NI Constitution

On this page, you will find all the work we did under the 'Constitutional Conundrums' banner and the ESRC Impact Acceleration Account funding we received for that project between 2016 and 2018.

The primary purpose of 'Constitutional Conundrums' was to investigate what the specific consequences of Human Rights Act 1998 reform and Brexit would be for Northern Ireland in terms of its constitutional settlement as a country in the UK and a former part of an EU Member State.

The Common Travel Area: Prospects After Brexit.

Maintaining the Common Travel Area that has existed between the UK, Ireland, the Channel Islands, and the Isle of Man has been set down by the UK Prime Minister as one of her government’s 12 key negotiating objectives. In this note, some of the functions of the CTA are described, and the possible threats to it from Brexit are explored. It is concluded that the flexibility and informality of the CTA means that while maintaining it in name is relatively easy, changes to its substance are likely. Close scruntiny of any changes to the reciprocal nature and substantive provisions of the CTA are therefore essential to assessing the success of this aspect of the UK government’s negotiations.

“There is no appetite for the return of the fortified border posts which were so emblematic of the Troubles. However, in choosing their words carefully, ministers have sought to reassure the Northern Irish public on the most extreme outcome (the hard border) while neglecting to address the other possible day-to-day impacts which Brexit will have on the island of Ireland.”

The Implications of the Good Friday Agreement for UK Human-Rights Reform.

Speculation is rife as to the impact of the Good Friday/Belfast Agreement upon the Conservative Government’s plans to repeal the Human Rights Act 1998. In the face of this speculation, the UK’s Conservative Government has provided little detail as to how UK human-rights reform will address the requirement for incorporation of the European Convention on Human Rights in the Northern Ireland settlement. We therefore analyse the Agreement as both an international treaty and peace agreement and evaluate its interrelationship with the Human Rights Act and the Northern Ireland Act. Once the hyperbole surrounding the Agreement and its attendant domestic legislation is stripped away, the effects of the 1998 settlement are in some regards more extensive than has to date been recognised, but in other respects are less far-reaching than some of the Human Rights Act’s supporters claim. The picture that emerges from our analysis is of an intricately woven constitution dependent on devolution arrangements, peace agreements, and international relationships.