Meath Peace Group Talks
No. 65 – ‘A Shared Future: Challenges and Realities in Interface Areas’
Monday, 12th February 2007
St. Columban’s College, Dalgan Park,
Navan, Co. Meath
Speakers:
Chris O’Halloran (Director, Belfast Interface Project)
Dr Neil Jarman (Director, Institute for Conflict Research)
Frankie Gallagher (Ulster Political Research Group)
Seán Brennan (North Belfast Developing Leadership Initiative CEP)
Chaired by
Michael Reade (LMFM)
Contents:
Introduction: Julitta Clancy
Chris O’Halloran
Neil Jarman
Frankie Gallagher
Seán Brennan
Questions and comments
Concluding words: Anne Nolan
Appendix 1: Extract from ‘A Shared Future’
Appendix 2: Biographical notes
photos
©Meath Peace Group 2007
65 – ‘A shared future: realities and challenges in interface areas’
Monday 12th February, 2007
“Reducing tensions at interface areas must go beyond the ‘band-aid’ approach. It requires a combined short, medium and long-term approach that is earthed in encouraging local dialogue and communication, the sharing of resources, which is set in a wider context of social and economic renewal.” (A Shared Future:Policy and strategic framework for good relations in Northern Ireland, OFM/DFM, March 2005. para. 2.3)
Introduction, Julitta Clancy: “On behalf of the Meath Peace Group I would like to thank the speakers and guest chair and all of you for coming to tonight’s talk which is the second in our series on the ‘Shared Future’ document. The first talk in the series [MPG talk no. 63] was held on November 13th, and a full transcript is available on our website. We hope to have a third talk on this theme on 21st May. Tonight we focus on interface areas of Belfast (touched on briefly in the November talk).So I will hand over now to our guest chair, Mike Reade, presenter of the ‘Loosetalk’ current affairs programme on LMFM radio….”
Chair: Michael Reade (LMFM)
“Thank you for having me, it’s always nice to be here and I regret not having been able to attend the last couple of meetings. I was particularly anxious to come to the meeting tonight – ‘Shared Future – realities and challenges in interface areas’ which for me translates as ‘living with the enemy’… We have four speakers here, you can read more about them in the handout. Each speaker will have 10 to 15 minutes which will give us around an hour for questions and discussion. Our first speaker tonight is Chris O’Halloran.”
1. Chris O’Halloran (Director, Belfast Interface Project)
“Thank you all very much and thanks again for inviting me along. My name is Chris O’Halloran and I am the Director of a project called the Belfast Interface Project. I have a slide show here – what I am aiming to do over the next 15 minutes or so is to give you a quick outline of four different things: 1) who we are: who the Belfast Interface Project is, 2) what is it that we do – I am going to deal with those two quite quickly. 3) Then I am going to give you some information about interface areas, what they are and some common features about interface communities, and 4) I am going to finish with a conference we had last year where quite a number of interface community activists came along and gave us a clear picture of some of the things that they think need to change…
Slide presentation of interface areas…..
“We commissioned the Institute for Conflict Research – Neil here beside me – to draw up a list of all of the NIO [Northern Ireland Office] identified interface structures in Belfast, and then we commissioned another photographer to go and take photographs of each one, from each side. ICR estimate that there are 41 distinct stretches of NIO-built interface walls and barriers in Belfast. Actually when you look at those in more detail, it comes to a total of 48 separate stretches, separate sections of NIO-built interfaces….
Belfast Interface Project: “The Belfast Interface Project is a membership organisation. We aim to promote the social and economic regeneration of interface communities in Belfast. We have a membership of just over 40 interface community groups from both nationalist and unionist areas, and we’ve got about a dozen or so associate members and a smaller number again of individual members.
“You can find out some information about us in the information packs we have left on the tables over there. There are four quite distinct things which we aim to do:
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Our first aim is to enhance the knowledge base about interface areas. There’s all sorts of mythology about interface areas and our aim is to increase the knowledge base from a simple way of just letting people see what they look like and a number of other means.
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Our second aim is to lobby for change to benefit interface communities
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Our third aim is to consult, develop and support our membership. We work to a management committee that’s elected from among our membership. We have three full-time and two part-time staff, and our management committee is elected from within our membership and they tell us what they would like us to be doing.
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Our fourth aim is to assist interface communities in addressing issues relating to conflict.
“Ok, so that’s what we do, and I’ll tell you a little bit more about that later.”
Definitions: “What is an interface? We define an interface as ‘the boundary between two residentially segregated communities’. In Belfast that tends to mean a Catholic/nationalist/republican community and a Protestant/unionist/loyalist community, and an interface community is the community that lives alongside one of those boundaries.
Types of interfaces: “There are different kinds of interfaces:
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“An enclave community is an island community within a sea of the other community. So in Belfast there are enclave communities such as Suffolk, which is a Protestant/unionist community within Catholic west Belfast, and Short Strand, which is a Catholic/nationalist community within Protestant east Belfast. There are a number of enclave communities in Belfast.
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“There are also what we simply define as a ‘split’. The Shankill/Springfield is a pretty good example of that where one community lives on one side of a very long wall and the other community lives on the other side.
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“We have a final kind of interface which we call a ‘buffer zone’, which is where a mixed community acts as a buffer between the two other communities, and one of the features of that kind of buffer zone is that it can move up a road, and in Belfast many of those buffer zones are proceeding up roads with a growing mostly Catholic/nationalist community behind the buffer zone.
