Living with the European Union: The Northern Ireland Experience

218 Pages·1999·0.81 MB·English

by  Dennis Kennedy

Living with the
European Union
The Northern Ireland Experience
Edited by
Dennis Kennedy
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Living with the European Union
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Also by Dennis Kennedy
THE WIDENING GULF: Northern Attitudes to the Independent Irish State,
1919–49
NORTHERN IRELAND AND THE EUROPEAN UNION (co-editor)
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Living with the
European Union
The Northern Ireland Experience
Edited by
Dennis Kennedy
Lecturer
Institute of European Studies
Queen’s University
Belfast
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First published in Great Britain 2000 by
MACMILLAN PRESS LTD
Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and London
Companies and representatives throughout the world
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 0–333–75380–1
First published in the United States of America 2000 by
ST. MARTIN’S PRESS, INC.,
Scholarly and Reference Division,
175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010
ISBN 0–312–22545–8
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Living with the European Union : the Northern Ireland experience /
edited by Dennis Kennedy.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0–312–22545–8 (cloth)
1. European Union—Northern Ireland. 2. Northern Ireland–
–Economic conditions. I. Kennedy, Dennis, 1936– .
HC240.25.N75S87 1999
330.9416'0824—dc21 99–25940
CIP
Selection, editorial matter and Chapters 1 and 8 © Dennis Kennedy 2000
Chapters 2–7, 9 © Macmillan Press Ltd 2000
All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made
without written permission.
No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written per-
mission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or
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Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1P 0LP.
Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to crim-
inal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
The authors have asserted their rights to be identified as the authors of this work in accordance
with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained
forest sources.
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Printed and bound in Great Britain by
Antony Rowe Ltd, Chippenham, Wiltshire
KENFM.QXD 6/30/99 6:23 PM Page v
Contents
List of Tables and Figures vi
Preface viii
Notes on the Contributors ix
1 Introduction: Portrait of a Region 1
Dennis Kennedy
2 A Region among Regions: the Wider View 17
Thomas Christiansen
3 Europe and the Northern Ireland Economy 38
Graham Gudgin
4 Changing Scene: EU Impact on the Rural Economy 71
John Davis
5 Trading Partners: Northern Ireland’s External
Economic Links 94
Esmond Birnie
6 For Richer or Poorer: the Social Impact 115
Quintin Oliver
7 European Rules and a Changing Environment 128
J. S. Furphy
8 Europe and the Northern Ireland Problem 148
Dennis Kennedy
9 The European Connection and Public Opinion 169
M. L. Smith
Index 197
v
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List of Tables and Figures
TABLES
3.1 Average annual expenditure by EC Structural
Funds in NI 48
3.2 UK net contribution to the budget of the EC 53
3.3 Operational programmes 1989–94 CSF 57
3.4 Sub programmes under Agricultural Development OP 59
3.5 Total impact of CSF expenditure in Northern Ireland 61
3.6 A comparison of the impact of individual
CSF programmes 62
3.7 Share of EC12 in manufactured exports 68
5.1 Unemployment and GDP per capita in NI and
the Republic of Ireland compared to the rest
of the EU, 1994–5 96
5.2 Northern Ireland manufacturing sector 98
5.3 Northern Ireland manufacturing sales growth 99
5.4 Trade between NI and The Republic of Ireland 103
5.5 Relative importance of foreign owned manufacturing
plants in NI and Great Britain 105
5.6 Development of large PLCs; NI compared to
small European economies, 1997 106
5.7 Largest NI controlled manufacturing firms compared to
the three largest Republic of Ireland companies 107
5.8 Ownership of the top 100 companies in NI and RoI 108
9.1a How do you think of your country’s membership
of the EC? 173
9.1b Would you say your country has benefited
from the EC? 174
9.2 Respondents who think the UK should continue
to be a member of the EC 175
9.3 GB respondents saying as a member state, the UK’s
relationship with the EC should be 175
9.4 GB respondents saying closer links with the EC
would make the UK … 176
9.5 Respondents saying as a member state, the UK’s
relationship with the EC should be … 178
vi
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List of Tables and Figures vii
9.6 Would closer links with the EC make the UK … 179
