Is it the position of Irish nationalism that the UK has no right at all to regulate who crosses the Irish Border?
The British government is to introduce an electronic travel authorisation (ETA) for short-term visitors, similar to the US’s ESTA and the European Union’s planned ETIAS visa waivers.
Everyone who does not currently need a visa to enter the UK, except Irish citizens, will have to apply for an ETA from 2025. That includes citizens of European Economic Area (EEA) countries entering Northern Ireland from the Republic.
There has been universal Irish outrage at this proposal, contained in the new Nationality and Borders Bill.
Tánaiste Leo Varadkar said the Government would be making its "concerns and objections" known. Taoiseach Micheál Martin said he wanted to preserve "seamless travel on the island of Ireland".
Sinn Féin's Pearse Doherty told the Dáil ETA "undermines the Good Friday Agreement and the Common Travel Area".
In Westminster, SDLP and Alliance MPs denounced it as “totally unworkable”.
Unaffected
Yet British and Irish citizens are completely unaffected: they can continue moving around the Common Travel Area at will – the only people to have ever had that ability.
The Belfast Agreement makes no mention of the Common Travel Area, let alone seamless travel for everyone in Europe.
EEA citizens in Northern Ireland can apply for the EU settlement scheme, enabling them to work, study, claim benefits including NHS care and travel in and out of the country effectively without restriction.
EEA citizens in the Republic who work in Northern Ireland can apply for a frontier worker permit, which is free and entitles them to work, rent accommodation and claim benefits and healthcare, again effectively without travel restrictions. It remains valid during lengthy periods of unemployment.
Permits and settlement paperwork are not checked at the Border. The UK government insists the same will be true of ETA – entitlement to be in the country will be checked in Northern Ireland when people apply for jobs or bank accounts or have other interactions with officialdom.
So the only people who need an ETA to cross the Border are tourists to the Republic from Europe, the Commonwealth and other places currently exempt from a UK visa, such as the United States and Japan; or nationals from any of these countries resident in Ireland who want to visit the North for some reason other than regular employment.
The tourist industry is understandably aghast – and all-Ireland tourism is covered by one of the bodies set up by the Belfast Agreement. That does not require seamless travel, however, nor are tourists unfamiliar with bureaucracy. Many already apply for separate Schengen visas, a process Ireland’s tourist agencies promote as straightforward. ETIAS will be far easier and ESA should be the same.
Foreign nationals resident in the Republic are an issue on a different scale. They comprise one-eighth of the population and have an almost infinite number of reasons to travel into Northern Ireland: visiting relatives, collecting children from school, having a business meeting or just taking the direct route from Donegal to Dublin.
If they had to apply for authorisation for every journey, ETA would be unworkable. But if it works like the US and EU equivalents, as expected, one application will cover unlimited journeys for years. An ESTA takes minutes to apply for online, which can done up to 48 hours before travel. It is valid for two years of visits up to 90 days with no minimum period between stays. An ETIAS will be valid for three years.
The UK has not yet specified its validity period, although it has said ETA will cover “tourism, business, short-term study and medical treatment”, similar to the US waiver, which notably allows most business engagements apart from taking up contracted employment.
Lack of clarity
There has been a lamentable lack of clarity and consultation with Ireland. The Nationality and Borders Bill leaves most details of how ETA will operate for ministers to regulate, and the UK government rejected SDLP and Alliance calls last week for exemptions for the island of Ireland.
However, repeated references in the legislation to the Common Travel Area show the Border is under consideration, even if ministers do not want to be pinned down now on exact rules.
If ETA is a simple online form covering all non-work trips for several years, what is the legitimate objection? It would be outrageous to demand the UK hold its border totally open to half the world purely to respect Irish dismay that the Border exists. A key tenet of the Belfast Agreement is recognising the Border does exist.
Brexit has exacerbated this sensitivity, of course, so perhaps it can provide consolation.
ETAs for the North will, in reality, be checked on entry to Britain. All the Bill’s mentions of immigration enforcement for Northern Ireland refer to “ships”.
It is another sea border, if only nationalism would see it. Amid all the fuss, unionism has not even noticed.