Ireland’s Future cannot belong to Irish Tories

While welcoming some aspects of the recent open letter released by the Civic Nationalist group ‘Ireland’s Future’ as a worthy breakthrough in opening up and publicising the debate surrounding Irish Unity; as Left wing Republicans Yes For Unity have no option but to be highly critical of its content.

YesForUnity was established to ensure that the needs and voice of the Irish Working Class would be fully represented within the Irish Unity campaign and to ensure that a post partition Ireland would provide a positive political and socio-economic impact for the majority of people of Ireland.

While we understand that Civic Nationalism must operate entirely within the strict confines of the current constitutional arrangements, and while we understand that the elected Irish Government will inevitably play an important role in ending partition, we cannot allow capitalism and the free state government to become the ‘gate keepers’ of Irish Unity and monopolise the entire process therein.

A United Ireland that benefits the majority of people in this country will not be created with a pro-austerity, pro-privatisation, anti-working class government at the centre of the process…

How can we hope to win any future debate and referendum if the designers of the future United Ireland do not wish to facilitate the needs of the majority of the people?

While we fully agree that there needs to be an open conversation on what we want our future country to look like, we also believe that the Irish Unity community should enter that conversation armed with the basic demands for an All Ireland National Health Service, an All Ireland Nationalised Housing Authority and an All Ireland Education Authority which provides free education to all.

None of the above will be achievable if the likes of Fine Gael and the pro austerity business community are the centre of the Irish unification process.

Yes For Unity assert that the Irish working class; the majority of Ireland, must be at the centre of planning for our future, thus ensuring true socio-economic and political equality at the core of a post partition Ireland.

Yes For Unity are not in the business of campaigning to swap a British Tory Government with an Irish Tory government.