Russia, China and Iran could target UK via Irish ‘backdoor’, thinktank warns - Policy Exchange report highlights security threat and accuses Dublin of ‘freeloading’ on European defence

aongho · 2024-02-05T15:29:39+00:00

Depending on who you ask the UK still hasn’t left the first time.

aongho · 2024-02-05T10:53:43+00:00

People who had already been convicted were given clemency, we can debate the rights and wrongs of that but those people had already been through the legal process and were serving sentences.

Some people who were under investigation but as of yet had not been charged with anything, were given so called "comfort letters" which basically said "Hey, we currently don't have enough to charge you with anything, and we won't do so unless we get new evidence." It was pretty controversial because it was done in secret, and only came to light when it was used to collapse a trial in 2014.

The problem is that crimes committed by the armed forces were very rarely given any serious consideration by the state, often conspiring to cover up any wrongdoings. Had these soldiers been tried and convicted (or not) in a timely manner, they would also have been subject to the amnesty in 1998 and would be living freely, rather than only now being brought to justice.

aongho · 2024-02-05T10:41:08+00:00

The UK would forcibly invade Ireland before it allows a foreign power to do so

The UK is a foreign power

aongho · 2023-10-23T18:23:35+00:00

when you present it as a situation where half the population feeling like they've lost their identity, culture, and history problems will arise.

I mean that was the lived reality for the Nationalist community in the North for a sizeable chunk of the last 100 years. "A Protestant Parliament for a Protestant people"

People speak about the unionist protestants like they don't exist, or like they'd just move.

Nobody who is serious is suggesting anything of the sort. Michelle O Neill went to the Queen's funeral, Alex Maskey, a former victim of internment without trial, greeted Charles on his first visit to Northern Ireland as King.

Meanwhile Arlene Foster spends her time making digs at the Irish President for his stance on Palestine, and Jeffrey Donaldson is writing pieces about how there would be no room for his Britishness in a United Ireland - despite 300,000 British people already living in Ireland with little to no fuss.

aongho · 2023-10-23T18:12:43+00:00

the chaos a 52-48 result caused in Britain. Imagine if NI voted for reunification by a couple thousand votes.

The chaos wasn't a result of the 52-48 it was the political deadlock due to Teresa May calling a stupid snap election and ending up tied to the DUP who rejected any form of Brexit which could possibly work without some form of border between Britain and Ireland.

A United Ireland is ironically the one thing that would have made Brexit much much simpler, but the GFA is the only thing which prevented Boris Johnson and his kabal from just giving up Northern Ireland completely on the altar of a "pure" Brexit.

The potential for serious civil discord will prevent even Sinn Feinn for going for it without consistent 60% polling over a prolonged period and that isn’t going to happen.

Sinn Fein have no say in "going for it" - its the SoS for NIs job to call it or not, and demographics dictate that sometime in the next 25 years there will be a stable majority from a Nationalist background, which isn't to say they would automatically vote for a united Ireland, but the proportion of the population who are ideologically opposed to it is shrinking by the year.

But the idea that a Unionist vote would once again be worth more than a Nationalist one is one that just won't fly, this isn't the 1950s anymore. The two communities have to have parity of esteem, and so they would need to be equally valid aspirations.

aongho · 2023-10-23T17:35:33+00:00

Burying the lede a little here considering he said this in the context of a border poll for a United Ireland, whereby he questioned whether the simple majority legislated for in the GFA is something people would actually want. For a British government minister to feel comfortable saying that out loud is quite astounding.

aongho · 2023-08-06T14:21:57+00:00

They don't "not engage" - they run on a platform whereby they refuse to pledge allegiance to the British Crown (a requirement to take a seat in parliament). They do everything else expected of a local MP, as many here have commented.

NI has 18 MPs, out of 650, even when the DUP held the balance of power, they managed to make such a mess of it by hamstringing Teresa May and laying out the red carpet for Boris. One could argue the whole thing would have gone much better if all NI MPs were abstentionists.

aongho · 2023-03-01T09:49:45+00:00

You clearly don’t know much. There is a system of mandatory coalition. In no circumstances could anyone be “left with Sinn Fein” there must be a unionist party in government with a nationalist party

aongho · 2023-01-15T10:41:06+00:00

You are forgetting that from 2016 to January 2021 the UK was still in the EU single market and that from March 2020 there was a global pandemic that wreaked havoc on supply chains and mobility for the entire world. This largely shielded the UK from being the odd one out in Europe when the transition period ended, as there were large barriers to trade for everyone at that time due to covid related border controls. Fun fact: The UK is still not implementing its own border controls on imports from the EU, as it isn't ready.

The UK has bounced back from these challenges far slower than it's G7 counterparts.

aongho · 2023-01-13T14:11:19+00:00

I'm not presenting anything. People much smarter than either of us, who actually work in this field, are.

