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Brexit negotiators should be prepared for united Ireland referendum, says Irish prime minister

Enda Kenny says a clause in Good Friday Agreement could be triggered to allow for future vote

Gabriel Samuels

Wednesday 20 July 2016 17:19 BST

Enda Kenny says the prospect of a referendum on Irish unity should be raised by Brexit negotiators (Getty Images)

Brexit negotiators should be prepared for the prospect of a referendum on uniting Ireland, the Irish prime minister has said.

The Taoiseach Enda Kenny said a vote may take place if there is clear evidence a majority of Northern Irish citizens want to remain within the EU and leave the UK.

Speaking from the MacGill Summer School in Co Donegal, Mr Kenny said a clause in the 1998 Good Friday Agreement could be triggered due to Brexit, allowing a unity referendum to be held.

“If there's clear evidence of a majority of people wishing to leave the United Kingdom and join the Republic - that that should be catered for in the discussions that take place,” the prime minister told RTE.

“It may be, in the eyes of some, a fanciful theory but who knows what happens in 10, 20 years time?”

Mr Kenny said the situation could be similar to that of East Germany when the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, after which the region was absorbed into the EU without going through a “very long and tortuous process” to secure membership.

The prime minister added the upcoming Irish Budget in October will be “shaped by, and address, the challenges resulting from Brexit”, framed around a “national economic response” to the vote.

At the same event on Sunday, leader of the opposition Fianna Fáil party Micheál Martin called for a referendum on unity, saying Brexit would encourage support for a united Ireland.

DUP MP Ian Paisley meanwhile said Mr Kenny’s comments were “pathetic and mischievous” and may not stand up to scrutiny.

6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

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1/66 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

More expensive foreign holidays

The first practical effect of a vote to Leave is that the pound will be worth less abroad, meaning foreign holidays will cost us more

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6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

No immediate change in immigration status

The Prime Minister will have to address other immediate concerns. He is likely to reassure nationals of other EU countries living in the UK that their status is unchanged. That is what the Leave campaign has said, so, even after the Brexit negotiations are complete, those who are already in the UK would be allowed to stay

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6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

Higher inflation

A lower pound means that imports would become more expensive. This is likely to mean the return of inflation – a phenomenon with which many of us are unfamiliar because prices have been stable for so long, rising at no more than about 2 per cent a year. The effect may probably not be particularly noticeable in the first few months. At first price rises would be confined to imported goods – food and clothes being the most obvious – but inflation has a tendency to spread and to gain its own momentum

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6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

Interest rates might rise

The trouble with inflation is that the Bank of England has a legal obligation to keep it as close to 2 per cent a year as possible. If a fall in the pound threatens to push prices up faster than this, the Bank will raise interest rates. This acts against inflation in three ways. First, it makes the pound more attractive, because deposits in pounds will earn higher interest. Second, it reduces demand by putting up the cost of borrowing, and especially by taking larger mortgage payments out of the economy. Third, it makes it more expensive for businesses to borrow to expand output

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6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

Did somebody say recession?

Mr Carney, the Treasury and a range of international economists have warned about this. Many Leave voters appear not to have believed them, or to think that they are exaggerating small, long-term effects. But there is no doubt that the Leave vote is a negative shock to the economy. This is because it changes expectations about the economy’s future performance. Even though Britain is not actually be leaving the EU for at least two years, companies and investors will start to move money out of Britain, or to scale back plans for expansion, because they are less confident about what would happen after 2018

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6 ways Britain leaving the EU will affect you

And we wouldn’t even get our money back

All this will be happening while the Prime Minister, whoever he or she is, is negotiating the terms of our future access to the EU single market. In the meantime, our trade with the EU would be unaffected, except that companies elsewhere in the EU may be less interested in buying from us or selling to us, expecting tariff barriers to go up in two years’ time. Whoever the Chancellor is, he or she may feel the need to bring in a new Budget

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55.8% of people in Northern Ireland voted to remain within the EU and 44.2 per cent to leave the union, making it one of a handful of places in the UK where Remain was victorious.

Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams said there is "a need to be open and imaginative" on new constitutional arrangements for Ireland post-Brexit, welcoming Mr Kenny’s comments.

"In the context of the north being dragged out of the EU by England, there is now a greater opportunity to achieve [unity]”, Mr Adams said.

Ireland was divided in 1922 and Irish republicans including Mr Adams have long fought for a united country, a prospect heavily resisted by Protestants in Northern Ireland.

Last week former Irish prime minister John Bruton said Brexit was "the most serious, difficult issue facing [Ireland] for 50 years", as the country's economy has already been affected by the vote.

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