“So there are different kinds of interface communities and there are many of them. Although the slide show shows 48 separate interfaces, those are just the walls and fences: there are many more interfaces between communities where there is no wall or fence. You can cross an interface by turning a corner, by passing a landmark, by just crossing a street, and for many people who don’t know those areas in Belfast, they might not even recognise that they are passing an interface but local people know exactly where they are and exactly where it is safe and exactly where it isn’t.
Common disadvantages: “So there are different kinds of interface communities that can change over time but they tend to share three common attributes, and this was shown by some researchers – Brendan Murtagh and later Dr Peter Shirlow, both of them are academics, Brendan Murtagh is at Queen’s, Peter Shirlow is at the University of Ulster – and basically what they showed was that most interface communities are characterised by three kinds of disadvantage:
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1) “High levels of inter-community tension, intimidation and violence, and the trauma that is associated with those over many years. Thankfully, the levels of violence are reducing and have been reducing very significantly in recent years but for many interface communities people still live with intermittent violence, and in almost all interface communities people live with the trauma of years of extreme violence. So that’s the first attribute which interface communities tend to share.
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2) “High levels of social and economic disadvantage coupled with environmental blight. Neil, I think, is going to talk about how things have changed and are changing in recent years in terms of new and emerging interfaces, but many interface areas are characterised by low levels of educational achievement, low levels of car ownership, high levels of unemployment, all the standard indicators of socio-economic disadvantage, and if you look at those pictures behind me you will probably appreciate that many of those areas aren’t very visually attractive.
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3) “A common problem in terms of difficulties in accessing facilities and services where those services are on the other side of an interface, so that in many interface communities people have a difficulty crossing the interface, travelling from their nationalist area – if that’s where they are from – into or through the unionist area on the other side of the interface in order to go to a shop or go to college, or go to their place of employment or go to the pub or get a bus, whatever it might be. And that’s a particular difficulty for people who live in enclave communities, those island communities, because, for people who live in that kind of community, virtually everything that they might want to access would be perceived as difficult and at times of tension it would be perceived as dangerous, positively dangerous, for them to access.
Patterns of violence: “The next thing I want to talk about is patterns of violence. There is often a perception outside of interface communities, and sometimes even within interface communities, that it is the interface communities who are at war with each other – ‘if only they would stop fighting with each other we would all get on fine’. And what people who live in interface communities commonly report is that when there is violence in their area – which historically would have happened particularly over things like Drumcree or times of political tension – what people report is that when violence erupts at their interface, typically people travel from quite far afield to their interface. In other words the interface is the site of violence rather than the sole source of violence. And it’s important to understand that, understanding that is a big part of the key to unlocking the problem in terms of how to address interface violence.
Youth-led violence: “In recent years, particularly since the ceasefires – this was put to me best by a fellow on the Cliftonville Road, he described the situation in Cliftonpark Avenue, he was saying: ‘it used to be the kids would come out and they would riot, then the bigger kids would come out and they would riot, then the men would come out of the pubs and they would riot, and then the gunmen would come out and the streets would clear, and now the gunmen don’t come out’. Against that backdrop of the gunmen not coming out, we have had an ongoing problem for some years where there is a huge problem of youth-led violence, where young people have been socialised into sectarian clashes, I suppose that’s the best way of putting it. For many of those young people it is a sport, what we would call ‘recreational rioting’, for some of them it is a way of showing their loyalty to their community and their actions in their eyes of defending their community. And it is a problem, not simply in terms of the actions of those young people. When we interviewed interface communities a few years ago, their number one concern was about the future for their young people, that’s against the backdrop of social and economic disadvantage, restricted access and high levels of violence. That was their number one concern, and their concern wasn’t just about the role of young people in violence, their concern was about their young people as victims of violence. So there’s been an ongoing issue in terms of addressing the issue of youth-led violence.
“In recent years, thankfully, there has been a growing capacity to address violence in interface areas, a growth in mechanisms like mobile phone networks, conflict transformation mechanisms and forums, but it is important to recognise that some of those difficulties that interface communities have, they aren’t all within their gift to address.
“For example, that issue of mobility and access. The interface community on the other side of an interface can only do so much to help that interface community to access employment that might be quite far away, that is within the gift of other people beyond the local, and it’s important to understand that.
Interface conference – identifying what needs to change: “We had a conference last year, Interface Communities. The people who attended were pretty clear in terms of what they think needs to change. There’s a lot of fragmentation across interfaces and they feel there is a need for a more shared vision, interface communities to be working together jointly. They feel there is a need for standardised mechanisms in terms of addressing violence. There’s a common recognition of this issue about young people and the need for much more focused work with young people. There’s a lack of partnership work and they don’t see any champion of interface communities on the horizon, certainly in terms of government and the statutory agencies. They are recognising the change in terms of paramilitary attitudes to interface regeneration, they’re acknowledging the need for more effective policing, they are virtually as one, united, on the need for much more effective means to increase people’s educational achievement right across Belfast.
Shared Future: “And if there is one thing that I think they are all pretty much keen on promoting, it’s this one document, and that’s where I’ll finish. This document was produced by government last year, it’s called the ‘Shared Future’ – it’s probably one of the most significant new policies to emerge from government in Northern Ireland in many many years. And what this says for the very first time is that every Government department, every single Government department in Northern Ireland, whenever it’s planning what it is going to do over the next three years, everything that it says it is going to do it has to say how doing that thing will promote a shared future – that is something that no government department ever had to do, and that’s something that we are all placing a great deal of hope in. Thank you.”
