Unionist reaction to the recent announcement that Fianna Fáil will organise in the north is both predictable and revealing. Fianna Fáil's lack of interest in the unionist squawking is also revealing, insofar as it demonstrates that unionism is essentially marginal to their thinking.
Predictably, the unionists are jumping up and down in anger at the thought of any 'southern' party having the cheek to organise in 'their' area. This reaction is one of unionism's oldest and stalest responses. As on other occasions, they have tried to threaten everyone else with dire consequences if Fianna Fáil goes ahead. Their main weapon, expressed by UUP leader Reg Empey, is a crude and badly formulated threat to stop working the current arrangements. As Empey puts it: "the prospect of Fianna Fáil ministers being in both the NI Executive and the Dublin government could put unbearable strain on the political process before it has had a chance to settle down". That little sentence contains both the unionist threat, and the unionist hope. Firstly, that 'unbearable strain' may break the current arrangements – in other words, the unionists may withdraw from them, but without any apparent idea of what consequences that would have. And the 'settling down' Empey refers to, reflects unionism's last shred of hope for its future – that the current arrangements in some way are a 'settlement', rather than a way station.
Alex Kane, a UUP strategist, followed his leader's example with a column in the Newsletter on 19 September, in which he complained that: "these proposals undermine the overriding purpose of removing Articles 2 and 3 – which was to reassure unionists that both sides, across Ireland and in Northern Ireland, could co-exist within their own clearly defined geographical and constitutional territories". This interpretation of the changes to Articles 2 and 3 is novel, at least. It is also, of course, wrong. The new Articles 2 and 3 merely make national unity an aspiration; they certainly do not promise that any party will stay on one or other side of the fence. If Kane really believes that the changes to the Constitution signified the abandonment of the aspiration to unity, then the UUP needs a better strategist!
Kane goes on to say that "Mr Ahern was sticking his nose in where it wasn't wanted", though surely this will be decided by the voters of northern Ireland, and not just by Mr Kane!
Revealingly, Kane also says that and that "the Irish prime minister (sic) seems to have decided that the Belfast Agreement isn't the concluding part of the peace process that some of us believed it to be". Again, this sentence tells us that the unionists really hoped that the GFA was the last word, despite the very wording of the Agreement which clearly indicates the next steps that may be taken along the road to Irish unity.
Lastly, and in the thinly veiled manner of unionist threats, Kane hints at violence: "It is a move which could have very serious, dangerous and violent consequences". For a people who have claimed to be law abiding and peaceful, unionists are never slow to hint at a violent reaction if they don't get their own way.
The unionist over-reaction to Fianna Fáil's perfectly legitimate decision to organise in the north tells us several things – firstly that unionism is still desperately clinging to the fast-sinking notion that the GFA is a 'final settlement', secondly that unionism still believes it can bluster and threaten everyone else with refusals to play the game, and thirdly, that when it realises that its tantrums are getting it nowhere, unionism still feels that it is acceptable to threaten violence.
Thursday 20 September 2007
Friday 14 September 2007
Phoney war, or phoney peace?
At the start of the second World War, from the declaration of war by France and Britain up to the German invasion of France and the Low Countries on 10 May 1940, there was a period during which neither side had yet committed to launching a significant attack, and there was relatively little fighting on the ground. This period became known as the Phoney War.
In Northern Ireland the same thing is happening, but it is not yet clear whether it is a phoney war or a phoney peace. Both sides have signed up to power-sharing, but on the unionist side at least they have not yet committed to any significant compromises with their nationalist 'partners'. On the contrary, there have been numerous examples of unionists, particularly from the DUP, sniping at the 'enemy'; from trying to rubbish Sinn Féin's proposals for tax varying powers, to criticising the plans for a stadium at the Maze, to dismissing the idea of a united Ireland as an "impossible myth", to trying to block an Irish Language Act, and so on.
