Addressing the issue of the political context at the time of Ireland’s first application to join the Common Market (as it then was) has more than a few ironic aspects in the light of more recent events, and I would like to address a few of them. One of them is the relationship between Ireland and Britain, then and now. Needless to say, any resemblance to current political events is entirely unintentional. Another is a sub-set of that – the foreign policy of Fianna Fáil in relation to both to Britain and to Europe, then and now. A third is the political culture of this Republic as a whole, then and now. You do not have to delve too deeply into political history to unearth evidence that things were not always as they seemed in these departments, or at least not as they are generally remembered.