Craig–Collins pacts

Craig–Collins pacts, two agreements concluded in response to continuing violence in Northern Ireland during early 1922. The first, negotiated at a meeting between Craig and Collins in London on 21 January, provided for the lifting of the Belfast boycott, the return to work of Catholics violently expelled from the Belfast shipyards, and negotiations to reach an agreement on boundaries. The second ‘pact’ was in fact a formal agreement between the British, Northern Ireland, and Provisional governments, following a meeting on 29–30 March. It repeated the earlier promises of restoration of expelled workers and negotiations on boundaries, called for the cessation of IRA activity in Northern Ireland, and made detailed provision for policing by a mixed Catholic‐Protestant police force. The agreements were a reflection more of British government pressure than of any real spirit of compromise, and had no significant influence on the level of either loyalist or republican violence.