Meanwhile the real battle has not even started, or at least not yet publicly. The Executive has not yet agreed its Programme for Government, and one can only imagine the discussions that are going on behind closed doors to try to find a Programme that both sides will sign up to. As so often, the DUP is busy painting itself into a corner – by publicly sniping at suggestions from Sinn Féin, they are limiting their own room for manoeuvre. If they think that Sinn Féin are going to accept a Programme for Government that contains only DUP-friendly proposals, then they are showing political immaturity. The Programme for Government will have to have as much in it for Sinn Féin as for the DUP, and will probably have to contain things that DUP MLAs have publicly denounced. Where will they then stand? Will they eat humble pie, or will they desert the party, as so many lower-level members have already done? Will they join Jim Allister's planned new party?
One thing is for certain – once the Programme for Government is published the phoney war (or phoney peace) will end. The sniping will have to cease, because the Programme will be a Programme for the whole Executive, DUP included. Either the snipers will split the DUP, leading to an all-out (political) war, or they will be silenced and marginalised and all-out peace may break out, complete with officially sanctioned republican-friendly policies, and fully functioning North-South Ministerial structures. The next few months promise to be interesting!
In Northern Ireland the same thing is happening, but it is not yet clear whether it is a phoney war or a phoney peace. Both sides have signed up to power-sharing, but on the unionist side at least they have not yet committed to any significant compromises with their nationalist 'partners'. On the contrary, there have been numerous examples of unionists, particularly from the DUP, sniping at the 'enemy'; from trying to rubbish Sinn Féin's proposals for tax varying powers, to criticising the plans for a stadium at the Maze, to dismissing the idea of a united Ireland as an "impossible myth", to trying to block an Irish Language Act, and so on.
Meanwhile the real battle has not even started, or at least not yet publicly. The Executive has not yet agreed its Programme for Government, and one can only imagine the discussions that are going on behind closed doors to try to find a Programme that both sides will sign up to. As so often, the DUP is busy painting itself into a corner – by publicly sniping at suggestions from Sinn Féin, they are limiting their own room for manoeuvre. If they think that Sinn Féin are going to accept a Programme for Government that contains only DUP-friendly proposals, then they are showing political immaturity. The Programme for Government will have to have as much in it for Sinn Féin as for the DUP, and will probably have to contain things that DUP MLAs have publicly denounced. Where will they then stand? Will they eat humble pie, or will they desert the party, as so many lower-level members have already done? Will they join Jim Allister's planned new party?
One thing is for certain – once the Programme for Government is published the phoney war (or phoney peace) will end. The sniping will have to cease, because the Programme will be a Programme for the whole Executive, DUP included. Either the snipers will split the DUP, leading to an all-out (political) war, or they will be silenced and marginalised and all-out peace may break out, complete with officially sanctioned republican-friendly policies, and fully functioning North-South Ministerial structures. The next few months promise to be interesting!
Tuesday 3 July 2007
A twenty year countdown?
Readers of this blog will be aware that the unionist majority in Northern Ireland is dwindling, and that within a generation Protestants will be a minority of the population. Evidence of these trends is visible in a number of different areas:
- the unionist majority that has, on several occasions, fallen below 50% of the overall vote,
- the clear downward trend in the unionist proportion of the vote, and the clear upward trend of the nationalist proportion,
- the fact that Protestants make up much fewer than half of schoolchildren,
- the fact that Protestants make up two-thirds of the elderly (and thus two-thirds of all deaths)
- the fact that fertility rates in Catholic areas are still higher than those in Protestant areas,
- the fact that more than half of all religious weddings now take place in Catholic churches,
- the concern of unionist politicians about the 'Protestant brain drain' amongst university students
… and so on.
This blog has pointed out (and here and here and here and here) that these trends will not have an overnight effect. Each year only a tiny proportion of the Northern Irish population is born, or dies, or goes to university in England. The best estimate that can be made, taking all of the visible trends into account, is that Northern Ireland will have a Catholic majority by around 2020, but will have to wait a few more years until there is a Catholic majority of the electorate (as the majority Catholic children of 2020 will still not have a vote).
