests), Taxi Driver now being a normal job, and not on a danger level equivalent to Army Bomb Disposal, sauntering into shops all casual, without holding our bags open in front of us for security checks, wafting across the border to Dublin like normal people. Of course tragedy still exists, but it was normal tragedy, car crashes, cancer, things that happen to everyone else, not bombs and shootings and being trapped in an escalating horror, not of your making but which you have to endure. I honestly thought that was the future my children were getting.
It was lovely. I cant believe we only got 20 years.

Sorry. That was a rant.

I’m just so furious, and disappointed, and desperately desperately sad for us all. For what we had a glimpse of having.

Might Teresa May have gone for a sea border before the DUP deal?

At the very least she could have given it consideration, without Sammy Fucking Wilson (google some of his opinions on Catholics, and gay people) trying the whole not-so-subtle “bring down the government” strategy.

"The Irish request is the EU's request," Mr Tusk said.
"I realise that for some British politicians this may be hard to understand.
"But such is the logic behind the fact that Ireland is the EU member while the UK is leaving."

just leaving this here

That was a considered rant Littlegrey, an absolutely justified one.

I agree they are a bunch of wankers (Sammy Wilson being lead wanker in my book); the trouble is while SF is still run by Gerry Adams (who, I don' t care what anyone says, was a terrorist who has yet to apologise for the worst of the stuff he carried out/ordered), they can be wankers and still try to claim the higher ground

Again we are back to the "first past the post" system - voting for any of the reasonable centre ground is a wasted vote and so people are driven to one appalling "side" or the other.

About May and the sea border - she might have considered it. Obviously she wouldn't have called it a sea border, she would have muttered about special consideration for NI, about the benefits to them of having their cake (trade with the UK) and eating it (trade with the EU) and it might have worked. People might not really have realised for a while that there was a tad more passport checking at the sea; most people use valid ID (passport, driving licence etc) when crossing anyway, the sea ports might have tightened up with "ID for security purposes", it might have worked.

But with the DUP yelling all over the place, and essentially the tail wagging the dog, May hasn't the guts to stand up and insist on anything - or even suggest anything at the moment

Thanks for new thread.

whosafraidofabigduckfart, I know he did, but he didn't say that at the time. He said he was resigning because Arlene Foster refused to stand down after the green energy fiasco. By resigning in such a way he caused the Assembly to Fall, and it hasn't (almost a year later) been reconvened.

It was obvious he was resigning for health reasons, and had he said that and tried to have some sort of successor in place, the elections might have gone more smoothly and we might not be in this mess (no budget for NI in almost a year).

..and yet things are happening. Bypasses, new health schemes, all sorts of stuff that is normally hindered by that shower on the hill. Maybe we could just tell our “elected representatives” to sod off and become the first ever state-let run entirely by the Civil Service. I mean we have a huge number of civil servants and they seem to be getting stuff done without any instruction.

Would we really be any worse off?

Then, when asked to pay the piper they say no, and Nelson Bloody McCausland does his “curry my yoghurt” bullshit

That was the ever charming Gregory Campbell I think. Not that I'm defending Nelson McCausland as such but I don't think he's quite as confrontational as Gregory.

Yeah, sorry Treacle. They all merge together in a miasma of bigotry, anti breastfeeding, creationist, racist, dodgy dealing bollockry.

Anyone else utterly bloody sick of them all?

Yes, I'm utterly sick of the lot of them. Totally sick.

I particularly hate the way the DUP bang on about Christian values yet if you dangled £100k in front of Ian Óg's nose sure he gives the impression that he'd probably sign up for anything.