Former taoiseach dismisses assurance from leave campaign, saying EU exit would be a catastrophe for Northern Ireland and Republic

Britain would have to reimpose border controls between Northern Ireland and the Republic if the UK votes to leave the EU, according to the former Irish prime minister who helped shape the Good Friday accords.



Bertie Ahern, who served as EU president during his three terms as taoiseach, said a post-Brexit reinforced border would be a catastrophe for north and south.

He also predicted that people traffickers would use the Republic’s1,970 miles (3170km) of coastline to smuggle migrants into the UK via the only land border Britain shares with an EU state.



In an interview with the Guardian, Ahern dismissed the assurances of Brexit Tories including the Northern Ireland secretary, Theresa Villiers, that there would be no new border controls or fortifications on Ireland if the UK votes to leave the EU.

“Villiers keeps telling us all the time that we have a common travel agreement from 1921 that ensures freedom of movement between Irish and British people across these islands. Yet her point is wholly irrelevant in a completely different from world from back then,” he said.

“We are not talking about freedom of movement between the Irish and the British. If the UK leave the EU we are talking about both EU citizens and non-EU nations still seeking a way into Britain. And the only land border between a post-Brexit Britain and the EU is on this island.”

Ahern said the logic of the leave camp in seeking to control immigration into the UK entailed strengthening the Irish border.

“If you follow the logic of the likes of Boris [Johnson] on the issue of immigration I cannot see any other way they can fulfil their promise to control the numbers coming into the UK unless they set up border controls between the north and south on this island. That would be a catastrophe in terms of business and the movement of people every single day north and south on the island,” he said.

“There are for example 200 unapproved rural roads linking the north and the south. Are the out camp seriously suggesting migrants won’t use these roads to get into Northern Ireland and then try to reach Britain?”

With regards trade, Ahern questioned the leave campaign’s assertion that Britain could easily seek out new markets in China, India and Brazil after Brexit.

“Here is something the people in the UK should remember. It is a fact that annual trade between Ireland and Britain is greater than the UK’s business with China and Brazil put together. Trading relations between Ireland and Britain are running at about €1bn a week. That is how important it is for both our countries to remain within the EU.”



Drawing on 30 years of experience in dealing with EU partners not only as taoiseach but firstly as Ireland’s minister for employment and later finance, Ahern said he watched successive UK governments fight and win for their country in Brussels.

As employment minister, Ahern helped negotiate the creation of the EU social charter on workers rights. He said he believed EU directives like the charter had been beneficial to both Irish and UK workers.



“The outers always go on negatively about EU directives but I am a great believer in the good that they have done. They gave maternity and paternity rights to workers as well as protecting the health and safety of employees across Europe. The directives helped clean up our beaches and ensured shops sold food hygienically. All these things were for the good of the Irish and British people as well as other Europeans,” he said.

