Eirexit: are we ever likely to see the day?

World of Politics with Harry McGee – harrymcgee@gmail.com

Hibexit. Eirexit. Irxit. Celtexit. Gaelexit.  It just doesn’t roll so easily off the tongue as Brexit. But at some stage in the future we are going to have to coin a portmanteau word to capture it.

Until now most of the energies of the authorities in this State have been expended on two distinct actions. The first has been giving strong backing at Government level to the Remain campaign. The second has been trying to mobilise the 400,000 or so Irish-born residents in Britain to vote to remain.

When you speak to Government politicians they adopt the pose of sports manager. Specifically when you ask what’s going to happen in the event of a Leave vote, they more or less tell you that losing is not an option.

But it is. And looking increasingly so. Any one who reads this column on a regular basis knows that I have a bit of an issue with opinion polls. They are crude and blunt, but not as crude and blunt when it comes to contests involving straight binary choices like we have in referendums: yes or no. When you have a general election, it is all the different choices (all those parties, all those candidates) that can distort.

Polls also become increasingly accurate the closer you get to polling date. And with little over a fortnight to go, it is as plain as a pikestaff (as the late editor of this newspaper John Cunningham loved to say) that the momentum has swung behind the Leave campaign. What was even-steven or a one-point gap last week has now stretched out to three or four. With the percentage of undecideds now dropping, it is beginning to look a little ominous.

Like most referendum campaigns, fear has been the biggest weapon deployed by both sides. Over the weekend, the leadership of the major parties came together jointly to advocated a Yes vote. The prime minster David Cameron said an Exit vote would set off an economic bomb over Britain from which it would take a long time to recover.

On the other side, the Leave campaign sent out an emotive statement that pandered to just about every prejudice about barmy Brussels bureaucrats, the uncaring EU and pesky foreigners. It said that at least 50 serious criminals were still in UK prisons because EU rules forbad their deportation.

It was a specious release but boy did it have traction. All of the Tory-supporting media organisations (The Times, the Telegraph, the Sun and the Mail) bigged up the story. Those campaigning to remain were forced to defend the practice.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.