How Ireland and the UK became closer than ever
Economically, politically and socially, Ireland and Britain have never had a better relationship
Taoiseach Enda Kenny meets British Prime Minister David Cameron under a portrait of former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher at 10 Downing Street in 2011
For more than 200 years, British ministers have sat at a long, oak table in 10 Downing Street, in a room lit by three brass chandeliers. History hangs heavily inside its walls. Looking out onto a rose garden, the Cabinet Room, in the shape it is seen today by ministers and officials, was finished in the late 1700s, just in time for the 1798 Rising.
In the centuries of debate that have taken place around the Cabinet table since, Ireland has frequently dominated: famine, rebellions, independence, two world wars.