Originally Posted by
flyingphil1
Not sure why but apparently you dont need a passport if coming from Ireland anyone know why is it the luck of the Irish ..?
If travelling between Ireland and Britain there is a longstanding agreement called the "Common Travel Area" which dates back to the separation of Ireland in 1921, which says the citizens of either country do not need passports to travel to the other. It also allows each to work in the other's country without work permits, etc.
If you travel by land between Dublin and Belfast across the border, not only are there no controls but you cannot tell even where the border is (apart from your mobile phone ringing with "Welcome to Vodafone UK/Ireland" when you are about a mile inside ! ).
There are all sorts of inconsistencies with this. Firstly if you are not a citizen of either country you do theoretically need to show your passport, but there is nobody at the land border to show it to. Then the Irish at major airports now ask for passports from all incoming UK pax, in violation of the agreement, as they seem unable to segregate the pax into separate streams (arriving back in the UK the rules are applied correctly, pax are segregated and passports are not asked for). Also there are differences between the VAT regimes of both countries which are exploited by smugglers across the undefended border. Presumably the loss of tax is less than it would cost to do customs checks.