Who decides on a border poll? Sinn Féin slam PM Burnham after comments in Belfast

A row has begun as Prime Minister Andy Burnham said this week that a united Ireland referendum is “off the table”.

This is Burnham’s first visit to Northern Ireland since becoming prime minister, and is part of his "cost-of-living tour."

Right to United Ireland referendum is a matter of law in the Good Friday Agreement and will be delivered – Mary Lou McDonald and Michelle O’Neill https://t.co/ZGwlGM2oLz

— Sinn Féin (@sinnfeinireland) August 27, 2026

“I’m here, as I said earlier, to listen, and I will take a collaborative approach, but some issues will be off the table, and that is one issue that will be off the table," Burnham said of a border poll discussion.

He added: “I think we’ve got to focus on bringing people together as best we can, and I think we’ve lived through a decade where there’s been a referendum on Brexit, we had Scottish independence just before it.

“What we find is the rifts that come from those situations take a long time to heal, and it sets you right back, and you can’t focus on what’s right in front of us here and now, the cost-of-living pressures that are hurting people in Northern Ireland, the need to get that budget set so that public services can function as they should.

“These are the things right in front of us and sometimes politicians go to things that they want to see, as opposed to getting the solutions that the public need.

“I think a decade since the Brexit referendum, I think we’ve had too much division, too much arguing, too much, backward looking. We need to fix the things right in front of us in the here and now.”

One of his own MPs, Dianne Abbott said: "Andy Burnham should know better. A border poll is mandated in the Good Friday Agreement. This is both a multi-party agreement, endorsed by referenda *and* an international treaty lodged at the UN."

Sinn Féin Leader Mary Lou McDonald, First Minister of Northern Ireland Michelle O’Neill, and MP John Finucane all met with Burnham where the issue was again raised.

Party leader McDonald said there was “robust” exchange as she highlighted the right to a referendum on Irish unity is enshrined in the 1998 Good Friday Agreement.

“To mark his first visit to Ireland with such divisive and ill-informed comments, that fly in the face of the Good Friday Agreement, is totally unacceptable,” she stated. The Sinn Féin leader said “refusing to prepare” will not stop a referendum from happening, and for Burnham to do so is “as reckless as Brexit”.

Who actually decides on whether to have a border poll?

The Good Friday Agreement states "that it is for the people of the island of Ireland alone, by
agreement between the two parts respectively and without external impediment, to exercise their right of self-determination on the basis of consent, freely and concurrently given, North and South, to bring about a united Ireland."

"If the wish expressed by a majority in such a poll is that Northern Ireland should cease to be part of the United Kingdom and form part of a united Ireland, the Secretary of State shall lay before Parliament such
proposals to give effect to that wish as may be agreed between Her Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom and the Government of Ireland."

"The Secretary of State may by order direct the holding of a poll ... if at any time it appears likely to him that a majority of those voting would express a wish that Northern Ireland should cease to
be part of the United Kingdom and form part of a united Ireland."

The British Secretary of State decides to hold the border poll, but they must be convinced that the majority want it and the Agreement is vague on how.

Many people believe polling done by academics, polling companies and newspapers will be what the decision is based on, as well the as political makeup of Stormont.

Sinn Fein are the largest party in the north, which they say their popularity in the polls north and south means that the majority of the people in the north have made it clear that they want Irish unity, or at least want to be persuaded and are calling for preparations to be made.

The most recent polling shows that a majority on the island north and south are in favour of Irish unity as part of the EU.

It is unknown or undecided how the British Secretary of State will decide when to call a poll, but given the pressure from Burnham's comments, pressure will mount on the British goverment to set it out.