We hardly need reminders of how little the Tories think of Ireland

We hardly need further reminders of how little the British Tories think of Ireland, but unfortunately we have more, courtesy of former prime minister Liz Truss’s execrable new book, Ten Years to Save the West. The Republic does not merit a single index entry, though the issue of the Northern Ireland protocol is briefly touched on, in order for Truss to declare: “we must have a regime that is in regulatory terms separate from the EU and part of the UK”; this in order to be “proud of our core values and tell the story of freedom again”. As for immigration, Truss has more wisdom to impart: “we must be intolerant of intolerance… I believed in what I was doing from a point of first principle”; others, in contrast, were “engaged in monkey tennis” on this issue.

Even the Northampton Saints rugby team devote more effort to understanding Anglo-Irish relations, with their conditioning coach Eamonn Hyland from Kildare speaking to them in advance of their European Cup semi-final at Croke Park this weekend to explain the historical significance of that venue.

The current stand-off between the British and Irish governments over immigration is another illustration of the complexities of the ties between the two countries being denied in order to strike for “freedom”. For the Tories, Ireland historically has been a pawn in other power games or an irritant to be denied.

Arrangements between the two countries regarding immigration have always been masked. The Common Travel Area (CTA), though not formally referred to as such in earlier decades, has been in existence since 1922 to deal with laws of entry and create a particular and privileged status for Irish nationals in Britain and vice versa, and was solidified by a further administrative agreement in 1952. In 1922, officials from the British Home Office visited Dublin to seek to ensure the Free State’s participation in the British system of immigration control and Irish officials were happy to oblige. The arrangements since then have been updated and amended and complicated by a variety of factors, including of course the Border in Ireland.

A simple question stopped Ireland in its tracks: why were so many children incarcerated?

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No line can be drawn under the Troubles for grieving families

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We hardly need reminders of how little the Tories think of Ireland

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Themes in McGahern’s That They May Face The Rising Sun have never been more relevant

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More than 20 years ago, [academic] Bernard Ryan characterised the operation of the CTA as ‘a pragmatic response by Britain and Ireland to the practical and political difficulties associated with an effective immigration frontier at the Irish border’

Professor of migration law Bernard Ryan has pointed to the degree of quietude about the CTA because of historical reluctance “to give its content publicity”. In the early 1950s, both governments accepted that controls on the Irish border were not feasible, the Irish Department of Justice accepting, “we have no check on the entry of aliens from [Britain]... and we could not impose an effective check on account of the existence of the Border”.

After 1973, joint EU membership was also relevant: in 1997, the Treaty on European Union, introduced by the Treaty of Amsterdam, included a protocol which stated: “The United Kingdom and Ireland may continue to make arrangements between themselves relating to the movement of persons between their territories.” This was reaffirmed in the UK-EU Withdrawal Agreement treaty, signed in January 2020.

A research briefing document on the CTA from last summer is available in the House of Commons library and observes: “Both governments recognise that there is potential for the CTA to be abused by people seeking to evade the usual controls on entry to Ireland or the UK… Operation Gull is a long-standing joint scheme by the UK and Ireland immigration authorities which aims to intercept and remove migrants who use this route to enter illegally.” It also highlights a 2016 briefing by Bernard Ryan which “points to some reasons for successive UK and Irish governments’ long-running support for the CTA arrangements”, including “the assumption of the UK authorities that it is impractical for the Irish border to be an immigration frontier”.

It further explains that “the CTA is underpinned by close and active co-operation between the UK and Irish border and immigration authorities”. In 2017, Home Office minister Baroness Williams of Trafford told the House of Lords that this includes “information sharing, alignment of border policies and processes, and use of data to inform immigration and border security decisions.” Around 2,800 people trying to enter Ireland by land were refused entry between 2013 and 2022.

More than 20 years ago, Bernard Ryan characterised the operation of the CTA as “a pragmatic response by Britain and Ireland to the practical and political difficulties associated with an effective immigration frontier at the Irish border”, which led to interdependence of immigration control in the two states, but that “the apparent continuities in the history of the CTA should not mask the extent to which it now faces a qualitatively new set of pressures”.

Recent developments have made this observation even more germane, given that the British government is in effect trying to make it impossible for asylum to be sought in Britain. Is the Irish Government right to push through legislation that makes it a party to this?