The distinguished Irish statistician, R. C. Geary, once recounted a story that told of when an eighth-century Irish poet, Sedulius, arrived at a monastery on the continent. The abbot, Strabo, musing as to why Sedulius had left Ireland, asked ‘whether it was due to the unsettled state of the country or the Irish habit of going away’. This ‘Irish habit of going away’ perceptively identified by Strabo is a central feature of modern Irish demographic history until the present day, and this is particularly the case for the period after the Great Irish Famine (1845–50). The sheer volume of scholarly literature on Irish migration since the early eighteenth century is a testament to the enduring interest in the subject. However, one lacuna in the current state of knowledge relates to Irish migration to Britain between 1921 and 1971, one of the most significant flows of migrants in twentieth-century Europe.

The aim of this book is to remedy this deficiency. The principal objectives of the study are threefold: firstly, to examine the patterns in Irish migration to Britain from 1921 until 1971; secondly, to investigate the factors which account for this migration; and finally, to assess the policy of both the British and Irish states in relation to large-scale movement between the two countries. While the structure is basically chronological, within each chapter a thematic approach is adopted. Certain themes recur throughout, such as the role of the state in facilitating or hindering migration, the relationship between population movement and the standard of living (broadly defined) in Ireland and Britain, and factors that contributed to high levels of migration from particular regions.