It seems that this blog is not alone in its analysis.
On 29 June 2007 The Newsletter quoted a "senior Irish government source" as saying that "they did not expect the constitutional position of Northern Ireland to be raised again for 20 to 25 years". And "one senior Irish source told the News Letter: There is no appetite or plans in Dublin to get into an Irish unity debate in five years' time or anything like that." This, the Newsletter misinterpreted as a complete lack of interest in Irish unity by the south - indeed it titled its article 'United Ireland 'off the agenda'.
The Dublin government was quick to refute this. In the Irish Times of 3 July 2007, a Department of Foreign Affairs spokesman said that "the Government's position on Irish unity remains unchanged". The spokesman said that the Government's position had been clearly outlined by the Taoiseach in his Westminster speech last May when he had said that "As an Irish republican, it is my passionate hope that we will see the island of Ireland united in peace."
The Dublin government is far from stupid. It knows, as does this blog, that there will not be either a Catholic or a nationalist majority in five years time (or even in 2016), and so has no intention of pushing for a border poll that would be lost. However, the demographic changes that are already underway will deliver both a Catholic majority, and a nationalist majority, in about "20 to 25 years", exactly the time period foreseen by the Dublin government for 'raising the constitutional position of Northern Ireland again'.
Friday 22 June 2007
2005 Labour Force Survey Religion Report
The 2005 Labour Force Survey (LFS) Religion Report has just been published by the Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister (OFMDFM). It can be downloaded from:
http://www.ofmdfmni.gov.uk/lfs-religion-report-2005.pdf
It is full of tables and graphs showing every permutation possible of age, gender, economic activity, and of course religion. As such it is a fascinating source of information on how many workers, unemployed people, and so on, are either Catholic, Protestant or 'other'.
The statistics revealing that Catholics are, for example, more likely to be unemployed than Protestants, or more likely to be students, are interesting, but for the purposes of this blog the key statistic is the breakdown of the overall working-age population by religion. The LFS doesn't cover school kids, so its figures for the Catholic proportion of the overall population 16+ are probably lower than the whole cradle-to-grave population. A further point to note is that the LFS is based on a sample, and so the figures vary quite a lot from one year to the next. Nonetheless, the overall trends revealed by the LFS are quite clear:
http://www.ofmdfmni.gov.uk/lfs-religion-report-2005.pdf
It is full of tables and graphs showing every permutation possible of age, gender, economic activity, and of course religion. As such it is a fascinating source of information on how many workers, unemployed people, and so on, are either Catholic, Protestant or 'other'.
The statistics revealing that Catholics are, for example, more likely to be unemployed than Protestants, or more likely to be students, are interesting, but for the purposes of this blog the key statistic is the breakdown of the overall working-age population by religion. The LFS doesn't cover school kids, so its figures for the Catholic proportion of the overall population 16+ are probably lower than the whole cradle-to-grave population. A further point to note is that the LFS is based on a sample, and so the figures vary quite a lot from one year to the next. Nonetheless, the overall trends revealed by the LFS are quite clear:
- The Protestant proportion of the population aged 16+ is dropping, and the Catholic proportion is rising,
- Between the ages of 16-24 there are more Catholics than Protestants (and this has probably been the case since around the year 2000),
- The population aged 60+ is still around two-thirds Protestant,
- The number of Catholics who are full-time students is considerably higher than the number of Protestants (providing fuel, of course, for the 'Protestant brain drain' worries of the unionists),
- A considerably higher proportion of Catholic households have dependent children, than Protestant households, and they have more of them.
All of which adds up to the inescapable conclusion that there is already a Catholic majority under the age of 24, and it is going to continue (look at the dependent children). As these young Catholics grow up, they will increasingly replace the older Protestants who are dying at double the rate of Catholics. The Catholic students will, as has been shown in other blogs here, tend to stay in Northern Ireland, thereby ensuring that the professions and the top echelons of business and administration will become majority Catholic.
