1973 was a turning point for Ireland

As I was ordained in 1973, that year became a pivotal point in my life for that and for a variety of other reasons. It was also the year Ireland joined the European Union – then the European Economic Community, the EEC; it was the year of an Arab-Israeli war (what else is new?) which caused an unprecedented 300% increase in fuel prices; and (as Colm Keena wrote recently in The Irish Times, recapturing a healthy youthful disregard for the priorities of an adult world) it was the year Thin Lizzy had a hit with Whiskey in a Jar. (Clearly, Jimmy Osmond’s Long Haired Lover from Liverpool, and Tony Orlando’s Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree, though they too were No. 1 songs, didn’t do it for Colm).

I’ve mentioned before in this space how easily we find it to speak about the bad old days in Ireland and how difficult it is to appreciate that, in the memorable phrase of the British Prime Minister, Harold MacMillan, at present in Ireland we ‘never had it so good’.

Fifty years on from 1973 and our entry into Europe, it is appropriate to offer a range of comparisons that might disabuse us of the notion that, with all the whingers and the complainers getting so much space to air their negativity in the media, a bit of positivity might not go amiss. At the very least it might explain why, unlike our former colonial betters across the pond, there’s no appetite in Ireland for a Brexit solution to our Irish problems.

Unsurprisingly, as we reach the first half-century of our membership in the European Union, the Central Statistics Office (CSO) has published a picture of Ireland in 1973, and Ireland in 2023, and again unsurprisingly, through a comparative analysis, has demonstrated the enormous gap between the two.

First population growth. The population had declined from 1841 when it was estimated at around eight million before the Great Famine to a low of 2.8 million in 1961. It then grew by almost 73% between 1971 and 2022 and is now at its highest level in 171 years.

As well as the overall numerical increase, the make-up of the population has changed. In 1971, almost half (47%) of the population was under 25 years of age. By last year this had fallen to 32%. Meanwhile the percentage of the population aged 65 and over had gone from 11% to 15%. Life expectancy, at slightly over 71 years in 1971, had lengthened by ten years by 2016.

The Republic of Ireland’s population in 1973 was around three million with its citizens on average poorer than the average European, now it exceeds five million and Irish citizens are on average better off than the average EU citizen.

The economy has been transformed beyond recognition. The figure for our total exports of goods in 1973 was €1 billion in 1973; last year it was a staggering €208 billion. In 1973, 24% of the workforce was in agriculture. The figure for 2022 was just 4% last year. 

Another telling statistic is that the number of non-Irish citizens working in the Irish economy has gone from just over 50,000 in 1998, to 470,000 last year. This last figure is a telling rebuttal of the anti-immigrant lobby who argues that all the Irish jobs are being taken up by foreigners. What it misses is the obvious truth that without the presently employed ‘foreigners’ the Irish economy would fold. They may need us but not nearly as much as we need them.

Some interesting statistics, in no particular order: in 1973, there were 22,816 marriages with 23,173, or just 357 more, taking place last year, despite the fact that there has been a huge increase in the population; in 1973, the location for marriages with a Catholic ceremony was 96% but only 42% last year; in 1973, John and Mary were the most popular birth names, but now it’s Emily and Jack; in 1973, the average residential property prices have increased exponentially from €9,000 to €366,653 last year while weekly industrial earnings have gone from €38.25 to €825; in 1973, the nominal average weekly earnings were IR£30.12 and the average house price was IR£7,095; a pint of milk then cost five pence, it’s equivalent now costs around 60 cents; the price of a 3.5lb bag of potatoes was, in Irish Pounds, 16p and the price of a 2lb loaf of bread was 13p; baskets of goods and services for 1975 and 2016 show food going from 30% to 10% of household budgets, while housing went from 6% to 10%; and an indicator of changing food tastes that no one would have predicted, the price of cabbage, which used to be recorded as part of the basket of goods index, has been replaced by broccoli.

1973 was the end of an era in more ways than one: Éamon de Valera stepped down as President of Ireland at the remarkable age of 90, and Liam Cosgrave became Taoiseach after a general election that ended 16 years of Fianna Fáil in government. My own compelling memory of my last days in 1973 in Maynooth was Garret FitzGerald arguing at a college debate that our future was with Europe because it rarely stopped raining in Ireland so we had the best grass on the planet and Irish cows were the happiest in the world. Ireland’s development could only go one way. And he was right, as even the begrudgers would now have to admit.

* Note: My new book, Holding Out For A Hero/The Long Wait for Pope Francis, is now available at €18 in the usual outlets or at www.mayobooks.ie.