Irish immigrants unleash wave of British bigotry

ANTI-IRISH sentiment in 1970s Britain made its way to the Taoiseach’s office in letters written by British citizens disgruntled at the number of Irish immigrants arriving to work there.

One particularly irate correspondent, a Mr H Whitfield from Cheshire, wrote several times in 1973 during Liam Cosgrave’s time in office, to urge him to stop “sub-standard peasant type Eirean immigrants flooding into Englande”.

Mr Whitfield was critical of the Catholic Church’s role in Irish affairs, expressing alarm at the number of “rosary beads and virgin mary statues” the “Eirean peasants” were bringing into England.