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northern ireland
Scottish Government Decries "Devastating" Effect Post-Brexit Border Policy Will Have on Economy
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon issued a call for a Scottish visa, which overseas workers could use to settle in the country and to bypass the Tories' proposed "points" immigration system.
Feb 18, 2020
Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon condemned the United Kingdom's new post-Brexit border policy after it was released Wednesday, saying new rules barring people designated as "unskilled" and those who don't speak English will devastate a number of Scotland's industries and worsen the country's depopulation crisis.
The newly-unveiled "points system" dictating who can migrate to the U.K. spurred officials to reiterate their calls for a separate Scottish visa system which immigrants could use just for Scotland, which employs many people from overseas in its tourism, fishing, and healthcare industries.
"It is impossible to overstate how devastating this U.K. government policy will be for Scotland's economy," tweeted Sturgeon, who also called for a new referendum on Scottish independence after the Conservative government won the general election in December. "Getting power over migration in Scottish Parliament is now a necessity for our future prosperity."
\u201cIt is impossible to overstate how devastating this UK gov policy will be for Scotland\u2019s economy. Our demographics mean we need to keep attracting people here - this makes it so much harder. Getting power over migration in @ScotParl is now a necessity for our future prosperity.\u201d— Nicola Sturgeon (@Nicola Sturgeon) 1582091479
Under the new U.K. border policy, migrants would be awarded "points," as they are under Australia's system, based on their skill level and background. Students and workers who don't speak English would not be permitted to migrate.
No temporary or general visas will be given to people identified as "low-skilled workers," and people considered "skilled" would need to have a job offer or endorsement from someone in their field.
"U.K. businesses will need to adapt and adjust to the end of free movement," the British government said of the plan, which officials want to enter into force on January 1, 2021.
The proposal appears intent on damaging the "U.K. manufacturing industry, services, agriculture, and fisheries... [and creating] more economic damage through deliberately causing labor shortages," tweeted Kirsty Hughes, director of the Scottish Center on European Relations.
\u201cUK's Brexit plans get clearer: damage UK manufacturing industry, services, agriculture & fisheries by putting up trade barriers (regulatory, tariff, non-tariff) & queues at ports, & create more economic damage through deliberately causing labour shortages\n https://t.co/PgNIddo24Y\u201d— Kirsty Hughes (@Kirsty Hughes) 1582120459
One in five tourism jobs in Scotland are held by people from overseas, according toThe Guardian. Migrants hold 16% of healthcare jobs, while more than 70% of those employed at fish processing plants in northeastern Scotland were born outside the country.
Under the new plan, it's estimated that 70% of the current E.U. workforce would not be awarded enough "points" to move to the United Kingdom. But in Scotland, which is projected to have more deaths than births over the next 25 years and whose population growth over the next two decades has been expected to come entirely from migration, industry leaders say people already in the country won't be able to fill roles that would otherwise go to migrants.
"Locking out some sets of skills from the U.K. will have a devastating impact on many parts of our economy and [is] deeply insulting," tweeted Hannah Bardell, a member of Parliament in Sturgeon's Scottish National Party. "The Tories have had 42 months to develop these proposals and they've come up with a half-finished, disastrous one size-fits-no-one policy that poses a very real threat to Scotland and leaves businesses and the public with just 10 months to prepare."
Scottish officials say the public widely supports a Scottish visa, which the government explained in a video on social media last month.
\u201cMigration to Scotland supports our economic growth and helps us thrive as a country.\n \nWe want to introduce a Scottish Visa to make sure more people are able to settle in Scotland and help us deliver vital public services. Learn more \u27a1\ufe0f https://t.co/My4drdRtyU\u201d— Scottish Government (@Scottish Government) 1580145975
Industry groups in Northern Ireland echoed Scotland's concerns Wednesday, saying the hospitality sector would suffer a "crippling blow" under the immigration plan.
"We are looking to double the number of jobs in the sector to 25,000, but we just won't have the people to fill them," Colin Neill, chief executive of Hospitality Ulster, told the Irish Times.
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'A Far Worse Deal Than Theresa May's Deal': Labour Vows to Defeat Brexit Plan Agreed to by EU
"This sell-out deal won't bring the country together," said Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn. "The best way to get Brexit sorted is to give the people the final say in a public vote."
Oct 17, 2019
News on Thursday that U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson reached a deal with the European Union to allow Britain to leave the coalition under the Brexit referendum of 2016 was met with criticism and derision by progressives, including Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn.
"It won't bring the country together and should be rejected," Corbyn said of the deal on Twitter Thursday.
Johnson made the deal with European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker Thursday. The agreement will go up for a vote in fron of the U.K. Parliament on a special Saturday session.
But opponents of Johnson's approach are prepared to make it an uphill fight.
