Brexit: Support for Ireland staying in the EU hits record high of 92%, latest poll shows

Support for Ireland remaining in the European Union has reached near-unanimous levels in the Republic, with a solution to the Brexit border problem looking further off than ever.

A full 92 per cent of the Irish population now support staying in the EU, according to a new survey by pollsters Red C, with just 7 per cent supporting a theoretical “Irexit” and 1 per cent saying they don’t know.

The findings are likely to disappoint Brexiteers, some of whom have suggested Ireland might follow Britain’s march towards the exit door – and that Irish departure could be a way of solving the border question currently plaguing Brexit talks.

On the contrary, findings appear to show the experience of the Brexit process has further strengthened pro-EU sentiment in Ireland.

Though the country has long been overwhelmingly pro-EU, as recently as 2013, when Ireland faced deep austerity cuts, only 81 per cent of the country supported remaining.

At the start of Brexit negotiations in 2017, the figure supporting remain was 88 per cent, according to a comparable poll by the same firm.

This year’s poll however shows that support is now over 90 per cent in most age groups, with only those aged between 45 and 64 just below average at 88 per cent.

Among those aged 18-24 a full 97 per cent support EU membership, the highest figure of any cohort, while Dubliners are 96 per cent in favour. The lowest regional support is in the Connaught/Ulster statistical region, at 89 per cent – still an overwhelming figure.

Maybe the Irish should leave the EU

87 per cent of those polled believed Ireland had on balance benefited from EU membership, with just 10 per cent disagreeing. Unemployed people were less likely to agree, however, at 70 per cent.

Smaller majorities of people supported Ireland contributing more to the EU budget and joining in a future EU defence and security union.

Noelle O’Connell, executive director of European Movement Ireland, which commissioned the poll, said: “People are very clear that leaving the EU would not be in Ireland’s interests. However, there is understandable uncertainty about what changes Brexit will bring to Ireland, the border and the Ireland-UK trade relationship in the long term.

“Contrary to recent claims, at 92 per cent support for Ireland’s membership of the EU remains strong; in fact it is at an all-time high since we first undertook this poll in 2013.”

In August 2017 Nigel Farage urged Ireland to leave the EU. “Maybe the best thing for Ireland given that she’s stuck in the wrong currency, given that nearly all of her overseas business is denominated in dollars or sterling, maybe the Irish should leave the EU and then we could then work out our own terms between us,” he said.

Brexit threatens life on the Irish border: in pictures

15 show all Brexit threatens life on the Irish border: in pictures

1/15 John Murphy flies the European flag outside his home near the border village of Forkhill, Co Armagh Reuters

2/15 An abandoned shop is seen in Mullan, Co Monaghan. The building was home to four families who left during the Troubles. The town was largely abandoned after the hard border was put in place during the conflict. Mullan has seen some regeneration in recent years, but faces an uncertain future with Brexit on the horizon Reuters

3/15 Mervyn Johnson owns a garage in the border town of Pettigo, which straddles the counties of Donegal and Fermanagh. ‘I’ve been here since 1956, it was a bit of a problem for a few years. My premises has been blown up about six or seven times, we just kept building and starting again,’ Johnson said laughing. ‘We just got used to it [the hard border] really but now that it’s gone, we wouldn't like it back again’ Reuters

4/15 Farmer Gordon Crockett’s Coshquin farm straddles both Derry/Londonderry in the North and Donegal in the Republic. ‘At the minute there is no real problem, you can cross the border as free as you want. We could cross it six or eight times a day,’ said Crockett. ‘If there was any sort of obstruction it would slow down our work every day’ Reuters

5/15 A defaced ‘Welcome to Northern Ireland’ sign stands on the border in Middletown, Co Armagh Photography by Reuters/Clodagh Kilcoyne

6/15 Potter Brenda McGinn stands outside her Mullan, Co Monaghan, studio – the former Jas Boylan shoe factory which was the main employer in the area until it shut down due to the Troubles. ‘When I came back, this would have been somewhere you would have driven through and have been quite sad. It was a decrepit looking village,’ said McGinn, whose Busy Bee Ceramics is one of a handful of enterprises restoring life to the community. ‘Now this is a revitalised, old hidden village’ Reuters

7/15 Union Flag colours painted on kerbstones and bus-stops along the border village of Newbuildings, Co Derry/Londonderry Reuters

8/15 Grass reflected in Lattone Lough, which is split by the border between Cavan and Fermanagh, seen from near Ballinacor, Northern Ireland Reuters

9/15 Donegalman David McClintock sits in the Border Cafe in the village of Muff, which straddles Donegal and Derry/Londonderry Reuters

10/15 An old Irish phone box stands alongside a bus stop in the border town of Glaslough, Co Monaghan Reuters

11/15 Billboards are viewed from inside a disused customs hut in Carrickcarnon, Co Down, on the border with Co Louth in the Republic Reuters

12/15 Seamus McQuaid takes packages that locals on the Irish side of the border have delivered to his business, McQuaid Auto-Parts, to save money on postal fees, near the Co Fermanagh village of Newtownbutler. ‘I live in the south but the business is in the North,’ said McQaid. "I wholesale into the Republic of Ireland so if there’s duty, I’ll have to set up a company 200 yards up the road to sell to my customers. I’ll have to bring the same product in through Dublin instead of Belfast’ Reuters

13/15 A disused Great Northern Railway line and station that was for customs and excise on the border town of Glenfarne, Co Leitrim Reuters

14/15 Alice Mullen, from Monaghan in the Republic of Ireland, does her shopping at a former customs post on the border in Middletown, Co Armagh. ‘I’d be very worried if it was a hard border, I remember when people were divided. I would be very afraid of the threat to the peace process, it was a dreadful time to live through. Even to go to mass on a Sunday, you’d have to go through checkpoints. It is terribly stressful,’ said Mullen. ‘All those barricades and boundaries were pulled down. I see it as a huge big exercise of trust and I do believe everyone breathed a sigh of relief’ Reuters

15/15 A bus stop and red post box stand in the border town of Jonesborough, Co Armagh Reuters

He added that such a solution was one that “Irish politicians and bureaucrats and media types and experts couldn’t possibly contemplate”.

Ireland has been at the centre of Brexit talks in recent months while negotiations take place on how to solve a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic. The EU says Theresa May’s decision to leave the customs union and single market will necessitate a hard border, which both sides say they want to avoid because of the Good Friday Agreement.