PeppyJeppy, trust me when I say this guy is not "clueless". He has been there since 2005 and has been captain for a good few years now. He is actually quite involved with the company, the one thing he did tell me is that he would not leave Ryanair for the world.
I said if he believed there was no Irish ban he was clueless. My guess as I said in my previous post is that like most Capts in RYR who have a decent niche he is looking to avoid being caught on record saying anything negative about the company and is in effect towing the party line.
It is of course impossible to get any hard stats on the non hiring of Irish pilots and it would be denied if put to RYR however like I said I know of a pool of 100+ Irish who have all applied and heard nothing at all from CAE. Compare that to 20-30 Brits/EU nationals who ALL got at the very least the CAE CV request and it paints a picture. This is with very similar hours/experience etc for the most part and in some cases the Irish had far more.