Emigration played ‘key role’ in Anglo-Irish Agreement

Garret FitzGerald used Ireland’s long history of emigration to gain an advantage over Margaret Thatcher during often tense negotiations over the 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement, his son has revealed.

Garrett’s grandfather Patrick FitzGerald, a labourer, emigrated to London in the 1850s or 1860s. The great-grandfather of Ronald Regan, the president of the US at the time the Anglo-Irish agreement was signed, and a close ally of Thatcher, also left for London around this time, and afterwards migrated to the US.

Garret’s father Desmond, who was minister for external affairs after Irish independence, was born in London.