\u201cFrom what we know, Johnson's negotiated a worse deal than Theresa May. This sell-out deal risks our rights, protections and NHS. It won\u2019t bring the country together and should be rejected.\u201d— Jeremy Corbyn (@Jeremy Corbyn) 1571308203
Labour's shadow Brexit secretary Keir Starmer expanded on Corbyn's criticism of the deal.
"It is clear that the Johnson deal is a far worse deal than Theresa May's deal," said Starmer. "It paves the way for a decade of deregulation. It gives Johnson licence to slash workers' rights, environmental standards and consumer protections."
According to journalist Paul Mason, a supporter of Corbyn, Labour intends to enter Parliament on Saturday united behind demanding a second referndum on either the Johnson deal or pulling out of Brexit completely.
"That's our strategy, let the people decide," said Mason. "Having achieved that--which I think we can on Saturday--that's the platform for going into an election and ridding this country of this right wing, authoritarian, white nationalist, and English chauvinist government once and for all."
\u201cDefeat the Johnson Deal - Labour will lead the fight for a second referendum on this shabby Brexit deal on Saturday morning ...\u201d— Paul Mason (@Paul Mason) 1571308398
Scottish Nationalist Party leader Nicola Sturgeon also rejected the deal's premise.
"It's hard to imagine a deal that would be worse for Scotland," said Sturgeon.
\u201cNicola Sturgeon on the new Brexit agreement: 'It's hard to imagine a deal that would be worse for Scotland.' https://t.co/tsZIzwSZvV\u201d— STV News (@STV News) 1571318407
The deal, which would go into effect for the current Brexit deadline of October 31, reportedly undoes the hardest sticking point of negotiations, what to do with the border between Northern Ireland and Ireland, by allowing goods to flow through the border after crossing through customs over the Irish Sea.
Johnson's counterpart in Ireland, Taisoeach Leo Varadkar, called the deal a "good agreement" in comments to reporters.
"The people of the north did not consent to Brexit. They rejected it."
--Michelle O'Neill, Sinn Fein
"It allows the United Kingdom to leave the European Union in an orderly fashion," said Varadkar.
That sentiment was not, however, shared by others in Ireland and Northern Ireland.
Northern Ireland's hard-right Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), who are relied on by Johnson and the Conservatives to maintain their majority in Parliament, flatly rejected the proposal. Without the DUP's support, passing Brexit becomes even more difficult.
"We have been consistent that we will only ever consider supporting arrangements that are in Northern Ireland's long-term economic and constitutional interests and protect the integrity of the Union," the party said in a statement. "These proposals are not, in our view, beneficial to the economic well-being of Northern Ireland and they undermine the integrity of the Union."
Irish nationalist party Sinn Fein, in a tweet, said that there was "no good Brexit."
"The people of the north did not consent to Brexit," Sinn Fein leader Michelle O'Neill said, referring to Northern Irelands vote against the proposal in 2016. "They rejected it."
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'Shocking Attack' in Northern Ireland That Killed Journalist the Latest Incident of Escalating Violence
A number of stressors, chief among them the political instability that comes from the U.K.'s ongoing Brexit struggles, may be to blame for the recent uptick in unrest.
Apr 19, 2019
A journalist whose work focused on Northern Ireland's troubled past was killed Thursday night in the latest in a series of militant escalations that are increasing in frequency as the United Kingdom and Ireland reckon with Brexit.
Clashes broke out Thursday in the Northern Ireland city of Derry as police forces attempted to raid suspected militant homes.
Lyra McKee was shot, allegedly by dissidents, during the violence. McKee died shortly thereafter.
The raid came in advance of Easter Sunday, which has significance for Northern Irish republicans who want to reunify Northern Ireland with the Republic of Ireland and see the continued division of the island as a leftover from centuries of brutal British colonial rule.
Reaction to McKee's death from leaders on both sides of the Irish Sea stressed the importance of her work and the senselessness of the shooting.
Leo Varadkar, Ireland's Taoiseach (Prime Minister), issued a statement condemning the violence in the country to the north.
"We are all full of sadness after last night's events," said Varadkar. "We cannot allow those who want to propagate violence, fear, and hate to drag us back to the past."
\u201cThe Government condemns in the strongest possible terms the fatal shooting of journalist and writer Lyra McKee in Derry. We are all full of sadness after last night\u2019s events. \nWe cannot allow those who want to propagate violence, fear and hate to drag us back to the past.\u201d— Leo Varadkar (@Leo Varadkar) 1555664419
"My thoughts are with the family and loved ones of Lyra McKee, senselessly killed while doing her job as a journalist," said Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn. "This shocking attack is a reminder of the vital importance of protecting the Good Friday Agreement and Northern Ireland peace process."