Chair (Mike Reade): “Thanks Chris. I think we are going to have another power point presentation next so that will take a couple of minutes to prepare…. I suppose the final part of what Chris had to stay will be interesting in terms of questions and the future. The background that he gave is particularly interesting for me as I am from a working-class area. If often think that the problems which people endure in working-class areas are always the same, and how they respond can be different and unique in Northern Ireland. We will hear more of that later. Now our next speaker is Neil Jarman…
2. Dr Neil Jarman (Director, Institute for Conflict Research):
“Thank you and good evening everybody….. It is very nice to be here again. It was I think probably about 1996 the first time I was down here [MPG talk no. 22: ‘Parading Disputes’, 1 Oct. 1996]…I remember some of the people here and it is certainly very nice to be welcomed back here.
“I am going to try and complement what Chris said – we tried to synchronise what we would say over the phone the last couple of days, I’m not sure if we have, but I am going to cover some of the same ground but I am going to make slightly different points of emphasis.
Broader definition of an interface: “I have a slightly broader remit of the notion of interfaces than Chris does. The definition of an interface as ‘a conjunction or intersection of two or more territories or social spaces, which are dominated, contested or claimed by members of different ethno-national groups’ is something I came up with in a paper I did for the Community Relations Council a couple of years ago. And the difference, I suppose, from what Chris said is that I am not limiting it purely to residential communities, that interfaces occur – in terms of spaces that are contested and fought over – in other types of environments in Northern Ireland. There are shopping centres which get used by one community rather than the other community, there are leisure centres, there are different types of spaces that people use which are not necessarily linked purely to their residence. So interfaces are mainly found in residential communities but not exclusively so. And part of that is a factor of the segregation which has underpinned life in Northern Ireland since urbanisation, since the early 19th century, two hundred years in Belfast in particular. So they are mainly a factor of the residential areas of Northern Ireland, and they are mainly a factor of the urban areas, though not exclusively an urban phenomenon. Interfaces occur in many of the communities in Northern Ireland.
Segregation: “Segregation is a prominent theme in residential and social life in Northern Ireland, it’s not an exclusive theme. There is a selection of our reports and publications on the shelf over there and one of the recent reports has started looking at mixed residential communities and areas which are not segregated in Northern Ireland, and trying to open up a debate, so that they’re not all about interfaces, it’s not the only thing in Northern Ireland.
Number of interfaces: “So, having said that they are not only residential, or that they are not only in urban areas, we can move on to the point that Chris made about counting the number of peace lines and so forth. We can count the number of NIO-built peace lines in Belfast and acknowledge also that they exist in Derry/Londonderry, in Lurgan and Portadown as well. But we don’t actually know how many interfaces there are because they are very vague and they are very general. Some of them have got fences and barriers that mark them out and make them very obvious, but many aren’t [obvious]. Some of them are marked by other forms of buildings. For example, my own office is on an interface, and putting a commercial development on a contested space is a way of regenerating that environment but also trying to provide the sort of buffer zone that Chris talked about as well.
Open spaces: “Some of them are marked by open spaces. A lot of the parks in Belfast you walk along won’t look like an interface because there will be trees, there will be vegetation, there will be open space, but that in itself is a buffer, it’s a way of keeping the communities apart.”
Flags: “Flags can also demarcate interfaces at certain times of year. At other times of the year they may be perfectly normal looking areas but at times – in the marching season and the like – flags go up and they clearly start to claim that territory, to contest that territory for one community over and above other people.”
Barriers in people’s heads: “The barriers that exist are also sometimes in people’s heads … you can cross the interfaces, some people do ignore them, and they tend to affect some sections of the community more than others. It’s not only a class thing, I would say it also affect males more than females and younger people more than older people, insofar as older women are more able to cross interfaces and access resources on the other side and feel unthreatened by it than a young male is. Because the same sort of patterns of contest and challenge and access and linkages to territory and gang association occur in Northern Ireland as they do everywhere else, they just have another dimension which is the sectarian divide between Protestants and Catholics which is mapped on top of that. So they exist in people’s heads, it’s what tells you at times that you can’t cross over this road, or you’ve got to walk up that side of the street, or it’s not safe to walk down one particular area.
Violence: “The violence is, or has been, a persistent and recurring problem and it is one of the things that has marked out interfaces as, I suppose, a theme which is attractive to the Meath Peace Group to want to talk about in Navan. The violence has often been associated with things like parades, but there are lots of other things that have provoked violence around interfaces:
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“football matches have increasingly come to the fore, not actually football matches that take place in Belfast or in Ireland but Rangers versus Celtic matches that take place in Scotland have provoked violence in interfaces in Belfast.
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“flags – I mentioned earlier that putting up flags can provoke tensions and lead to disorder.
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“The night-time economy – people coming back having had a few beers, walking past an interface, deciding to sing a few songs or throw a few bottles over a wall – whereas it becomes a nuisance and is anti-social behaviour in other towns and cities, in parts of Belfast it can provoke sectarian tensions and it generates a response because it is ‘them’ doing it to ‘us’ and they are doing it to us because they don’t like us rather than because someone is drunk.
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“And a lot of it is associated with the presence of young people and the boredom of young people, and the fact that throwing stones and starting a fight around the interfaces can be exciting at certain times of year.
