A CONSERVATIVE politician has successfully applied for an Irish passport, saying Brexit had “awakened his Irishness”.
Demand for Irish passports has risen sharply in the wake of the Brexit vote, with 2016 seeing a record number of applications, while that figure likely to be beaten again this year.
It was also revealed last year that a number of Tory MPs had applied for an Irish passport.
Now Charles Tannock, a Conservative MEP for London, has revealed he has received his passport and is planning a pilgrimage to Ireland, adding he feels “ashamed to be British”.
Speaking to the Irish Times about his interest in his Irish roots, he said: “It has been awakened by Brexit because, to be honest, I am quite ashamed to be British in many ways.”
Mr Tannock, whose grandmother was born in Dublin in 1895 before emigrating to England with her mother, added: “I feel more Irish than ever. I am very proud to be Irish.
“I am going on a pilgrimage with my mother because she has also just got an Irish passport. She got hers in Paris.
“We are going on a mother and son pilgrimage to Dublin in the autumn to try and locate the house where her mother was born in 1895.”
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Born in Aldershot, Oxford-educated Mr Tannock – who previously worked as a consultant psychiatrist – has been an MEP since he was first elected to the European Parliament in 1999.
He was in favour of Britain remaining in EU ahead of the Brexit vote.
Adding that the document was “more a statement of my EU and Irish heritage and loyalty” rather than to use now, he said: “I believe that you can be loyal to more than one country, you can love different things in different ways.
“I love being European, I love being Irish, I love being British and I don’t see any incompatibility between them.
“Having an Irish passport made me feel a lot better psychologically to be honest.”
In August, the former Ambassador to Britain, Dan Mulhall, revealed that the number of Irish passports issued to Britons this year is expected to be twice that of the last full year before the Brexit vote.
The uncertainty surrounding Brexit has been identified as the reason for the upsurge.
Applications for dual Irish citizenship currently require having at least one grandparent born in the country.
