Ireland’s former president Mary McAleese has warned that Brexit may lead to fresh divisions between communities and destroy the goodwill built up during the years of the peace process in Northern Ireland.
“It is retrieval that we’re into now, because if we’re talking about Britain withdrawing from the single European market, [and] withdrawing from the customs union...we know that no matter who says ‘Everything will be alright on the day,’ it won’t, because it has to change. And if the border hardens, I would be worried that hearts would harden too,” the former Irish president said speaking to The Tablet exclusively.
The Queen signed the Article 50 bill into law today (16 March), giving Theresa May the right to formally start talks with Brussels to leave the European Union. The Prime Minister has said that the “defining moment” will happen by the end of March.
McAleese said that as the UK prepares to withdraw from the European Union many of the “mechanisms and infrastructures” that it took to create the political relationships that brought about the Good Friday Agreement are about to be dismantled. “I don’t think that’s a good place for any of us to be in,” she added. Her hope is that Ireland has a “vested interest in ensuring that the relationship Britain maintains with the European Union is as strong as it can humanly be.”
The former president added that membership of the EU has played a huge part in improving relations between Britain and Ireland and that it was crucial at the time of the Good Friday agreement in 1998. Without it, she said, there might have been a different outcome to the vote in support of the peace process which took place in the both the Republic and Northern Ireland.
“I’m not sure, to be perfectly frank, if we had known at the time that Britain was going to pull out of the European Union and with it bring Northern Ireland out...that people south of the border would have been as quick to sign off on changing the Irish constitution, because it was easier to do that [as] we were all members of the European Union. It was an easier sell and nobody thought in terms of withdrawing from the EU, so now we are in a very, very different situation.”
Looking ahead to Pope Francis’ visit to Ireland next year for the World Meeting of Families, McAleese believes the pope will have to offer “something different” and not just repeat familiar statements on abortion and gay marriage, if the visit is to be a success.
“Given that we’ve been through the gay marriage referendum very successfully and that abortion will be an issue, this is the Ireland that he’s coming to. It’s a place that’s very confident in debating issues that previously might have been regarded as taboo but no longer are.”
The former president – who campaigned for a “Yes” vote ahead of the 2015 referendum which made Ireland the first country in the world to support same-sex marriage by popular vote – said the Pope has got to be “very careful” about how he handles the issue, because “it was hugely endorsed by Catholics. So there’s a need for reconciliation there.”
The most important part of the visit, she thinks, would be a trip to Northern Ireland, possibly to Armagh, the historical centre of Christianity in Ireland, although this has yet to be confirmed. The Pope’s presence there - and the reception he would receive – would be a “test of the credentials of the peace process, it will be a test of how embedded parity of esteem is,” she said.
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