Disastrous results in the Republic of Ireland's past two elections have forced Sinn Féin to kickstart yet another crusade for Irish unity, the terms of which were set out by Gerry Adams on Comment is free yesterday. In Dáil elections they did not make the breakthrough they hoped and indeed have lost ground. But it was in the recent European elections in the Republic that the Sinn Féin experiment really showed its vulnerability.
The loss of the Sinn Féin vice-president Mary Lou McDonald's European seat was probably a death blow. It indicated that Sinn Féin cannot break out of its northern ghetto. While it is still possible in Northern Ireland to simply avoid real answers to questions by hiding behind the rhetoric of the peace process, this is not an option in the republic or further afield.
Adams sets himself three goals.
First, he wants the UK government to actively encourage a united Ireland. He makes no suggestions as to how he would achieve this or what the government would do to further a united Ireland agenda.
Second, he wants the Irish government "to begin preparations for Irish unity". Once again there is no specificity to his call – and no costings. Someone should tell him that the Celtic Tiger has limped back into the undergrowth in such poor health that it will probably never be seen again. The republic cannot afford a united Ireland and its population by and large does not want it. The average citizen in the republic wants to go to bed at night and feel that Catholics in Northern ireland are receiving a fair shake. In other words they feel that the current political dispensation is the basis for Ireland's future.
Lastly he wants "to engage with Ulster unionism on the type of Ireland we want to create".
This last goal is undoubtedly the most ridiculous.
An Ulster unionist is someone who, by definition, believes in the efficacy of the Union. As a unionist I like being a member of a multinational, multiethnic, multicultural, multilinguistic, liberal, pluralist democracy. What Adams seems to believe is that we would voluntarily give all of this up and join another state. He gives no rationale for this suggestion. He seems to think that it will simply happen.
The problem that Adams has with his quest for a united Ireland is that he has no conception as to why over 1,000,000 Irishmen and Irishwomen would wish to remain within the United Kingdom. He seems to view us simply as errant brothers and sisters who can be easily persuaded to see the errors of our ways. Apart from being insulting, this is also dangerous.
If 30 years of violence, the murder of 2,000 people by the IRA and similar action by their loyalist counterparts, could not bring about a united Ireland then how does he believe that a series of conferences in the US and Great Britain can somehow persuade a significant section of the Irish race to completely change a political position they have held for many generations.
The difficulty that Adams faces is that under the Good Friday Agreement the Irish government gave up its territorial claim over the people and territory of Northern Ireland and accepted that a united Ireland is not a right, but can only come about once the majority of the population of Northern Ireland demands it. Northern Ireland remains within the United Kingdom and Martin McGuinness, a former member of the Army Council of the Provisional IRA, is our deputy first minister. He and his Sinn Féin colleagues are helping the rest of us (DUP, UUP and SDLP) to administer British rule in Northern Ireland.
There has been a final result to the IRA's armed struggle and they lost. Democracy won. The Irish and British governments won. More importantly, the people of Northern Ireland won. Comments likes those made by Gerry Adams this week in the "Mother of Parliaments" are simply a crude attempt to persuade Sinn Féin supporters in Northern Ireland that quest for a United Ireland goes on and is achievable. Everyone else in Ireland knows this to be nonsense.
Adams finishes his piece by stating that if 20 years ago he had, "... been in London asking for support to build a peace process I would have been thought of as at best naive or just daft. Had I predicted cessations, peace talks, an international agreement ... I would have been dismissed by the Guardian and others as crazy."
No Gerry you would not. But your comments this week are such that the Guardian and others might be forgiven for thinking that you are slightly bonkers.