Sir, – Kevin Nolan (December 24th) takes a hard line on who are to blame if a no-deal Brexit emerges: Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. The inevitable consequence of this, he says, will be a hard border.
I am in complete agreement with Mr Nolan that a no-deal Brexit will result in a hard border. I am in total disagreement with him when he says the blame for this will lie with Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael.
Neither of these parties called for a referendum on UK membership of the EU. Neither of these parties had a vote in that referendum.
The people to blame for a hard Brexit, should it come, will be the Tory Party, in calling a referendum and then engaging in self-delusional negotiations, and the British people who voted to leave the EU. No Irish political party, excepting the DUP, had hand, act or part in the birth of Brexit.
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I also disagree (I think) with Mr Nolan’s concluding statement:“If the economic prosperity of this country suffers because of a no-deal; it will have been the Irish Government which perpetrated that act upon its own people – to safeguard nationalists living in another country!”
I do hope he’s referring to English nationalists and not to his fellow-countrymen and women living in the north of Ireland. – Yours, etc,
JUDE COLLINS,
Antrim.