Don’t tell the jingoists, but the “great” in Great Britain is not some accolade of national superiority but a geographic term. As the island stretches over 80,000 square miles and the French peninsula of Britany only covers a bare 13,000, the word is a statement of the bleeding obvious, no matter what some Tory backwoodsmen might say.

Unfortunately, the effect, combined with national nostalgia over pink-painted globes results in a UK government, such as we now enjoy, who believes the country “punches above its weight”, merits a seat on the UN Security Council and deserves a ‘special relationship with the USA. For such reasons, the UK has severed ties with its neighbours and suffers an ignorance about them worse than anywhere else in Europe.

One explanation for this might be that the British have the lowest proportion of its people who can make any fist of a foreign language. Even after half a century in the EU, four out of five Brits who do visit Europe do so on a Mediterranean holiday, conducted entirely in English. They have such little contact with local culture that they find scant reason to dispute UK government claims that we dealt with Covid; saved people’s wallets; came out of recession better than anyone else. Were British media less parochial and tabloid-minded, the truth might have been revealed.

Even where no language barrier exists—with our closest neighbour, Ireland—the collective ignorance, led by Westminster silence on Irish success and prosperity studiously ignores the object lesson that modern statistics* teach. Many Brits still believe Ireland to be a Catholic-dominated Guinness-dark agricultural backwater where the young leave to find jobs.

Time we woke up and smelled the poteen.

Ireland’s population is blossoming. At 5.123 million, it is about to overtake Scotland. At $100,170, its GDP per capita is now DOUBLE the UK’s $46,510. Ireland exports goods worth $134,510 per capita—TEN times the UK figure of $13,360. And, while UK debt climbs toward $3 trillion on the back of $61.4 billion in borrowing each year ($910 per person), in contrast the Irish state enjoys an $8.45 billion SURPLUS—or $1,680 per person. The stats demolish Westminster post-Brexit bluster: average UK household income of £44,480, vs £76,110 in Ireland; national debt of 103% of UK GDP, while Ireland’s is 55%. The list just goes on.

No wonder the government stays shtum about this. A former colony, the first to break the bonds of empire doing better than the mother country? Unthinkable!

Britain may have Canary Wharf and Fintec, but very little else not associated with tourist tat these days. Meanwhile, Dublin boasts a dynamic tech sector filling disused warehouses along the lower Liffey. This was catalysed by the likes of Apple and Google being lured by incentives. The same tax breaks encouraged the likes of Starbucks and Amazon to site European HQs here. They’ve even pinched much of the financial business that escaped London after Brexit. 

Dublin is on a roll—a lively, liveable city, full of young enthusiasm, boasting an international airport that makes Heathrow look Heath-Robinson-esque and Edinburgh’s a down-market mall with a runway attached. One of its appeals is clearing US customs BEFORE boarding. And, being an hour closer, offer flights to ten US destinations, vs.  Edinburgh’s two.

While the SNP flails about trying to make a case for “indy”, it would do well to trumpet why our prospering neighbours are won’t reverse 1922 to don the shackles of this tired Union once again. Because Westminster certainly won’t.

*See Country Comparisons at: https://www.worlddata.info/country-comparison.php?country1=GBR&country2=IRL#economy

#1070—592 words