\u201cMy thoughts are with the family and loved ones of Lyra McKee, senselessly killed while doing her job as a journalist. \n\nThis shocking attack is a reminder of the vital importance of protecting the Good Friday Agreement and Northern Ireland peace process.\u201d— Jeremy Corbyn (@Jeremy Corbyn) 1555669163
Michelle O'Neill, the deputy leader of the Irish party Sinn Fein, said she was "shocked and saddened" by the attack and hoped it would not reopen old wounds.
"The murder of this young woman is a human tragedy for her family," said O'Neill, "but it is also an attack on all the people of this community, an attack on our peace process and an attack on the Good Friday Agreement."
\u201cSinn F\u00e9in Deputy leader @moneillsf has said her thoughts are with the family of 29-year-old Lyra McKee who was shot dead by so-called dissidents in Creggan last night.\u201d— Sinn F\u00e9in (@Sinn F\u00e9in) 1555673624
Thursday's shooting is the third violent incident involving dissidents in four months. In January republican militants set off a car bomb outside a Derry courthouse. Two months later, another group of pro-unification dissidents sent at least four, and possibly five, bombs to locations across Britain.
That's a major escalation over recent years; Northern Ireland has been largely quiet since 2007. The country, which is one of four in the U.K., has gone through a generally peaceful spell of time since the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, which began to put an end to "The Troubles"--the Irish and Northern Irish name for the sectarian war that raged along the Northern Irish border for decades.
A number of stressors, chief among them the political instability that comes from the U.K.'s ongoing Brexit struggles, may be to blame for the recent increase in violence.
The U.K., which includes Northern Ireland, has continually put off leaving the E.U. through Brexit. The terms of the departure, which could result in a militarized border with Ireland and subsequent reigniting of "The Troubles," are still up in the air.
As Jochen Bittner put it in The New York Times:
In London, Prime Minister Theresa May has vowed to respect the peace accord and avoid a hard border in Ireland. But neither she nor anyone else has yet explained how not to control a border that separates a European Union country from a nonunion country. Mrs. May's Brexit plan leaves open the possibility of at least customs checks along the border; without a plan in place, a hard border will almost certainly be needed.
That's led to a situation where nobody knows what will happen, or when. The deadline for departure was recently extended to October 31 after May couldn't convince Parliament to sign off on her deal.
The New Yorker's Amy Davidson Sorkin laid out the situation in a recent essay on the effects of Brexit on Northern Ireland:
This is the paradox and the tragedy: Brexit fundamentally conflicts with the Good Friday Agreement, but the U.K. government is in a state of denial about that conflict. It insists that it is committed both to Brexit and to the peace accord: Brexiteers claim that they can maintain a "frictionless" open border with the Republic of Ireland after Brexit--in the same place that the newly hardened border with the E.U. will be.
Relations between the two countries are strained due to Brexit, but, as one unnamed U.K. official toldPolitico, there aren't a lot of options for either country--so they'll have to make do.
"You can't do without the relationship," said the U.K. official of relations between Ireland and the U.K. "It will survive because it has to. The ties are too strong."
Whatever happens, today the city of Derry, the countries of Northern Ireland and Ireland, and writers across the world are all mourning McKee.
Her supporters in the journalism world shared some of their favorite pieces McKee wrote on "The Troubles" and growing up in Northern Ireland.
\u201cDevastating to hear that courageous journalist Lyra McKee \u2066@mediagazer\u2069 was killed in a terrorist incident in Derry last night. Her writing (shared here) shone a light on the impact of violence and death in Northern Ireland. Condolences to her family https://t.co/Jq0VJikUEC\u201d— Norah Casey (@Norah Casey) 1555650466
\u201cThis piece by Lyra McKee, about the rocketing rates of suicide among her own generation of "Ceasefire Babies" in #NorthernIreland shows what an exceptionally talented journalist she was and why her killing is such a tragic waste. @TheAtlantic https://t.co/8KCJ3fAOb7\u201d— Rory Peck Trust (@Rory Peck Trust) 1555694689
\u201cLyra McKee, the journalist who was killed in Northern Ireland last night, wrote a letter to her 14 year old self, about love and life. It\u2019s a really beautiful read. \n\n\u201cKeep hanging on, kid. It\u2019s worth it. I love you.\u201d\n\nhttps://t.co/KBVdYglAlN\u201d— Roz Warren (@Roz Warren) 1555648097
And at an emotional ceremony honoring the writer's life just hours after her death, McKee's partner Sara Canning delivered a message of peace.
"Lyra's death must not be in vain," said Canning.
\u201cIncredible courage as Lyra's partner Sarah pays tribute to the 'love of her life'\u201d— Damien Edgar (@Damien Edgar) 1555681497
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