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Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald has said that there will be a united Ireland within 10 years, and tried to assure trade unionists that they would “remain British” if Northern Ireland voted to leave the UK.
In a YouTube interview with British journalist and left-wing activist Owen Jones, McDonald said: “We will do it in the next decade. In fact, we will do so in this decade. This is the decade of opportunity. “
She predicted: “We can have our referendum, we can win it, and we can win it well.”
“We have citizens who are British … they are British in a divided Ireland and they will be British in a united Ireland.”
He called on trade unionists to get involved in discussions on a united Ireland and said that “we have a great deal of preparatory work to do for an orderly constitutional transition.”
He urged trade unionists “not to equate the reunification project with threat or loss … it has to be about gain or additionality.”
“I would tell our unionist friends ‘be part of this conversation.’ I respect the fact that trade unionists themselves are better able to articulate their needs, ideas and concerns around a reunified Ireland much better than I am as an Irish Republican woman. I think we need to make room for that conversation … We need to recognize each other, we need to appreciate each other. “
He said Irish reunification was not a Sinn Féin project. “This is a national project and it belongs to everyone.”
Ms. McDonald also said that the approach of the Taoiseach and its predecessor was to say “now is not the time, don’t talk about reunification, don’t talk about the referendum.”
“I think this is a mistake, I don’t think that will comfort anyone, including our unionist brothers and sisters, because I think it is clear that the winds of change are blowing. There is no point sticking your head in the sand. “
She said the responsibility was to plan for a united Ireland and have a citizens’ assembly to discuss the issue. “I would say now is the game, let’s talk, let’s plan, let’s listen to each other”
He said the threshold was “50 percent plus one,” and “once that is achieved, there will be a constitutional change, so we are going to design it together.”
Ms McDonald said the European project had lost “beyond all doubt”, but that Brexit had put the issue of Irish unity “front and center”.
The Irish unity, he said, was a “common sense approach … the best plan for the people who live on this island.”
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