Stark division over united Ireland

More Catholics in the South favour an independent Northern Ireland than do Protestants in the South. Where Catholics are concerned, the figure is almost a third, at 32.5 per cent, while for southern Protestants it is less than a quarter, at 23.3 per cent.

Over a third of northern Catholics do not want a united Ireland.

Among southern Catholics, 54.9 per cent favour a united Ireland, while 9.1 per cent believe the North should remain in the UK. Among Protestants in the South 41.9 per cent favour a united Ireland, with 23.3 per cent believing the North should remain in the UK.

In the North, 65 per cent of Catholics want a united Ireland. But 21.1 per cent believe it should remain in the UK, with 11.2 per cent favouring an independent Northern Ireland.

Among northern Protestants an overwhelming 87.7 per cent believe Northern Ireland should remain in the UK, with 5.1 per cent favouring an independent Northern Ireland. Only 3.8 per cent favour a united Ireland.

Despite the quite extraordinary consensus in values and attitudes among Catholics and Protestants North and South, there remains stark division when it comes to the constitutional question, particularly in the North.

In the South, identity is characterised "by overwhelming uniformity" descended from a strong national identity forged in the 19th century, with a strong linkage between "Irish" and "Catholic". Following earlier alienation there has been "increasingly widespread acceptance of an Irish identity among the Protestant population in the Republic".

This "has been accompanied by a growing sense of distance from northern Protestants and a rejection by southern Protestants of their portrayal by their northern co-religionists as an oppressed minority". By the mid-1990s Protestants in the South were said to have far more in common with their Catholic fellow citizens than with their northern co-religionists.

A European Values Survey 1999-2000 found that 99 per cent of southern Catholics were "very/quite proud" to be citizens of the Republic while such figures for Protestants in the Republic was 93 per cent. Figures for the "very proud" among all citizens of the Republic have soared since the arrival of the Celtic Tiger, rising from 55 per cent in 1994 to 71 per cent in 2003.