Violence – statistics for North Belfast region: “There are very few statistics as to how much violence occurs in interfaces. One of the few sets of statistics that I have got is from the North Belfast region – this is from 7 interfaces out of the 41 that Chris has mentioned which have got barriers marked:
April 1996 – April 2004 (North Belfast):
Riots: 376
Disturbances: 1, 021
Assaults: 1, 343
Criminal damage: 3, 883
Rioting: “Just look at that figure. When you think about how often rioting occurs in Ireland, when the riots occurred in Dublin last year they were headline news. Belfast has come to accept or to come to normatise rioting at times and the amount of disorder that occurs. Those statistics give you an indication that it is a persistent and recurring problem over a long period of time in which people have come to accept it as a problem, and to some extent have had to put up with it, and to some extent it has been the motivation for work to try and reduce it. And a lot of that work – and I will talk about it in a minute – has come from work on the ground, some of the people who are here tonight. A lot of the responses to that violence and disorder have come from grass-roots activism rather than from the State.”
Contrasts in the peace process: “Where are we in relation to interfaces within the peace process? Since 1994 we are into thirteen years since the ceasefires. Over that period, none of the interface barriers in Belfast or the other towns in Northern Ireland has been removed. That’s a fairly depressing fact. The Border crossings all opened up very quickly, but the border crossings, the closures in Belfast, haven’t started to come down. In fact, of those 41 barriers, that fact that 20 of them are either completely new or have been extended or enlarged or strengthened in some way during the peace process gives you an indication of some of the contrasts that are going on in the peace process – that violence carries on at a low level at the same time as the peace is carrying on.
Permanent barriers: “The barriers have also, to some extent, been made more permanent. The earliest barriers, in the late 1960s or early 1970s were barbed wire or sheet steel. They have now become aestheticised, you won’t notice them very much so obviously because they are designed – they’re brick, they’re steel, they are colours, they have been harmonised into the environment. And that conveys a sense that they are really part of a permanent structure here, they are not just thrown up on a temporary basis and going to be pulled down again.
Sense of security: “And they are there, in some senses, because they do offer a sense of security for people, they provide a sense of safety and security from the threat or the reality of violence. Although it doesn’t necessarily stop it, it provides some sense of safety about it, and they also provide a sense of security against social change, that people’s territories, the environment in which they live and in which they identify, is to an extent fixed and permanent and it’s not going to change.”
Change: “Having said that, interfaces are not static areas, they do move, they do change. There are a variety of forms in which interfaces have emerged, new interfaces have come into being, maybe not with barriers and so forth but they are changing. There is a sense in many communities that what is happening in the working-class communities, there’s a ‘greening process’ – places that had been predominantly Protestant working-class communities are becoming steadily Catholic working-class communities. The process doesn’t seem to operate so much in the reverse – Catholic communities becoming Protestant communities – it tends to build up a pattern, or has built up a pattern, in Belfast and elsewhere that there is a greening process.
“And you can see that in the overall demographics of Belfast, that it has become a majority Catholic city over the course of the ‘Troubles’.
Immigration: “We also see the current wave of increasing diversity with migrants coming in and new communities establishing themselves in Belfast and other parts of Northern Ireland. Sometimes those people go into interface areas, or move into interface areas because the housing is cheap, the housing is available, and they get caught up into the tensions and the changing dynamics of those communities.
Suburbanisation: “There has also been a pattern of suburbanisation going on as people move out from the inner city areas to the satellite towns and the Greater Belfast Area. That brings with it some of the patterns of Belfast, and some of the contests that were in the inner city areas have now started to be reproduced in some of the satellite towns, particularly through the activities of young people accessing resources and facilities and gathering on street corners and engaging in rivalries.
Redevelopment: “Building redevelopment, regeneration – a factor that has come through the peace process – can often lead to the creation of new interfaces by building up on brown field sites which have been almost deliberately left as brown field because they were too dangerous to build on and redevelop. And you start to create new houses and new properties, and the conjunction of the new properties with the old properties can create interfaces as well.
Displacement of violence: “And also sometimes the work that has been done in trying to control and limit the violence can actually in turn end up in displacing the violence, as the people who want to engage in some form of rioting, or some forms of disorder, can’t do it in point ‘A’ so they move up the area to point ‘B’. An area which wasn’t particularly contentious in one period of time starts to become more fought over and contentious.
“So there are a whole number of factors – some of the interfaces have been there for 20/30 years, some of them haven’t, and there are processes of change going on, so it’s a very real and a very live issue.
Responses: “The responses to the interfaces which I would emphasise as being the most significant over the last ten years have really come from the communities on the ground and the people working in those communities as conflict intervenors, forms of conflict management. Chris mentioned the work involving people linking up through mobile phone networks to provide communication and coordinate responses. A lot of the early work was really about fire-fighting, reactive responses to violence and disorder. It has steadily moved on to being more predictive, of knowing that the problems are likely to occur in certain places and at certain times and having people out on the ground to manage that disorder and prevent it happening rather than to respond to it happening. You then see the increasing process of intra-community dialogue and inter-community dialogue: debates within single-identity communities of the need to address the problems and debates between groups within the two communities coming together to coordinate how they are going to respond to the disorder and how they are going to manage it. And now in most of the community interface networks certainly in Belfast, you have got quite a wide range of cross-community networks, of groups coming together to manage their interface and the problems in their communities, but from that building on to work on other issues. And that has also served as a means of building communication, building dialogue, building trust, building relationships which can then convince people to engage in other issues that affect those communities, not just the hard edge of conflict.”
Sharing resources: “And then, moving on from that, is where we are starting to go now, where we are just starting beginning to engage now – the point that Chris was talking about – we start to think about how you plan and how you develop strategies for sharing resources. Because for a lot of the communities the interfaces cut through resources, so that a barrier goes up, access to a shop is no longer so ready, access to a bus stop, access to a doctor’s surgery, any kind of facilities that people want can become more problematic. So people are beginning to think more constructively now over the last few years, about how you can start to plan and to share resources, to share the facilities.
