Kate Hoey Quotes (1946-)

“[T]he tricolour is not my flag ... I genuinely don't feel Irish. Is there something wrong with that?”

“[On Northern Ireland remaining part of the UK] I don't think anyone from a pro-union background should fear Keir Starmer becoming the next prime minister of the United Kingdom.”

“I’m pro-union, I’ll do anything to make sure that the United Kingdom has Northern Ireland as an integral part of it on the same terms as any other part of the United Kingdom when we leave the EU.”

“While I understand that Ireland was quite shocked at our decision to Leave, so much of the controversy over the border has been manufactured by it to try to keep Northern Ireland bound by EU regulations and different from the rest of the UK.”

“I'm pro-union. I would not dream of voting for Sinn Fein, I wouldn't dream of voting for the SDLP.”

“I'm actually going to be voting in Northern Ireland and unfortunately the Labour Party is so anti-democratic in Northern Ireland that they allow people to join but they don't put up candidates. [...] So I'll be voting for a pro-union candidate in Northern Ireland.”

“I personally couldn't vote for the Withdrawal Agreement because of Northern Ireland but I could understand many of my colleagues in the Leave campaign because they have to do it.”

“I don't have to believe in conspiracy theories to see that the Irish Government and the European Union have been from day one working closely on tactics particularly relating to the border question.”

“I thought our Shadow Foreign Secretary saying she would be campaigning for Remain is quite shocking and goes 100% against our manifesto. More and more people are feeling more confirmed in their views that politicians say one thing in their manifestos and then change their view.”

“Taking foreign laws from a foreign legislature, governing much of our economy in Northern Ireland and keeping us in a foreign customs code whereby GB, Great Britain, our country, where our capital is, becomes a third country, becomes our foreign country – it’s just not acceptable.”

“Then there is the crucial issue of the Irish border. If, in any deal, Northern Ireland is to be treated differently from the rest of the UK then anyone who believes in the Union could not possibly support that deal. No doubt there will be some flowery EU-speak designed to hide the true intention and we will be told that as it is never intended to be needed then we shouldn’t worry.”

“If Stormont goes back with the present Windsor Framework, they in fact would be almost like what happened during the war with the Vichy government, where all those [w:Member of the Legislative Assembly (Northern Ireland)|MLAs]] [Members of the Legislative Assembly] would be collaborators with a kind of colonial government.”

“[The vote for the Conservative Party in the 2019 general election was] what we needed for stability because now the European Union knows that we're not going to revoke Article 50. We're not going to have a second referendum. We're going to get out, and they will have to change their attitude, too, to the negotiations. And we will get, I hope, within the next year a good free trade deal with the European Union. And of course, then we will be discussing with the United States to get an even closer relationship with you as well.”