IT will be some months before a programme is confirmed for next year’s state visit to Ireland by King Charles, but it can be expected that the tone will be very much in keeping with the precedent set by his late mother, Queen Elizabeth, during the initiative 15 years ago which was rightly described as historic.

The engagement was the first of its kind by a British monarch since her grandfather, King George V, arrived in Dublin a century earlier, five years before the Easter Rising, when the whole of Ireland was part of the UK.

It was by any standards a hugely significant itinerary in Dublin, Kildare, Tipperary and Cork, with Queen Elizabeth receiving overwhelming praise for both her symbolic gestures and the content of her speeches.

What is striking is the way in which King Charles has followed the example of his mother by regularly displaying respect for different traditions, in a way which can only cause consternation for some unionists who would otherwise present themselves as the House of Windsor’s most loyal followers.

Queen Elizabeth opened her landmark address at Dublin Castle by saying in Irish ‘Uachtaráin agus a chairde’, and went on to express her deep sympathy to everyone who had suffered during the enduring conflict between Britain and Ireland.

She went further, through a wreath-laying ceremony at the Garden of Remembrance in........

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