Positive phase: “I think realistically the interface barriers are going to be there for some time yet, a lot of them are very solid structures, a lot of them have only just been built, and there’s no real indication yet that people have got to the stage where the barriers are coming down because they do provide that sense of security. But I think people are increasingly talking around the problem of the barriers, and around building relationships to start to continue the work where the violence is not so much of a problem, and the relationships can continue and the spaces can start to be shared and utilised together, and the violence won’t keep interrupting that dialogue and setting things back. So I think we are looking at a fairly positive phase over the last two or three years in terms of the management of violence, and we are beginning to move into a phase of constructive engagement with documents like what Chris talked about – the Shared Future. Thank you”
Chair (Mike Reade): “Thanks Neil. Can I just ask you – do you think in the future if it will make a difference to the unionist community if they are looking to nationalists who serve as police officers for assistance, at times such as when they need a crime investigated?”
Neil Jarman: “I don’t think people necessarily look to see what community background that police officer is from at the moment, increasing numbers – I am not sure of the figures ….”
Mike: “No, but in time, when people find themselves not just interfacing but when they actually realise that they are looking to a nationalist for assistance in a crime that has been committed against them, surely that would break down some of the barriers?”
Neil Jarman: “I think people would say, I think probably the police would say that they are not a nationalist police officer or a unionist police officer, they are a police officer. That police officer has to stand outside that role, and I think historically, certainly people in unionist community haven’t tended to see police officers as nationalist or unionist.
“Probably the Catholic community tended to see them all as unionist, pro-unionist, whereas the unionist community hasn’t tended to characterise. There’s been a resistance on behalf of the police in trying to go down that line, and there were certainly discussions when the police reform process was up about recruiting police from a locality to police that locality and therefore having a more cantonised form of policing. I don’t think it’s going to go down that road, quite honestly.”
Mike Reade: “You don’t think people will notice, or be bothered to notice?”
Neil Jarman: “I don’t think they will want to notice. The issues might come up occasionally if things go wrong. I don’t think it will have an effect. I don’t think people will look at the police officer in terms of their community background at all. One of the interesting things I suppose at the moment is that at the last police recruitment I think 12% of the applicants were Polish so that creates another dynamic for policing in Northern Ireland…”
Mike Reade: “Yes, plenty of Catholic police officers because of that! We’ll move on [tape break] … Our next speaker is Frankie Gallagher:
3. Frankie Gallagher (Ulster Political Research Group):
“I want to thank Julitta and the Meath Peace Group for bringing me down again. 1998 was the last time I was here, with some ex-prisoners and their families [at the MPG talk no. 29: ‘The Good Friday Agreement’, 5 May 1998] and I think we broke down some barriers that night, not just here in Navan but also when I went back to east Belfast, went back to Belfast and within the constituency of the UDA. Because we had seen how difficult it was to break out of the stereotyping, the demonisation, the criminalisation which my community and my people have been put into which is a large part of the problem, of trying to get out of the trouble we are in at the moment.
“I’m not here as any expert. I have two of my comrades here with me – Ronnie Black and Isaac Andrews. Ronnie is from north Belfast and Isaac is from west Belfast, probably two of the areas with the most interfaces and contentious parades in the whole of Belfast, probably in the whole of Northern Ireland. I brought them along tonight so that when we are talking after this, they can answer questions as well. And it’s another opportunity for us, and I’m thanking the Meath Peace Group for giving our people an opportunity to break out of our enclaves and come and speak and test our own theories, so I want to thank you for all of that.
Class discrimination within unionist community: “We are talking about interfaces and nobody one has mentioned ‘class’ yet, not one person has mentioned class. Ronnie and Isaac live in north and west Belfast, and I live in east Belfast. East Belfast has got one interface or so they say. But I can tell you, I live in east Belfast and there are as many social and economic interfaces where the middle classes and the unionist ascendancy, the unionist hierarchy etc, discriminated against me as well. And that had a profound impact on a lot of the people, certainly within the Protestant community that would be in the Ulster Defence Association right across Northern Ireland.
“I come from a place called Ballymacarrett. Ballymacarrett in the Great Famine of 1845 was not part of Belfast City Council, it was in County Antrim across the Lagan. There was a book brought out, I don’t know if anybody here has read it, called The Hidden Famine, and it was about the Ulster-Scots, the Scotch-Irish people who were over with the absentee Scottish mill owners, and they just left their workers to rot in Ballymacarrett. And the people in Ballymacarrett at the time, in 1845, walked to a farm called Tullycarnet, and I happen to live in Tullycarnet now, but it used to be a farm. And they used to go out to the farm and they used to collect the rotten turnips, take them back down to Ballymacarrett, boil them up with pigmeal and that’s what they survived on. And they were all Protestant, Presbyterian dissenters. And that is a legacy which we have not forgot, but which we failed to get across or people failed to talk about whenever they talk about a unionist family. The legacy for us was that we were discriminated against as well, between the established churches and certainly within unionism.
