Too right, McGrath. But that's an awkward situation, isn't it? If the Unionists say "we're British", does the rest of Britain have the right to say "no you're not"? Put it in another group (eg. "If black people say...") and see how it sounds. The fact that most ppl over here hate the guts of the bigoted bastards running the Orange Order is beside the point - the point is self-determination, the right to choose your own national identity.

One trouble is that 6 counties is a pretty coarse measure - better might be to split them up into smaller sections for the purposes of a referendum. But there's also the problem that the two communities are often living side-by-side, so one street in a city is Catholic and the next street is Protestant - in these cases it'd be like mixing up salt and sugar and then trying to separate the grains. I guess in those kind of cases, they'll just have to accept the majority verdict - either that or move to another area.

As a cynical view to avoid gerrymandering in the split, assign 3 counties to the Republicans and 3 counties to the Unionists for division into smaller sections. By the time each has done their devious thing, they'll be about even. ;-)

Graham.