The geographic split (also shown in the LFS) shows clearly that the areas of Protestant majority are shrinking back to the old areas of north Down and south Antrim colonised by Hamilton and Montgomery before the official Plantation, but with the added factor of a soon-to-be-majority-Catholic Belfast in the middle.
Thursday 21 June 2007
They must be getting REALLY worried ... !
On top of all of the other references to the (Protestant) 'brain drain' that are blogged below, the concerned unionist Tom Elliott MLA was reported in the Newsletter on 20 June 2007 as being "shocked to discover just how many more Roman Catholics are staying in the Province to study - suggesting a Protestant brain drain".
Poor Mr Elliott has inadvertently let the cat out of the bag. It is not the 'brain drain' per se that unionists are concerned about, but only the protestant brain drain. As the media-unsavvy Mr Elliott went on to say, "This is an important issue as many of these students who travel to mainland universities do not return to work in the Province". Of course, as previously pointed out, what really vexes him is that they do not return to vote in Northern Ireland.
If Mr Elliott was commenting on a report by an employers' organisation complaining of skills shortages in a booming economy, then his concern for the 'non-returners' might be reasonable. But he isn't, he is making a petty, sectarian point that illustrates the level of worry that is starting to permeate the unionist establishment.
It seems that their years of denying the inevitability of demographic change are starting to give way to anger; if they continue to follow the classic model of sequential stages of grief (for their dead Project Ulster), then we can look forward to bargaining, depression and finally acceptance. Some may argue that the Good Friday Agreement, and the St Andrews diktat, were a form of bargaining, but there is little evidence that the DUP has really accepted the need to bargain. Maybe the next few years might see the beginnings of some real bargaining in the Assembly and Executive - however since the demographic changes cannot be 'bargained' away, the next stage - depression - is almost an inevitability for poor unionism. Acceptance will probably come sometime during the 2020's, when unionism is a political minority with an age-profile that will ensure that it has no future.
Poor Mr Elliott has inadvertently let the cat out of the bag. It is not the 'brain drain' per se that unionists are concerned about, but only the protestant brain drain. As the media-unsavvy Mr Elliott went on to say, "This is an important issue as many of these students who travel to mainland universities do not return to work in the Province". Of course, as previously pointed out, what really vexes him is that they do not return to vote in Northern Ireland.
If Mr Elliott was commenting on a report by an employers' organisation complaining of skills shortages in a booming economy, then his concern for the 'non-returners' might be reasonable. But he isn't, he is making a petty, sectarian point that illustrates the level of worry that is starting to permeate the unionist establishment.
It seems that their years of denying the inevitability of demographic change are starting to give way to anger; if they continue to follow the classic model of sequential stages of grief (for their dead Project Ulster), then we can look forward to bargaining, depression and finally acceptance. Some may argue that the Good Friday Agreement, and the St Andrews diktat, were a form of bargaining, but there is little evidence that the DUP has really accepted the need to bargain. Maybe the next few years might see the beginnings of some real bargaining in the Assembly and Executive - however since the demographic changes cannot be 'bargained' away, the next stage - depression - is almost an inevitability for poor unionism. Acceptance will probably come sometime during the 2020's, when unionism is a political minority with an age-profile that will ensure that it has no future.
Monday 4 June 2007
Getting to grips with the [Protestant] brain drain
Ian Paisley has returned to the issue of Northern Ireland's supposed 'brain drain'. He is reported to have told the Business in the Community Awards in Belfast City Hall that it was essential the brain-drain is stopped if Northern Ireland is to develop hi-tech and knowledge-based industries.
Why is it only the unionist parties that seem to consider this an important issue?
