Good Lord, Eilis could be getting the road when Comrade Harris reads that!
https://m.independent.ie/opinion/comment/moving-the-goalposts-on-irish-unity-now-is-moral-cowardice-40272586.htmlNow, though, it appears that some, alarmed by the prospect of a potentially destabilising Border poll in the next few years, want to change the rules, arguing instead that a simple majority should no longer be sufficient for a change to the North's constitutional status.
Such a retreat was signalled by former SDLP deputy leader, the late Seamus Mallon, in his 2019 memoir.
In it, he argued that "the GFA metric of 50 per cent plus one for unity will not give us the kind of agreed Ireland we seek". Fearing the violence that could erupt, North and South, in the event of a narrow majority for Irish unity, Mallon came to the conclusion that the "parallel consent" principle which applies in the Assembly - which requires a majority of both unionists and nationalists, or a "weighted majority" including at least 40pc of both - should be applied to the constitutional question itself.
Otherwise, he warned, Northern Ireland risked replicating the conditions at the start of its existence, when nationalists were resentfully forced to remain in the UK against their will.
Mallon was right. But only half right. Such a scenario might indeed turn unionists into an angry minority on the island; but changing the rules to appease them would also incentivise the worst elements in loyalism to threaten trouble. As for nationalists, changing the rules to stop them from achieving a united Ireland, even after they'd won a Border poll, would simply cement the old poisonous idea that peaceful change is impossible.
It's not surprising that Mallon's plan has been embraced by many unionists who, whilst pooh-poohing the idea that a Border poll could deliver a majority for Irish unity any time soon, clearly aren't minded to take a risk.
They like the additional safeguard that "parallel consent" would offer, for a little while longer at least. In practice, though, it would be a false consolation. Once nationalists gained a majority, the end of Northern Ireland would simply be a matter of time.
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What stops them from acknowledging it (the cynicism of parallel consent -- my italics) is fear. Fear of violence. Fear of contamination from a virus of sectarian militancy spreading south in future. Those fears are not unreasonable, given Irish history. Faced with that risk, people in the 26 counties would be entitled to decide that a unitary state was not for them, even if the North had earlier voted in favour.
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Perhaps what ultimately frightens those in the Republic who are hitching a ride on the late Seamus Mallon's coat tails in the hope of preventing a Border poll in the short or medium term, is the very idea of change. Abhorrently, many commentators have even taken to arguing against Irish unity on the risible grounds that people "up there" are not as authentically Irish as the people "down here".
"I will never consider them as Irish as I am," one columnist wrote recently. On social media, nastier things still are spewed by anonymous trolls.
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It's perfectly possible to make reasoned arguments against a united Ireland without painting everyone in the North as some kind of lesser species who mustn't be allowed to sit on the best furniture lest they leave a stain or a smell. People who know better should leave that toxicity to Twitter.
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