Anti-social behaviour: “So when you are talking about interfaces, I believe there is a class issue and that class issue has to be addressed as well, many of the issues that we are seeing at the interfaces at the moment that everyone has spoke about so far. There is the fact that there is recreational rioting going on, there is rioting being arranged now through the Internet, through texts on mobile phones. And we think it is anti-social behaviour, we think it is recreational and it is nothing actually to do with sectarianism. And that is one of the thinkings we have within our approach, trying to deal with these issues. So, how much of it ever was about sectarianism and how much of it was about class, how much of it was about the social ills of deprivation within our areas? Because, if there is still rioting, they’re still at it, and we’ve all come to terms politically and all the rest of it – as I hope we do when they go to the polls on the 7th March – then why are the kids still doing it? Why are people still doing it? So we have to look way beyond the normal, and it says it in the Shared Future document, you have to go beyond, into the wider context of social and economic issues, around neighbourhood renewal etc. So that’s very much where we are.”
UDA contribution to creating stability: “But what we are also saying is that we have been a part of the problem and we want to be part of the solution. And I would say that certainly in the last four years, with the removal of Johnny Adair, with the removal of Jim Gray, with the removal of the Shoukris, the McClanes, who were all drug dealers – they were criminals, they were opportunists who had worked their way in whether by stealth or whether they were put there by our governments. They managed and controlled our communities. It was them who sent kids out, for example one young lad in north Belfast who was sent out with a fuse on a pipe bomb that was already tried and tested, it went out – that same lad blew his arm off and died. He was only about 19. So these are the people who wanted to keep our communities locked in this sectarian, or so-called ‘sectarian’ situation. But then who was running them, who put them there, who managed them? And you can see what is being played out in Northern Ireland with that.
“So my community within the UDA, within east Belfast and across Northern Ireland and the areas where my comrades come from, we have been exploited by those same forces and we want to move on. But what we are trying to do now is we’re trying to create stability. I think we have done that to a degree.
“I don’t hear anybody, and I haven’t heard any of the two speakers mentioning the UDA once, yet I believe it was UDA that stopped the pipe bombs being thrown in north Belfast. I think out of all the changes, the UDA has been accredited with the most dynamic change and the most impact on the ground, but that is not to take away from the work that the lads have been talking about earlier because we need everybody to work at it.
New environment: “And the other thing I believe I think we have done is we have created a whole new environment. One of the main things, as I said earlier, is we got rid of criminals, criminals who were being run either by themselves as opportunists or people within the State, to control those communities. One of the most important impacts so far we have created is we have created a stable political environment. Now you may not think at the moment it is stable with the two of them shouting at each other and all the rest of it, but I think what we have done, we created the environment where … politicians, if they were in a corner or couldn’t get out of an impasse they were in, went around to the local criminal, the local drug dealer, whoever, and said ‘listen, bit of interface trouble here, get it going, we need off the hook’ – and I can tell you, I would accuse Sinn Féin straight to their face of doing the same. We stopped that. Now it’s up to the politicians in Northern Ireland. Outside of blaming the bully boys, the paramilitaries and all the rest of it, it’s down to them now, and what we are seeing played out now is politicians who have no longer anybody to blame, they can’t get off the hook and they are wriggling all over the place! And it’s brilliant to see it, and I hope they continue to wriggle, and that they wriggle their way into government because it’s the only place we are going to get continued stability.
Hypocrisy: “I think the UDA has to be accredited with that. Nobody has accredited them with it and that’s one of the problems of the peace process – they are demonised, they are criminalised, they’re ‘no good’, they’re ‘bad people’, yet they have brought about more change than anybody else. And this is the hypocrisy that you get in Northern Ireland. We get more recognition when we come down to Meath, when we come down to Glencree, when we go to Brussels, when we go everywhere, people recognise us – bar the people certainly within our own community, and certainly unionist so-called leaders. Maybe they’re scared of us, maybe they don’t want us because of the underlying class issues, they don’t want us addressing those types of issues.
“But what we have tried to do in all this five or six years’ development, at great risk – and it was only two years ago that they tried to murder me, they put me in the boot of a car. Thank God, the people that were told to put me in the boot of the car were sitting beside me and they said ‘Frankie what will we do?’ And I said ‘well, don’t put me in the boot of the car… ’
Confidence needed:“So, it went on from strength to strength there, but we have got to start giving credit where credit is due, whether they are the perceived monsters and all the rest of it. Sinn Féin could not do what they are doing – and this is one of the ironies of the peace process which I think is very healthy, it’s a political process that is very healthy in Northern Ireland – you could not have got Sinn Féin and the IRA to move unless they were strong, they were confident and they could make decisions, and competently make decisions to go away, because only they could make themselves go away. My people need to do that as well.
Interface trouble: “…. You may ask ‘what’s this to do with interface trouble?’ It’s everything to do with interface trouble because that’s where it was played out, that’s where the charades were played out, that’s where the shenanigans went on with everybody to get off the hook of not finding political stability. And if all it took was one of the republicans to do with the Provisional IRA to come out with 1 pipe bomb, as soon as they threw 1 pipe bomb the UDA came out and threw 20 pipe bombs. But when they were getting the 20 pipe bombs, the IRA would phone up the press and the TVs so, by the time they were throwing the 20 pipe bombs, the press was coming down and the only pogroms and the only morons that they could see on TV were the Protestants attacking the Catholic community. It totally distorted the whole picture. I believe that’s true because in the short space of about 4 years, we are here in relative stability, we are talking about things and issues that people actually don’t want to do these things, it’s the normal things, the social ills, about football, about low education, about no jobs, low self esteem – that’s where we are going with all this.
“That existed then but somebody else was playing games with it. We have changed that environment. We don’t get no credit for it but we are going to go on. ….