In January the UUP's Ken Robinson said:
"In 2004, of 32.5% of Northern-Ireland based students who study on the mainland, two thirds will not return to Northern Ireland. At this rate we are losing 20% of our university educated young people on an annual basis. "
Then in February Kenny Donaldson, also of the UUP, repeated much the same thing:
"Two-thirds of our young people who go elsewhere for higher education will never return. Far too many of our talented young people are being lost to Northern Ireland. Our economy is losing 20% of our university-educated young people on an annual basis. This exodus greatly undermines our aim of creating a competitive, knowledge-based economy fit for the challenges of the new century."
Jeffrey Donaldson thinks that the non-return rate is 75%! Leslie Cree, Thomas Burns, and many other unionist politicos are singing from a similar hymnsheet.
And now in June we have Paisley joining in, parroted by party colleague Robin Newton in the Newsletter on 30 May (and on the DUP website) who added "The Executive must kick off a programme of attracting back those who have gained valuable international experience and who can make a positive contribution."
Does he mean "who can make a positive contribution … to the unionist vote?"
Could it be that what is really concerning them is that the 'brain drain' is actually a Protestant drain? This has been known about for quite some time, and was commented on by the (London) Independent in 2004:
An exodus of some of the brightest young Protestants is contributing to an extraordinary process of social change in Northern Ireland, according to an academic study. [ … ]
The brain drain, which has been going on for decades, refers to the trend for many Protestant teenagers to go to universities in England and Scotland and find jobs there instead of returning home. The pattern has even generated its own facetious acronym - NIPPLES - which stands for Northern Ireland Protestant Professionals Living in England and Scotland.
Partly due to this exodus, Catholics now make up around 60 per cent of undergraduates at Northern Ireland's two universities, with the proportion of Catholic graduates and those taking more of the desirable jobs steadily rising.
You can see why the unionists are getting worried. Now that everyone has agreed that the constitutional future of Northern Ireland will be decided by a head count, the continued loss of so many unionist heads must be giving them cause for concern.
Amongst other things, the unionist identification with intolerant religious fundamentalism is a major contributor to their own problems. As Linda Gilby put it in the Sunday Life on 3 June, in a reference to Paisley (junior)'s recent anti-gay remarks:
[Paisley (senior)] pointed out that we need to stop the Northern Ireland brain drain, that it's essential to hold on to our brightest people if our economy is to prosper.
No argument there, but he could make a start by putting his own house in order.
Having a quiet word with his son and namesake should start the ball rolling.
Then, all those local, bright, shiny graduates who have received their university education across the water won't feel as if they are setting their watches back 50 years when they return here again.
Why is it only the unionist parties that seem to consider this an important issue?
In January the UUP's Ken Robinson said:
"In 2004, of 32.5% of Northern-Ireland based students who study on the mainland, two thirds will not return to Northern Ireland. At this rate we are losing 20% of our university educated young people on an annual basis. "
Then in February Kenny Donaldson, also of the UUP, repeated much the same thing:
"Two-thirds of our young people who go elsewhere for higher education will never return. Far too many of our talented young people are being lost to Northern Ireland. Our economy is losing 20% of our university-educated young people on an annual basis. This exodus greatly undermines our aim of creating a competitive, knowledge-based economy fit for the challenges of the new century."
Jeffrey Donaldson thinks that the non-return rate is 75%! Leslie Cree, Thomas Burns, and many other unionist politicos are singing from a similar hymnsheet.
And now in June we have Paisley joining in, parroted by party colleague Robin Newton in the Newsletter on 30 May (and on the DUP website) who added "The Executive must kick off a programme of attracting back those who have gained valuable international experience and who can make a positive contribution."
Does he mean "who can make a positive contribution … to the unionist vote?"
Could it be that what is really concerning them is that the 'brain drain' is actually a Protestant drain? This has been known about for quite some time, and was commented on by the (London) Independent in 2004:
An exodus of some of the brightest young Protestants is contributing to an extraordinary process of social change in Northern Ireland, according to an academic study. [ … ]
The brain drain, which has been going on for decades, refers to the trend for many Protestant teenagers to go to universities in England and Scotland and find jobs there instead of returning home. The pattern has even generated its own facetious acronym - NIPPLES - which stands for Northern Ireland Protestant Professionals Living in England and Scotland.
