Present Tense Shane HegartyThey walk among us. They may be your neighbours, your work colleagues, your hedge fund administrators. They have come here in their hundreds of thousands, and now form Ireland's biggest immigrant group. Yet, you would hardly notice them on the street, as they go about their day. Are their thoughts still on the homeland they left behind? Are they wondering when they'll next see it? Perhaps they're deciding it will have to wait until Ryanair's next sale.
They are the British. And, according to the census, there are 112,548 UK nationals resident in Ireland. One in 37 of us is British. Although, that figure should probably be adjusted upwards when addressing readers of The Irish Times.
When we talk about "the new Irish", there's a clear sense that we're not including the Brits in that mix. We mean Latvian Irish or Nigerian Irish. The British will always be British. They're not "foreign nationals". They're not "immigrants". They can't be asylum seekers, escaping the horrors of Brown's Britain. They're just British. Except, of course, when they're Welsh, which means they're Celts like us; or Scottish, which means they're practically Irish; or Liverpudlians, which means they are Irish.
A UCD study this week reminded us of their overlooked ubiquity, presenting a map that showed where they were concentrated about the country. They are particularly attracted to the extremities of this island, huddling along the western seaboard, perhaps in the hope of getting a lift to America. They cluster in Donegal, Mayo and Kerry. Southwest Cork seems popular. Mizen Head is particularly busy.
We've become fascinated by the various nationalities arriving here, but not by the British. What do we know about their culture? They too have their ethnic stores - Tesco, Boots, Dixons and Marks & Spencer - where British immigrants can be seen grabbing prepacked Yorkshire puddings and toad in the hole as they grumble about the ghastly Irish food, with its "scallions" and "turnips".
We have Polish and Russian bars appearing across the country, but there would now appear to be a market for chains of British pubs. As yet, we have no opportunity to pop into a Wetherspoons for a bit of "authentic" British culture, with pints of bitter and packets of pork scratchings.
Such pubs could double as British cultural centres, where immigrants might gather together during times of difficulty: namely, every two years when a major soccer tournament comes along. Because, while they may not face the prejudices and discrimination of other nationalities, they cannot easily wear English soccer jerseys, fly Union Jacks or stand up for God Save The Queen when it comes on the pub television. During last year's World Cup, once the Irish failed to qualify we wanted another team to support. We looked immediately for the biggest immigrant community and ignored them in favour of the Poles.
Perhaps we overlook the British because we don't see them huddled on the laneways of Dublin's docklands, hoping to pick up a day's work as a financial analyst here, a few hours as a senior internal auditor there.
Maybe they don't get the credit they deserve because, unlike other recently arrived immigrants, the British haven't slotted into the jobs we're not so keen on doing ourselves any more. We don't have a generation of British cleaners turning beds in our hotels. We don't have a nice British girl who comes to the house once a week and does the hoovering. When we pop out to buy a packet of Rizla at a garage at four in the morning, there's not a patient team of British manning the till.
As with other immigrant communities, they have their own newspapers, which can be seen on the stands of most newsagents. Some of these suggest that the reason why they've come west towards us is because they've been pushed out of home by their very own invasion of immigrants. These British papers have in recent years attempted to feature stories on the Irish too. It's been a quite charming if rather clumsy attempt to ingratiate themselves with us.
Yet, if they are generally overlooked as an immigrant group, perhaps it is because they have been so successfully integrated. Thank God we have at least avoided the British ghettos that have so obviously blighted large regions of Spain.
And, in turn, we have benefited culturally from them. We watch their television shows, complain about their soap operas, listen to their music, support their soccer clubs, obsess over their celebrities. No other immigrant group, in fact, has had such an impact on our culture as the British. They have already left a legacy. Quite extraordinary, given that they've only been coming here for 800 years.