Conflict Transformation Initiative: “And I wanted to come here and not whinge about the interface areas and all the rest, and how downtrodden we are. We are doing something about it, we’re doing something about it through an initiative called the Conflict Transformation Initiative. And it’s to bring that stability. It was based on the question ‘is the war over?’ And if it’s not, then what will we do next? And if it is over, where do we go next? So we went through these last 4 months, into those areas that we are talking about, where the interface fighting went on, and we asked over 4,000 people from December, 4,000 men, all in the Ulster Defence Association, those questions. And everyone of them said: ‘the war is not over but it has changed, it is about the real enemies in our community, social issues, deprivation, the lack of jobs, the lack education, the lack of confidence.’
British identity: “They also believe it’s not over because the IRA have not given over their aspiration for a united Ireland. Well, why should we give up our aspiration to remain British, as part of our British identity? Not an English identity but a British identity which is much broader than an English identity, which I think people get mixed up with. So, everyone to a man has decided they want to move on, they can no longer sustain the status quo. They have all got confidence through the actions we have taken. So we are trying, and one of the admissions was that we, through the interface violence, where those people who came out, the gunmen who came out, the pipe bombers and all the rest that Chris talked about, was that they wanted to move from a position of defending and to end it… because first and foremost they admitted that they had harmed and hurt their own community, and it had to stop. So they wanted to help mend their own community and move on and maybe mend the whole bigger picture , within the nationalist/republican community, Roman Catholic community, and any other communities that may well have been hurt.
Managing change: “But to do that they have also said that they had to face up to the challenge to manage change, and that’s where we are at the minute. And I think the interface trouble and the interface issues have totally changed now, they’ve changed because of what the UDA has done. Now they didn’t do it on their own, they can’t do it on their own, but I think they were certainly one of the last pieces of a big jigsaw that fell into place to create that stability.
Dialogue: “So I am hoping that continues. I think that what we are also doing now is that we are giving confidence to people within our own community to respect the dead, to respect other people’s dead, to try and create dialogue. And one of the things in the Shared Future document was that dialogue had to be sort of ‘earthed’ in local dialogue etc. Well we are doing that, and hopefully if we can do it within our own community we intend moving out quickly into other communities to talk and try and do it. And the important thing is that we bring people with us to do that.
Post-traumatic stress – time bomb waiting to explode: “So we are trying to do this, we have worked hard and we are going to continue to do it but one of the problems we have, and I suppose that everybody has, is that people who have demonised people within my community for so long think they can just go away, they think they can stop it overnight, they think all you have to do is down tools and go home. It doesn’t happen like that. We just buried a comrade in west Belfast on Saturday morning. That guy was at the front of the fighting, he took the war to the IRA, for all the right reasons that he believed in, whether the violence was wrong, we are coming to terms with it. And I definitely hope that another Irish republican never dies for Ireland, I hope they live for Ireland and their united Ireland, but I also don’t want to see another loyalist die for Ulster. I want them to live for Ulster. And one of the problems we are having now, and the demonisation and criminalisation process is heavy on our hearts, that that person is suffering from what we call ‘post-conflict traumatic stress syndrome’. And nobody actually recognises that back home. And if you go into a loyalist community, because of the lack of loyalist leadership, because of the lack of recognition within our unionist community and our unionist leaders, it’s a time bomb waiting to explode – there are hundreds and hundreds of people within the loyalist community who have went and have murdered, who have killed their enemy as they see it, and have been killed by their enemy. And it’s ready to explode. And they are all living on the interface areas.
New phase: “So we are moving to a new phase we believe. We think we have stabilised in large the interface areas. We believe people think this is the end game, you know this would make a good documentary, the end game in Ireland. What a load of nonsense! We believe this is just the end of the beginning. They have put in the physical structures, they have done some economic stuff, though not enough, all the physical stuff has been done. What we are saying now is it’s about people, it’s up to my community interfaces to get the capacity, to get the training, to get the support and the confidence to be able to walk across that divide and go and speak to people in Ardoyne, to go and speak to people on the Falls Road, and bring them over to us and do the same. So it is all about people now.
Time bomb within loyalism: “But nobody is listening, nobody is listening to the time bomb that is happening within loyalism. Because we believe there are hundreds and hundreds of our volunteers who are ready to explode, and they are killing themselves at a terrible rate, and they’re not even recognised.
Conclusion: “So I hope that what comes out of the Meath Peace Group and the talk tonight is that this is not the end game, this is only the end of the beginning. There’s other issues, there’s social ills that we have to address. But let’s not fall into the trap of sectarianism. Let’s fall into the position of recognising there are class issues. Yes there are political issues and religious issues but there are other issues being hidden. And let’s try and stop demonising each other within Northern Ireland. And maybe if we can get the understanding of the people in the Republic – you know I think we have far more friends down here now who are arguing our case and the arguments are coming back up into Northern Ireland. And it’s ironic that we are coming down here for to try and get a voice, but we are going to continue to do it. The Meath peace Group has given us the opportunity again. What I hope is that we continue our progress, I don’t want the credit for it or anything else but I hope that the volunteers who were ex-combatants, who fought the war, who are now trying to establish peace in Northern Ireland, get the credit, because they need the confidence, they need the help, they do need a pat on the back at times. And I think this is where it starts. So I am hoping that we come out of this with something positive because there is a time-bomb just waiting to explode on the interface areas and I think we have to address it. Thank you very much for listening.”
Mike Reade: “Thank you. There’s plenty to react to there, I’m sure we will have plenty of questions. Our final speaker is Seán Brennan.”