Partly due to this exodus, Catholics now make up around 60 per cent of undergraduates at Northern Ireland's two universities, with the proportion of Catholic graduates and those taking more of the desirable jobs steadily rising.
You can see why the unionists are getting worried. Now that everyone has agreed that the constitutional future of Northern Ireland will be decided by a head count, the continued loss of so many unionist heads must be giving them cause for concern.
Amongst other things, the unionist identification with intolerant religious fundamentalism is a major contributor to their own problems. As Linda Gilby put it in the Sunday Life on 3 June, in a reference to Paisley (junior)'s recent anti-gay remarks:
[Paisley (senior)] pointed out that we need to stop the Northern Ireland brain drain, that it's essential to hold on to our brightest people if our economy is to prosper.
No argument there, but he could make a start by putting his own house in order.
Having a quiet word with his son and namesake should start the ball rolling.
Then, all those local, bright, shiny graduates who have received their university education across the water won't feel as if they are setting their watches back 50 years when they return here again.
Monday 30 April 2007
Demographic suicide
Right-wing Americans, particularly those on the Christian conservative wing of the Republican Party, point to falling European birth rates as a sign that European societies have given themselves completely over to the pursuit of pleasure, to the point that they are committing demographic suicide. They love to extrapolate birth-rates to demonstrate that, as one commentator put it, "in 200 years, French and German will be spoken exclusively in hell".!
As with all the best propaganda, there is a shred of truth in what they say. In theory, a society with a Total Period Fertility Rate (TPFR) below 2.1 children per woman (the 'replacement level') will shrink in size, unless immigration replaces the 'missing' children. Immigration is, of course, an unknown – some societies do not attract immigrants, and even those that do, cannot be certain what kind of immigrants they will attract. Some societies do actually shrink – modern-day Russia is a large and important example.
Immigration may save a society from disappearance, but it will change its appearance. If fewer children are born to the 'host' community, and the difference is made up by other people, then the society becomes less like the 'host' community – in certain cases, this can lead to a dramatic change over a relatively small period of time.
In Northern Ireland several generations ago Protestants were a clear majority. The religious breakdown of the elderly shows that they were in a majority at one time even in areas that are now considered 'green' – Cookstown District Council area now has a Catholic majority (57.6%), which rises to around 62% amongst the children, yet amongst its elderly residents Catholics form only a minority, falling to 39.1% amongst the over-90s. Down District, currently 62% Catholic, has an even lower proportion of Catholics amongst its over-90s: 37.4%. Dungannon, Fermanagh, Limavady, Magherafelt, and Moyle all show the same phenomenon. Other areas show either a Catholic majority that is getting larger, or a Catholic minority that is getting larger (http://www.nicensus2001.gov.uk/ - look for table s305_dc_level.xls).
This tipping of the balance has not come about through immigration, but by higher birth-rates amongst Catholics than amongst Protestants. Until 1992 both religious groups had birth-rates that were over the replacement level, but the Catholic rate was so great that their share of the population gradually increased.
Recently, though, birth-rates have tended to reduce, mirroring those of the rest of Europe. The latest Total Period Fertility Rate statistics for Northern Ireland show an overall figure of 1.95 births per woman – well below the replacement level of 2.1. It would appear therefore, that Northern Ireland is committing demographic suicide.
But this overall conclusion masks some important variations in the TPFR at local level. In the 2005 Annual Report of the Registrar General, two areas with solid Catholic majorities (Newry and Mourne, and Dungannon) have TPFRs over the replacement level, and the solidly Protestant areas of Larne, Carrickfergus, Coleraine and North Down have TPFRs significantly lower than the average (1.85 for the period 2003-2005). In fact, of the 11 Catholic-majority areas, 8 have a TPFR above the average. Of the 13 Protestant-majority areas only 6 have an above-average TPFR. In Belfast and Armagh neither religion has a majority. Of the 8 'least-Catholic' districts only one – Ballymena – has a TPFR over the average.