9.7 How do you think of your country’s membership
of the EC? 181
9.8 Respondents’ views on the future of the
pound in the EC 186
9.9 Should the UK do all it can to unite fully
with the EC? 188
9.10 Respondents’ views on the future of the
pound in the EC 190
9.11 Respondents’ views on whether the UK should
do all it can to unite fully with the EC 192
9.12 Attitudes to Europe among the 18–24,
45–54 and 65+ age groups 193
9.13 Political party identifiers’ views that the UK
should do all it can to unite fully with the EC,
by age groups 194
FIGURES
3.1 GDP per person, Northern Ireland as per cent
of the EC average (EC12) 40
3.2 Unemployment rates in NI, UK and EC12 42
3.3 Growth of GDP in Northern Ireland, UK and EC12 44
3.4 Growth in employment in Northern Ireland,
UK and EC12 45
3.5 EC Structural Funds (£m 1996 prices) 48
3.6 EC Structural Funds as per cent of public
expenditure in NI 50
3.7 The financing of public expenditure 50
3.8 EC Structural Funds as per cent of external funding
of public expenditure in Northern Ireland 51
3.9 The components of EC subsidies to NI agriculture 65
3.10 EC agricultural payments as per cent of total
farm income in NI 66
4.1 Agricultural land prices in the United Kingdom 83
9.1 Respondent’s views on whether the UK should
do all it can to unite fully with the EC 184
9.2 Respondents’ views on increasing or reducing
the powers of the EC 185
9.3 Respondents’ view on the powers of the EC,
by political party 189
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Preface
Much of the material for this book originated in a conference held at
Queen’s University, Belfast, in February 1998, to consider Northern
Ireland’s experience over 25 years as a region within the European
Union. In addition to the named contributors, the editor wishes to
thank Mr John Simpson, of the European Economic and Social
Committee, and Dr James Magowan, formerly of the Brussels office of
the Northern Ireland Centre in Europe. Thanks are also due to
Catherine Madden, Manager of the Resource Centre in the Institute of
European Studies at Queen’s University, for her help in organising the
material and preparing the manuscript.
While the terms ‘European Community’ and ‘European Union’ are
technically distinct they have become interchangeable in common
usage. In this work the term European Union or EU is generally pre-
ferred, except where the context clearly indicates otherwise, or where
the source quoted uses European Community or EC, as is the case with
Eurobarometer and some other tables.
Belfast DENNIS KENNEDY
viii
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Notes on the Contributors
Esmond Birnie is Lecturer in Economics, Queen’s University, Belfast.
He was elected in 1998 to the new Northern Ireland Assembly.
Educated at Cambridge University, he worked as Research Assistant at
the Northern Ireland Economic Research Centre, 1986–9. He is author
of several comparative studies on Northern Ireland and other regions
of the European Union.
Thomas Christiansen is Jean Monnet Lecturer in European Studies in
the Department of International Politics at the University of Wales,
Aberystwyth. He holds degrees in international relations and west
European politics from the London School of Economics and did his
doctoral research at the European University Institute in Florence. He
has published on the European Commission, the role of subnational
governments in the integration process and institutional reform of the
European Union as well as on theoretical and normative questions of
European governance.
John Davis is Director of the Centre for Rural Studies, Queen’s
University, Belfast, and Head of the Department of Agriculture and
Food Economics. Director of Economic Research, Department of
Agriculture for Northern Ireland. Educated at Queen’s University,
Belfast, and the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, he is former
President of the Agricultural Economics Society of Ireland and current
Honorary National Secretary of the British Agricultural Economics
Society. He has published extensively on agriculture and rural affairs in
Ireland and elsewhere. His most recent work dealt with the BSE crisis
and its economic impact.
J. S. Furphy is former Chief Conservation Officer in the Department of
the Environment for Northern Ireland (1965–97), in charge of all
aspects of nature and countryside conservation, including the prepara-
tion of legislation. He was responsible for numerous surveys in
Northern Ireland on behalf of the British Trust for Ornithology. He has
an honours degree in geography from Queen’s University, Belfast.
Graham Gudgin is Director of the Northern Ireland Economic Research
Centre since its establishment in 1985. He was appointed, on second-
ment (1998), as special economic adviser to the First Minister of
ix