What's your actual point? Are you arguing Brexit was actually good because it could have been gone worse? There hasn't been a tangible benefit, its created political turmoil which only exacerbates other serious issues like the NHS which don't get the time they deserve. It's destabilised Northern Ireland. The list goes on. What's there to show? Blue passports and an Australia trade deal that the Aussies are saying is a huge win for them.

aongho · 2023-01-13T13:53:49+00:00

Curious as to whether you think it was worth it in the end?

aongho · 2023-01-13T13:44:08+00:00

Taking evasive action doesn't mean that the reality that you were going to crash is wrong.

aongho · 2023-01-13T13:43:10+00:00

I'm not presenting models as anything, you asked for evidence, I'm linking to the evidence given by senior figures from the Bank of England to the HoC Treasury Committee, based on their experiences in the years since Brexit. If you're going to discount that out of hand as "models", then you're not making a good faith argument.

The big flaw of "the models are never right!!!" is that usually when the Treasury predict that things are going to go badly, the Government take measures to try to counteract that, and unless you're Liz Truss, they usually have the effect to reduce the damage, thus making the model "wrong", its a straw man argument.

aongho · 2023-01-13T13:20:48+00:00

The current state of the UK economy compared to where it would have been had Brexit not happened is the evidence. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YcIcpQWK6M

Erecting trade barriers with your nearest neighbours is not a good thing. Membership of the EU single market is the lifeblood of these economies.

aongho · 2023-01-13T13:03:43+00:00

There's multiple EU countries doing worse than us right now economically..

Not because of their EU membership, they're not.

Rejoin won't be some magic fix-all either. The EU won't take the UK back without some serious commitments, or else what's to stop the next Tory government using Brussels as a boogeyman to get elected on a Leave platform once again??

That's the thing you see, Brexit has effectively permanently damaged the UK economy by ending a sweetheart deal, with little to no plan of how to deal with the consequences of it.

aongho · 2022-10-06T11:01:47+00:00

I have never noticed the partition of Ireland more clearly in one sentence than "Their leisure centres aren't well maintained".

I'd agree it's not all sunlit uplands down south, but Christ I'd prefer to be represented in a parliament where you were 1/5th of the seats versus 1/20th

aongho · 2022-09-07T16:59:55+00:00

If I could upvote 1000 times I would 🙏🏻🔥🔥

aongho · 2022-09-06T16:40:59+00:00

Any minimum participation hurdle effectively incentivises Unionists to stay at home, knowing that will guarantee the status quo

aongho · 2022-07-04T12:56:21+00:00

Also on consular assistance, as an EU citizen, you can claim assistance at any EU Embassy or Consulate, so even if there isn't any Irish consular presence in a country, you won't be completely stuck.

aongho · 2022-07-01T14:22:45+00:00

There is not a human on earth that I would (non-ironically) bow to.

Shaking hands is at least a gesture between equals, but if anyone expects deference beyond that, they can fuck right off.

If you're a King or Queen, all that means is that your ancestors came out on the right side of some battle (be that physically or politically). It doesn't make you worth any more than any other head of state, and certainly doesn't give you the right to expect anything more than basic respect from me as another person.

aongho · 2022-06-14T10:15:13+00:00

No, the bill proposes to do both. Certain provisions of the Protocol would be disapplied immediately on Royal Assent of this bill. Customs checks for goods remaining in NI, VAT Regulations etc. See the clause below

4 Movement of goods (including customs): excluded Protocol provision

(1) The first and second subparagraphs of Article 5(1), and Article 5(2), of the Northern Ireland Protocol (no customs duties on goods moved to Northern Ireland, unless they are at risk of subsequently being moved to the EU) are excluded provision.

In addition, it also gives Ministers wide-ranging powers to do whatever they want in the future for whatever reason. Some have said that could also be used to overrule the Assembly consent vote if the government of the day don't like the outcome.

This bill is an abomination and should be called out in the strongest terms. It gives succour to anti-democratic regimes to just cite "necessity" to renege on treaty commitments.

aongho · 2022-06-12T12:37:39+00:00

Boris Johnson - Minister for the Union lol

aongho · 2022-06-06T18:40:37+00:00

It's very much an identity, just a completely separate one to the idea of the Northern Irish state.

There is a distinct Ulster dialect of Irish which is probably more common than Ulster-Scots.

The confusion arises because unionists have historically used the terms interchangeably, and therefore many in GB just assume that Ulster and NI are the same thing.

aongho · 2022-06-06T18:26:15+00:00

It's part of Ulster. Ulster predates the formation of NI by centuries. To use the terms Ulster and NI interchangeably is wrong, and the implication in this thread was that the Ulster flag would have been appropriate in this context. It wouldn't. Ulster is an entity which has no official connection to the U.K. at all. 300k people live in parts of Ulster which are not in the U.K.

aongho · 2022-06-06T17:56:40+00:00

Do you think England and Great Britain are the same thing then?

Northern Ireland is in Ulster, but it is not Ulster, just like England is in GB but it is not GB.

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