The push for Irish unification in Brussels

A group of Irish activists in Brussels have begun efforts to normalise the idea of Irish unification within European Union institutions, and to lobby them to prepare for unity referendums and a possible eventual united Ireland.

The recently formed BXL-Irish Unity, which describes itself as a “non-partisan civic group of Irish diaspora based in Brussels”, is made up of current and former officials, policy wonks and assorted Brussels longhaulers originally from Ireland north and south.

A founding member is Emma Rainey, a west Belfast veteran of the Repeal campaign and long-time gender equality campaigner in Brussels.

At an after-work meeting over beers in a Brussels cafe, Rainey presided over a laptop laying out the group’s plan of action. On the to-do list: lobby members of the European Parliament to pledge support for Irish unity, hold a policy event on Irish unity and the EU, and lobby the European Commission to conduct an analysis of Irish unification.

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“We’re basically plotting our strategy for the next two years,” Rainey explains.

The idea for the group began when she and David Garrahy, a Brussels based Clareman who works in a pro-EU NGO, started messaging each other about a “gap in the discussions” on Irish unity about the importance of the EU.

“We had a meeting, and I reached out to former Repeal colleagues in Brussels, and it just kind of grew from there,” she says.

The members share both international networks and an appreciation for the norm-setting power of the EU institutions and the capital’s diplomatic bubble, which is why they believe political arguments – wherever they relate to geographically – need to be won in Brussels.

“What would a new Ireland in the EU look like? What implications would EU membership have on the structures there would have to be in a new Ireland?” Garrahy asks. “The more that debate is advanced in Brussels, the more readiness there might be to accept a united Ireland.”

They plan to press EU institutions to produce some kind of policy document that would build on the so-called “Kenny text” adopted in 2017 in a meeting of EU national leaders.

Then taoiseach Enda Kenny successfully argued for a joint declaration acknowledging that in the case of unification as set out by the Belfast Agreement, “the entire territory of such a united Ireland would thus be part of the European Union”. This means Northern Ireland would automatically re-enter the EU if it unified with the Republic, without any accession process being required, following the precedent of East Germany in 1990.

The emergence of a group advocating for Irish unity in Brussels is a reflection of how Brexit galvanised interest in unification by unpicking the status quo.

Unification was the topic of the day as Irish diaspora gathered for St Patrick’s Day pints at Kitty O’Shea’s, a Brussels institution a few steps from the European Commission.

“It’s been quite amazing seeing this radical change in a lot of people’s thinking,” Rainey says, describing the scene.

“What’s also surprising is that a lot of it’s coming from ... D4-type spaces,” she laughs.

For Jim Maher, a European Parliament official from Co Tipperary, the long years of negotiations with Britain served as an education for many in Brussels and Strasbourg about the geopolitics of the island of Ireland and the reality of all-island economic integration.

“When I came to Brussels first of all, nine years ago, Irish unity just wasn’t a conversation anyone in Brussels was having,” Maher says. “It’s really in the mainstream in Ireland now, and I get so many questions in Brussels.”

Eamon O’Reilly, a recently retired European Commission official from Belfast, noted a similar transformation.

“My wife’s family, they’re French from Strasbourg. They’re asking: when’s Irish unity going to happen?” he says. “They weren’t asking that question 20 years ago. It wasn’t even a discussion.”

A short-term aim – one shared with the bulk of Irish MEPs – is to increase the democratic representation of Northern Ireland within the EU, to fix the anomalous post-Brexit situation in which it continues to follow many EU rules but without elected representatives who can vote on them.

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In the meantime, they believe the EU institutions should take contingency planning for Irish unity in hand.

“The EU needs to plan for a united Ireland as a member state of the EU. It needs to put together its packages, programmes and financing,” O’Reilly argues. “It needs to do that now, so that when the debate around an Irish border poll starts, there’s something on the table.”