{"id":540526,"date":"2026-07-09T06:29:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-09T06:29:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/540526\/"},"modified":"2026-07-09T06:29:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-09T06:29:08","slug":"there-is-nothing-inevitable-about-a-united-ireland-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/540526\/","title":{"rendered":"There is nothing inevitable about a united Ireland \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Sir, \u2013 Your letter writer Eoin \u00d3 Murch\u00fa (\u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/opinion\/letters\/2026\/07\/07\/new-approach-to-a-united-ireland-needed\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/opinion\/letters\/2026\/07\/07\/new-approach-to-a-united-ireland-needed\/\">New approach to a united Ireland needed<\/a>\u201d, July 7th) writes of \u201cthe demographic changes affecting the North that will ultimately ensure a united Ireland\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \"> While the proportion of Catholics in Northern Ireland has edged up in recent years, the proportion of the electorate voting for nationalist parties has fallen. In the 2010 general election, the combined SDLP\/Sinn F\u00e9in vote was 42 per cent. This had fallen to 38.1 per cent in the 2024 general election.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Opinion polls in Northern Ireland show support for a united Ireland hovering around 35 per cent. This has changed little since the 2016 Brexit referendum. There is nothing inevitable about a united Ireland, despite many commentators saying this would come about as a result of demographic changes and Brexit. \u2013 Yours, etc,<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">EUGENE O\u2019DONOVAN,<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">London,<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">UK.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sir, \u2013 Your letter writer Eoin \u00d3 Murch\u00fa (\u201cNew approach to a united Ireland needed\u201d, July 7th) writes&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17772,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43,2443,3415],"class_list":["post-540526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news","tag-northern-ireland","tag-sinn-fein"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=540526"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540526\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17772"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=540526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=540526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=540526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}