Common Ground

Evolving Islands: Ireland & Britain - a special series from The Irish Times exploring the complex relationship between the two

There is one other measure we could take to reduce deaths from road crashes

Ireland chooses to be an outlier in Europe by not operating a consultant-led helicopter emergency service that would bring life-saving expertise to the scene of an accident

By Justine McCarthyFri May 17 2024 - 06:00

Dublin-Monaghan attacks mattered less to Irish than Birmingham IRA atrocity, UK diplomat reported

Fifty years on from the bombings that killed 33 people, fresh research into contacts between Dublin and London shows the UK believed in 1974 the bombers had been detained

By Mark HennessyFri May 17 2024 - 06:00

A personal housing plan: Move to Newry, buy for €150,000 less, commute to Dublin

A commute from Newry two or three days a week could be worth it for millennials priced out of the Republic

By Jessica DoyleWed May 15 2024 - 06:00

One of the two main museums dedicated to memory of Great Famine has disappeared. That’s astonishing

That the world’s largest collection of visual art and printed materials relating to the Great Famine is in storage in America is a grim story of what happens when a nation fails to take ownership of a central part of its own history

By Fintan O'TooleTue May 14 2024 - 06:00

‘Change must come’: One man’s fight to end Northern Ireland’s segregated education

Just 8% of children in the North attend integrated schools. 90-year-old former priest David Rice says helping to change this is his final battle

By Mark HennessyTue May 14 2024 - 05:00

Northern Irish plan to improve Traveller children’s school outcomes ‘isn’t working’

Strategy that came into effect more than a decade ago is failing, says joint chairman of group behind it

By Luke ButterlySun May 12 2024 - 08:00

How an enigmatic, cross-dressing British spy became London’s emissary to Dublin in the second World War

Dudley Clarke was best known as British intelligence chief who devised the SAS but lesser known is his role advising De Valera’s government on how to fend off a feared German invasion

By Mark HennessySun May 12 2024 - 08:00

There’s too much death: Prospect of an ‘official’ British history of the Troubles is hurtful to families like mine

Injustice of the Legal Act has been compounded by the knowledge that nine historians will participate in this project, apparently oblivious to the trauma of families

By Karl O'HanlonSat May 11 2024 - 07:00

‘For a few weeks, the reliable machinery of suburban life shut down. There was no milk, no petrol, often no electricity’

During the dramatic two-week Ulster Workers’ Council strike in 1974, there was a sense of societal collapse

By Donald ClarkeSat May 11 2024 - 06:00

Official histories and public histories

Access to material and “awkward questions”

Sat May 11 2024 - 05:00

No line can be drawn under the Troubles for grieving families

Previous official histories of the Troubles have involved privileged access to files unavailable to others and the unhelpful policy looks set to continue

By Diarmaid FerriterFri May 10 2024 - 06:00

There’s an obvious solution to the migration row: compatible national identity cards for Ireland and Britain

Rights groups who raised valid objections to the intrusiveness of identity cards need to accept that ship has sailed - the alternative is Kafkaesque bureaucracy and racial profiling

By Newton EmersonThu May 09 2024 - 06:00

Peace Comes Dropping Slow by Denis Bradley: A no-frills account of the Troubles and its legacy

This book is quite the page-turner, a masterly and deeply moving account of a formative era in Ireland

By Marianne ElliottWed May 08 2024 - 05:00

London investors told Sinn Féin-led government would be ‘more New Labour than Corbyn Labour’

Group put together by Davy to meet finance spokesman Pearse Doherty included investors in government bonds, Irish banks and other businesses here

By Pat LeahyTue May 07 2024 - 06:00

A hard Border is now a patriotic cause - and we laughed at the British for that kind of nonsense

Giving these gifts to the 'Ireland is full' mob borders on the insane.

By Fintan O'TooleTue May 07 2024 - 06:00

‘It’s a gamble’: Can an official history of British policy during the Troubles really be done?

