Mary Lou McDonald tells UK TV Northern Ireland ‘makes no economic sense' in call for border poll

Irish Independent

3 days ago

Ms McDonald made her case for the reunification of the island of Ireland as she fielded questions on Good Morning Britain on Monday morning regarding Northern Ireland's economic state.
'We are now 27 years on from the Good Friday Agreement, as we all know a historic moment where we settled on the democratic and institutional arrangements to end what was a conflict that ran for centuries,' she said.
'We created the space to build peace and reconciliation, build friendships, build relationships across the island of Ireland, but also between Ireland and Britain. At the heart of that agreement is the commitment to a referendum to make the decision on partition.
'Just remember, more than a century ago Ireland was partitioned down the barrel of a British gun. There was no democracy involved. It was imposed on the island, and the consequences of it were literally devastating for our island, and deeply damaging to he relationship between Britain and Ireland. We need to fix all that.
'Politics has changed, we've all moved on, the peace has been established, I think we have made enormous strides, all of us, and I think Ireland and Britain and all the political leaders and the people deserve great credit for that.
'Now we're at a point where we say 'what's the next chapter?'
'For us, logically, in economic terms, in social terms, in democratic terms Irish unity makes sense.'
Having previous distanced herself from running for the Irish Presidency, Ms McDonald last week appeared to soften her stance on a potential campaign, saying the party's candidacy was 'a moving picture'.
Asked is recent polling, with a majority in Northern Ireland still against reunification, Ms McDonald added: 'Just remember this, any polling that's done now is done in a context where there hasn't been an active conversation around preparing for referendums or raising the questions around what will our health service look like, what will our education system look like, so in a way, for us now, our first ask if that preparation needs to start.
'We do not, with all due respect, want to walk down a Brexit scenario where a question is put and the political system has no answer.
'Brexit is Brexit is not an answer and never was.
'There's work to be done here and it's really, really important that government in Dublin and critically Sir Keir Starmer is true to the Labour Party legacy of building peace in Ireland, of being part of progress in Ireland and is a partner to the Dublin government in laying the ground for making the preparations.
'I absolutely accept and appreciate that unionism will argue for the union,' she said
'None of us should be surprised about that. I totally respect that. This will be a democratic process where the proposition is put, a reunified Ireland that has all of the economic options and levers and opportunities that will come with this. The maintenance of a border has brought and financial and a social cost.
'I would say to our unionist friends, those for whom the question of identity and being British is at the core of their concerns, you are British in partitioned Ireland, you will be British in a united Ireland. This is not an attempt to, in any way, push back against the identity or the integrity of somebody's sense of self. This is about building a modern dynamic and peaceful country.
'Why is the six counties, the north, consistently in economic difficulties? The answer to that question is because it is not economically viable as a territory. It's six counties of the historic nine county province of Ulster. It's cut off from its natural political, social and economic hinterland. Since the peace agreement was signed in 1998 the value of the All-Ireland economy has multiplied six fold. The natural economic activity for a small island like Ireland is the entire island. It makes no sense to have partition.'
Asked that if any referendum went against her wishes for reunification, Ms McDonald said: 'We will never drop the idea of a freedom and unity of Ireland.
'Irish people had to really, really struggled, we had to fight for our freedom, It is precious to us. I'd hope it wouldn't be the case that the question has to be put again, but there is a seven year time line on that.
'The reality is partition is not sustainable, and by the way other data matters. Unionism has lost its electoral majority, It's gone, it's been gone for several election cycles. My colleague, Michelle O'Neill, is First Minister in a place that was designed, specifically engineered, to maintain a perpetual unionist majority. That's over. I think all of us, unionist, loyalist, republican, nationalist, need to ask the question how do we now navigate and manage this part of Irish history, when change is happening?
'I want everybody to be part of this conversation, including those who will say, actually, they don't want a united Ireland.'