David Campbell: Unionism can learn a lot from results of Irish presidential election - the notion of holding a border poll now has little or no merit

The combined left coalition led by Sinn Fein that united around Connolly saw its percentage share of the poll drop by a third compared to the Dail election.

Whilst the focus has been on Fianna Fail mismanagement and the future of taoiseach Micheal Martin, it is difficult to see how the McDonald-O’Neill leadership of Sinn Fein can be sustained much longer.

Secondly, the anti-Protestant tone of the election campaign and at times the outright nasty sectarianism that was witnessed will not be lost on the Protestant-unionist population of Northern Ireland.

The leopard has not changed its spots and the brutally cold sentiment against the former British population of what is now the Republic of Ireland is still all too evident.

The ‘shared island’ policy of the Irish government would appear to extend little further than Iveagh House.

One unintended consequence, however, is that the notion of holding a border poll now has little or no merit.

The question of leaving the United Kingdom for some form of united Ireland would be heavily defeated in Northern Ireland and I suspect it would have difficulty passing even in the Republic.

Unionism can never become complacent, however.

Already the attempts to introduce voting in at least this election for Irish passport-holders in Northern Ireland continues apace.

But let us be clear on this point.

For the Irish Republic to grant such a franchise would be a clear and profound breach of the sovereignty provisions of the Belfast Agreement and would effectively be a re-establishment of the Republic’s territorial claim over Northern Ireland.

I have no issue with countries providing voting rights for their citizens and taxpayers who are transient residents of third countries when elections at home occur.

Indeed, as Honorary Consul for the Republic of Turkiye, I have regularly facilitated Turkish residents of Northern Ireland, where they are in Northern Ireland legally, of voting in important Turkish elections.

It is entirely different to offer a vote to citizens of the United Kingdom who happen to have an Irish passport but who have no domicile (and probably never have had) in the Republic of Ireland.

To change this, as nationalists are clamouring for, would distort democracy in both jurisdictions and would kill the Belfast Agreement.

The United Kingdom government and the Irish government, as co-guarantors of the agreement, must quickly and decisively rule out any such change.

In some ways this is a road we have travelled before. Early in the first Stormont Assembly, senior Sinn Fein MLAs attempted to also stand for Dail seats, no doubt in an attempt to create an illusion of political unity.

The United Kingdom government quickly legislated to prevent such a perversion of democracy.

The sovereignty provisions in the agreement are not just words.

They represent the core protection for unionists now and in the future and in many ways were the main achievement of David Trimble and the Ulster Unionist Party.

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l David Campbell is a former UUP negotiator and chairman