Nine historians who have agreed to participate in an official or public history of the Troubles have been subjected to a fierce backlash

By Ronan McGreevyTue May 07 2024 - 05:00

United Ireland would be the ‘most desirable outcome’, Bertie Ahern says

‘Hard yards’ required to demonstrate that unionists and their traditions would be respected, former taoiseach says in advance of New Ireland Commission event

Tue May 07 2024 - 00:01

‘No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs’: Irish Times readers recall seeing notorious signs in Britain

‘The cardboard was brown, the lettering was black, and each statement was in descending order from the top’

By Katie MellettMon May 06 2024 - 06:00

Maybe now the Irish Government will accept that the UK and unionists had a point about open borders

Britain and Ireland can at least agree on one thing: nobody wants to start talking about the border again

By Alex KaneSat May 04 2024 - 06:15

Legacy: The lesson of history teaches us that it is the powerful who control the story

Due to the controversial Legacy Act, which came into effect on May 1st, an inquest into any tragedy which took place during the Troubles can no longer take place in the North

By Freya McClementsSat May 04 2024 - 06:03

The talented Sinn Féin adviser moving South to guide strategy for Mary Lou McDonald

Stephen McGlade (44) is an accomplished Sinn Féin backroom operative with vast experience and a talent for looking to the future

By Freya McClementsSat May 04 2024 - 06:00

Costs of united Ireland would equal pain of the austerity years, economists say

Recently published report estimated cost for unification at €20bn a year for 20 years but this figure is contested

By Mark HennessyThu May 02 2024 - 20:54

Opinion: Cost of Irish reunification overblown and benefit underplayed

If done properly, redistribution will be from rich to middle and poor, not from the South to the North

By Brendan O'Leary and John DoyleThu May 02 2024 - 06:57

Farmers in North face major losses if UK-EU vet medicines deal fails, experts warn

Failure to reach a deal would be ‘unforgivable’, warns peer

By Mark HennessyTue Apr 30 2024 - 00:01

‘No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs’: How common were such notices in Britain?

Unthinkable: The only known photograph of such a sign is from an unknown source

By Joe HumphreysMon Apr 29 2024 - 05:00

Andrew Muir: Out and proud Stormont Minister in charge of Northern Ireland’s farming

‘To make a case for constitutional change in Northern Ireland, you should first show this region is successful, that people can doctor, can get a school place,’ says Andrew Muir

By Mark DevenportSun Apr 28 2024 - 00:00

Irish in London: ‘Nobody was making me stay. I could have left at any time and gone home to Sligo ... That was 24 years ago’

What brings the new generation of Irish emigrants to London, and what motivates them to come home?

By Bernadette FallonSat Apr 27 2024 - 05:00

Sinn Féin meets UK investors in London

Party has been attempting to soothe corporate anxieties over the prospect of it leading the next Government

By CantillonSat Apr 27 2024 - 05:00

Bandit Country author says IRA was ‘very clever’ using ‘machinery of the British state against the British state’

The book about South Armagh is being republished for the first time after 25 years with a few minor additions

By Mark HennessyMon Apr 22 2024 - 07:00

‘Northern Ireland is broken’: how a ‘toxic’ culture and better pay is enticing North’s doctors across the Border

Doctors in the North can earn two and a half times what they make with the NHS in the health service in the South

By Seanín GrahamSun Apr 21 2024 - 06:00

The story of the Irish in Britain comes ‘home home’

A new exhibition at the Irish Emigration Museum EPIC tells stories of many who left Ireland for Britain from early 70s onwards

By Mark HennessyThu Apr 18 2024 - 20:29

Simon Harris was right. Many southerners know London or Paris better than Belfast

Figures suggest a substantial share of the southern population may never have been north of the Border

By Newton EmersonThu Apr 18 2024 - 06:00

Harris says people of his generation more familiar with Berlin and Paris than Derry and Belfast

Taoiseach tells British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly Ireland is facing period of ‘extraordinary geopolitical uncertainty’

By Jack Horgan-JonesMon Apr 15 2024 - 21:46

‘He chose a different route’: Centenarian Troubles survivor Barney O’Dowd laid to rest

Man who lost two sons and a brother in loyalist attack achieved own justice ‘by outliving the forces that had sought to destroy him and his family’

