Integrate new citizens swiftly for sake of unity

Your editorial on Dec 29 said that despite the economic problems of recent years, the circumstances in this country “are enviable when compared to the lot of billions of people around the world”.

Those conditions are partly why 36,000 people born outside of this country received Irish citizenship in the past two years. The editorial contextualised that by saying that the Plantation of Ulster in the early 1600s, which “changed the face of Ireland forever, involved fewer than 20,000 adults”.

The million people in the north-east, who are the descendants of those who came here 400 years ago, are not anxious to receive Irish citizenship.

During most of that period they had the power, and they abused it.

But it can be argued that the Good Friday Agreement, signed nearly a decade and half ago and supported by a big majority vote on this island, drew a line under all that.

How far we have to go, however, is highlighted by the time, effort, and energy that both communities in Northern Ireland put into a row about the number of days a particular flag flies over a certain building in Belfast.

Let us hope that we, in this democratic republic, do not abuse our power, and hope also that we integrate our new citizens faster.

A Leavy

Sutton

Dublin 13