The table below summarises the situation at local level, with the districts shown in order of the 'Catholicity':
[table removed temporarily]
In some 'Protestant' areas with an above-average TPFR, it is clear from the increasing Catholic proportion of the younger children (ages 0-4), that this is largely due to a higher fertility rate amongst the Catholic minority – in Ballymena, Ballymoney, Craigavon, Antrim and Lisburn the proportion of children who are Catholic is greater than the proportion of the parents who are Catholic.
So is Northern Ireland committing demographic suicide, or is it just Protestant 'Ulster'?
As with all the best propaganda, there is a shred of truth in what they say. In theory, a society with a Total Period Fertility Rate (TPFR) below 2.1 children per woman (the 'replacement level') will shrink in size, unless immigration replaces the 'missing' children. Immigration is, of course, an unknown – some societies do not attract immigrants, and even those that do, cannot be certain what kind of immigrants they will attract. Some societies do actually shrink – modern-day Russia is a large and important example.
Immigration may save a society from disappearance, but it will change its appearance. If fewer children are born to the 'host' community, and the difference is made up by other people, then the society becomes less like the 'host' community – in certain cases, this can lead to a dramatic change over a relatively small period of time.
In Northern Ireland several generations ago Protestants were a clear majority. The religious breakdown of the elderly shows that they were in a majority at one time even in areas that are now considered 'green' – Cookstown District Council area now has a Catholic majority (57.6%), which rises to around 62% amongst the children, yet amongst its elderly residents Catholics form only a minority, falling to 39.1% amongst the over-90s. Down District, currently 62% Catholic, has an even lower proportion of Catholics amongst its over-90s: 37.4%. Dungannon, Fermanagh, Limavady, Magherafelt, and Moyle all show the same phenomenon. Other areas show either a Catholic majority that is getting larger, or a Catholic minority that is getting larger (http://www.nicensus2001.gov.uk/ - look for table s305_dc_level.xls).
This tipping of the balance has not come about through immigration, but by higher birth-rates amongst Catholics than amongst Protestants. Until 1992 both religious groups had birth-rates that were over the replacement level, but the Catholic rate was so great that their share of the population gradually increased.
Recently, though, birth-rates have tended to reduce, mirroring those of the rest of Europe. The latest Total Period Fertility Rate statistics for Northern Ireland show an overall figure of 1.95 births per woman – well below the replacement level of 2.1. It would appear therefore, that Northern Ireland is committing demographic suicide.
But this overall conclusion masks some important variations in the TPFR at local level. In the 2005 Annual Report of the Registrar General, two areas with solid Catholic majorities (Newry and Mourne, and Dungannon) have TPFRs over the replacement level, and the solidly Protestant areas of Larne, Carrickfergus, Coleraine and North Down have TPFRs significantly lower than the average (1.85 for the period 2003-2005). In fact, of the 11 Catholic-majority areas, 8 have a TPFR above the average. Of the 13 Protestant-majority areas only 6 have an above-average TPFR. In Belfast and Armagh neither religion has a majority. Of the 8 'least-Catholic' districts only one – Ballymena – has a TPFR over the average.
The table below summarises the situation at local level, with the districts shown in order of the 'Catholicity':
[table removed temporarily]
In some 'Protestant' areas with an above-average TPFR, it is clear from the increasing Catholic proportion of the younger children (ages 0-4), that this is largely due to a higher fertility rate amongst the Catholic minority – in Ballymena, Ballymoney, Craigavon, Antrim and Lisburn the proportion of children who are Catholic is greater than the proportion of the parents who are Catholic.
So is Northern Ireland committing demographic suicide, or is it just Protestant 'Ulster'?
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