By Martin DoyleMon Apr 15 2024 - 19:21

‘After a few thumps, they let go of me’: Veteran editor on covering the North from Troubles to today

Noel Doran singles out the murder of Patrick Kielty’s father in 1988 in influencing his outlook as editor of Irish News for 25 years

By Freya McClementsMon Apr 15 2024 - 06:00

Britain should not fear ‘an honest approach’ to past sins, says historian

Mistakes in dealing with terrorism in Northern Ireland are being repeated elsewhere, argues Prof Richard English in a new book

By Mark HennessyMon Apr 15 2024 - 06:00

Sinn Féin is now out of touch with its own supporters, claims Aontú leader

Mary Lou McDonald ‘wrong-footed’ on major issues as party seeks centre ground to secure majority, Tóibín tells podcast

By Mark HennessySat Apr 13 2024 - 12:21

It took leaving and returning for me to become a Derry girl

As a child, I feared not monsters under my bed but men in balaclavas. While many of my memories of the city were unhappy, I needed to return

By Elizabeth DaySat Apr 13 2024 - 07:00

‘It’s somewhat downplayed in Ireland – the trouble that the Troubles caused for the Irish living in Britain’

The Look Back to Look Forward exhibition at the Epic museum in Dublin traces the story of the Irish in Britain from the early 1970s to today

By Mark HennessySat Apr 13 2024 - 06:00

Joe Brolly and Sinn Féin are sick of experts. Have any of them heard of Brexit?

The united Ireland conversation involves listening to people who don’t agree with you and whose advice you don’t want to hear

By Pat LeahySat Apr 13 2024 - 06:00

Denis Bradley: ‘Partition doesn’t work, never has worked, never will work’

The former priest who played a key role in the peace process reflects on the backchannel that enabled dialogue between the IRA and the UK government

By Gerry MoriartySat Apr 13 2024 - 06:00

United Ireland: money should not be the deciding factor but nor should it be ignored

For more than 50 years, opinion polls in the South have suggested two-thirds wish to see a united Ireland, but that is qualified when money comes up

By Diarmaid FerriterFri Apr 12 2024 - 06:00

Harris holds first call with Sunak as Taoiseach but Troubles Legacy Act not discussed

Leaders of both countries hold ‘very good call’ before Taoiseach spoke to North’s First Minister and Deputy First Minister

By Cormac McQuinnWed Apr 10 2024 - 19:15

When it comes to the cost of Irish unity, maybe it’s okay if the heart overrules the head

Eight key points to bear in mind when weighing up the estimated €20.5 billion per year cost – and the benefits – of a united Ireland

By Bobby McDonaghWed Apr 10 2024 - 06:00

Wide gaps in education levels for workers in Northern Ireland and Republic – ESRI

Workers in Republic much more likely to be educated to at least degree level

By Mark HennessyWed Apr 10 2024 - 05:00

North’s ailing economy explains the high cost of unification

Regardless of the terms of disengagement by UK in any unification, there is no magic economic pill to bring NI up to standards down South

By Eoin Burke-KennedySun Apr 07 2024 - 11:00

Battle lines are being drawn in the escalating row over the cost of Irish reunification

Irish unity report highlights how analysis of the costs and potential pay-offs is now required

By Cliff TaylorSat Apr 06 2024 - 07:05

Can’t agree on the potential cost of a united Ireland? The Germans may have the answer

Germany’s experience is relevant to Ireland given the sharp differences that followed the publication of a report on unification costs

By Mark HennessyThu Apr 04 2024 - 20:19

Sinn Féin disputes findings of report suggesting united Ireland to cost €20bn annually

Donegal TD Pádraig Mac Lochlainn insists actual cost is less than headline figure in IIEA study

By Vivienne Clarke and Seanín GrahamThu Apr 04 2024 - 16:09

Price of united Ireland: Bringing North’s welfare up to scratch presents cost challenge

Irish unification will cost hundreds of billions over decades, according to a new economic report

By Mark HennessyThu Apr 04 2024 - 06:00

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