The Irish question

"I can’t imagine why anyone wants to live in the Falklands and as for Gibraltar -"

That's perhaps part of the problem. Some people simply think we can abandon the people from our British Overseas Territories because they don't think they are worth protecting.

As for the weird raising of Simon Weston into the debate he holds a different point of view to those posters who feel the protection of the Falkland Islanders was of no interest to the government and it was all about oil. I will agree with the post that says:-

" History can look very different depending on who tells it."

Didn't many people abandon the people of Gibraltar when they voted to leave the EU?

The people are worth protecting but I don’t think the cost of maintaining far flung territory as outposts of empire concerns most people here apart from headline writers in the Sun. Maybe the small populations in the Falklands etc should be given the option of becoming completely independent with all that entails or relocating to the UK.

They don’t want to be independant ( although they are, to all intents and purposes) but if that happened then Argentina would take them over immediately.
They have lived there for generations, it is their home.

Why on earth would the people of the Falklands want to 're locate to the UK or be forced into independence that they don't want? The Falklands has been their home for generations so why should they have to do either of these things simply because they've now become an expensive white elephant? If they relocated anywhere, I guess New Zealand would be infinitely preferable and more familiar than overcrowded Britain. As with the people of Gibraltar, they've made their wishes perfectly clear, so shrugging them off as an inconvenience would be pretty disgraceful.

www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2017/12/12/the-eu-has-to-demand-a-treaty-now-to-protect-its-citizens-and-ireland-from-perfidious-brexiteers/

Back to the question of Ireland.
I agree that the agreement should be put into a treaty before the EU moves on. If it isn't, it will just show that May and Davis were not serious about the agreement.

These far flung outposts are a relic of the empire we can’t just cling onto them with threats of military invasion. We’ve got the smallest army and navy in history now. I can’t imagine why anyone wants to live in the Falklands

I can't believe you said that suzied!!
It's home to many people who were born there and probably love it.
They may not be able to imagine why anyone wants to live in over-crowded UK or Europe.
The Falkland Islander I knew always hankered after home but lived here in the UK because she fell in love and this is where her DH's job was.

As for the weird raising of Simon Weston into the debate he
Sorry, I mentioned him first simply because he was at a do I was at a while ago.

I think people who live in these 'far flung outposts' have a totally different view than those here who consider them 'throwbacks of the Empire and an inconvenience'.

I’m sure people who live in the Falklands love it, but they can’t expect to be automatically supported by a country thousands of miles away their ancestors waved goodbye to generations before. I never said they were an “inconvenience “ just that sometimes we have to take a reality check. I also didn’t say abandon them or not protect them either, though I don’t believe military force is the answer. Times have changed and Britannia no longer rules the waves. Any way, that’s not about Ireland which this thread is supposed to be about. Apologies for the diversion.

They could have been given half a million for each family + relocation expenses - to non crowded parts of the UK - there are plenty around, near the sea ...

it would have saved 1000s of lives and massive suffering, on both sides - and a ton of money.

But as said before, anyone who believes that the Falklands war was about protecting a small number os British people there - must be massively naïve.

It was about minerals, oils and mainly, keeping a strategic out-posts in that part of the world.

But enough about the past ... my point is, that we would find it extremely difficult, and probably impossible, at this stage- to get into war again- be it there, or for Gibraltar- because of Brexit.

There's quite a few uninhabited Scottish Islands Falklanders might feel at home on.

I hope the people advocating that Falkland Islanders move to uninhabited islands at the other end of the world are not the same people who think that people should not be forced to move 100 miles out of London to social housing elsewhere.

If I may say so - not really a sensible comparison.

My main points are : how many dead, burned, maimed people are worth the rights of a few people to not be re-located?

And 2, again- does anyone really believe the Falklands war was about the freedom of those few people, and not about minerals, oil and stategic piece of South America for Army/Navy/weapons?

And 3- do you really believe the UK, at the present moment- has the capacity to keep either Gibraltar or the Falklands if challenged? That was actually the main point.

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

I'm not advocating the Falkland islanders move out, but if Argentina did forcefully claim again those Islands for strategic /historical reasons - and no-one is suggesting they are about to- would they insist the inhabitants moved out? If that was the case, maybe the UK should have plans to help them that didn't include sending in our much reduced military. Just as well Argentina is not a strong military power. I don't think people have a god-given right to expect others to pay for them to live in a particular town / area ) , if they can't afford to live or work there, ( especially if those others can't afford that area either), this may lead to difficult choices, but that is a whole different discussion.

As Theresa May keeps hardening her stance in order to placate the brextreemists, and has now said we will be leaving the single market, the customs union and any kind of customs union, how could it ever be possible to solve the Irish Question?

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/feb/09/northern-ireland-will-stay-in-single-market-after-brexit-eu-says

I have just listened to "Any Questions" on R4. There was a question about the Irish Question.

Here is the problem. If we leave the single market and customs union, meaning tariffs would be different inside and outside of the EU, it follows that there would have to be a "hard border" to stop people and goods flowing freely the way they do now.

One of the panelists was the leader of UKIP, Henry Bolton, who said that if there was a hard border, it would be the fault of the EU. This man has very little credibility.

None of the other panelists- Sal Brinton, President of the Liberal Democrats, Stephen Kinnock, Labour MP and Therese Coffey, Conservative minister- none of them could come up with an answer to this conundrum.

Who is right?

From what I've read I don't think there is an answer.

Just that...

The EU

Listening briefly to a chap phoning into Any Answers, he was an exporter of some sort working a lot in Ireland. North and South. He thought there would be no problem and an open border could function easily even with a hard Brexit. He said Mr B was playing it hard and trying scare tactics which weren’t going down to well with the Irish. I was only able to half listen as DGS was chatting too. Did anyone else here him?

The trouble with listening to contributors to Any Answers and similar programmes is that they all phone with an axe to grind, knowledge limited to their own perspective and inevitably they think the answers to what happens about the Irish border and other Brexit problems are simple. Goodness knows why we have such a large civil service or have had to finance a whole new government dept to deal with Brexit, just get in a few of these people who think it's all simple!!

The Irish don't think it's simple at all:

www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/eu-warns-uk-brexit-transition-phase-is-not-a-given-1.3387100

Not least because a soft border will open the way to illegal immigration, people trafficking and fraudulent transactions involving goods.

It was good, at least, to here someone being positive about it all. There's just so much negativity, we seem to have turned into a nation of moaners and doom mongers.

Far too many people, and far too many vested interests have been far too negative about our membership of the EU for far too long.

At last we are beginning to appreciate what we have and do not want to lose.