Party from Northern Ireland went over in ship to find roots (5)

I believe the answer is:

spuds

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'find roots' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both related to change as well as being verbs in their -s form.
Perhaps you can see a link between them that I can't see?

'party from northern ireland went over in ship' is the wordplay.
'party from northern ireland' becomes 'dup' (I can't justify this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'went over' is a reversal indicator (I've seen 'go over' mean this).
'in' is an insertion indicator.
'ship' becomes 'SS' (prefix in ship names eg SS Great Britain).
'dup' reversed gives 'pud'.
'pud' inserted within 'ss' is 'SPUDS'.

'to' is the link.

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for spuds that I've seen before include "Potatoes (colloq.)" , "Potatoes (informal)" .)

I've seen this clue in The Irish Times.

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