4. Seán Brennan (North Belfast Developing Leadership Initiative):
“Good evening and thank you for inviting me here. I’m supposed to be Conor Maskey [of Intercomm Belfast] but unfortunately Conor wasn’t able to make it so I’ve been sent down in his place.
Community empowerment programmes: “I am going to endorse everything the other three speakers said. I think they’ve all hit on the main points. I’ll start off by just explaining who I am and what I do. I work for the North Belfast Developing Leadership Initiative Community Empowerment Programme – a bit of a mouthful. The Community Empowerment Programmes grew out of the consequences of the Holy Cross dispute. And just to follow on from what Frankie was saying, following the Good Friday Agreement, or the Belfast Agreement, whatever you want to call it, in 1998, a lot of people decided that that was it, it was over, and a lot of the communities in interface areas were just ignored and forgotten about, primarily for the reasons that Frankie has outlined, they didn’t need them to go and kill anyone anymore so they were just left to their own devices. This created a series of problems within north Belfast and community people have tried their best to move that on, especially within the Protestant community, but they just got nowhere, and, unsurprisingly, interface violence erupted and we had the Holy Cross dispute and the consequences of that. In a way it was a good thing because it forced government to address the needs of interface communities. … Quite often people point fingers at interface communities and say, ‘it’s your fault and if only you’se would all get on with each other, why don’t ye and … everything will be grand?’
Dunlop Report: “So the community organisations had tried and tried for years and nothing had come of it but because of the Holy Cross dispute the government commissioned the Dunlop Report. And the Dunlop Report looked at interface violence, especially in north Belfast, and it came up with this strategy to address it. Now you have to remember that North Belfast is a patchwork quilt of interface communities, and not only, as has been mentioned here earlier, the physical interface communities but also what I call the intellectual interfaces, between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’- who think they’re doing ok and they don’t want the ‘have nots’ to get anything. And that’s of course in contrast to north Down where you have the ‘haves’ and the ‘have yachts’! So there are people who did extremely well out of the conflict in Northern Ireland, let’s not forget about that.
Murder triangle: “But in north Belfast you have to start to imagine what it was like. North Belfast was known as the ‘murder triangle’, proportionately it had more people killed than any other part of Northern Ireland. Last year Pete Shirlow did a piece of research which discovered that the majority of people who were killed in north Belfast were killed within 9 feet of their front door! So that means that trying to get anyone to move out of an interface community is virtually impossible – people were living with their doors blocked up, their windows had grills on them, their lights were turned out, their back gardens – instead of having plastic oil tanks, they have metal oil tanks. So they were basically living in cages, and they would come out during the hours of daylight and they would be back before it would get dark and then they didn’t answer the door.
Health and social problems: “You had a range of social and economic problems there. Not surprisingly, people were taking drugs, and that’s not even without going to the illegal drug dealers. People were going to the doctors, the children were on all types of medication and the parents were on all types of medications. And if anybody knows the kind of cycle you’ll understand what happens. And it usually happens to women because they are under more pressure than anyone else. So the mother goes to the doctor, she gets all these tranquillisers, then she finds it hard to get up in the morning, she doesn’t get the kids out to school. The kids don’t go out to school, the kids hang about the streets all day long, they get a bit of a bad name.
“Other parents come to the mother complaining about the kids, the mother goes back to the doctor and the doctor gives her stronger medication. The kids stay out late, stay up drinking, start taking drugs, start creating anti-social behaviour. Then the paramilitary guys come around and say ‘you’ve got to start looking after your kids’, the mother goes back to the doctor for more medication and the cycle goes on and on and on. And not surprisingly people drink a lot and smoke a lot in those interface areas, so there are huge health implications as well. Now that’s without even going into the political situation.
“You can imagine the difficulties that people have even trying to organise to address those kinds of issues. It’s difficult to come out your door and try and form a group and try and campaign against a specific issue if there’s nobody in the street or you’re terrified of going out or if you think that something’s going to happen to you.
North Belfast Community Action Unit: “So, as a consequence of all that, the government formed this group called the North Belfast Community Action Unit, an organisation within government, set up within OFM/DFM [Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister] so it has direct ministerial support. And it’s made up of representatives of different departments who come together to address specific issues within an interface because government has now recognised that it needs a multi-agency approach but it also needs the community. And because of the difficulties in north Belfast, community organisations had to be empowered to facilitate the change. So what was encouraged was a series of empowerment partnerships where you had small little groups dotted about areas. They were brought together in this large umbrella organisation of an empowerment partnership. Then government would ask the local people to identify what specific issues were affecting their area, and identify strategies, and they would provide small pieces of money to address that. And from that we now have 14 community empowerment partnerships in north Belfast, and north Belfast being what it is, it stretches right across from Carlisle Circus right out to Newtownabbey. Because government thought as this stretches across two local district council boundaries that there was no point stopping it in Belfast and then the kids in Rathcoole rioting against the kids in Belfast. So it had to stretch right out. So not only does the interface issue cover Belfast and the different areas in it, it also covers Newtownabbey, so you have two local district council areas. And that is known as the parliamentary constituency of North Belfast.
Difficulties in Protestant interface communities: “So, as Neil has said, within that range of interface communities, sometimes it’s better not to look at it as Catholic against Protestant. They are the buts where both sides fall out and hit each other. Within either side of those interfaces there are stresses and strains. Frankie has made a point towards that, talking about some of the politicians within the Protestant community. In actual fact, it is probably better to be in a Catholic community than it is to be in a Protestant community, especially if you are at working-class level because the political struggle is still going on, and the DUP are still arguing out issues and that sort of reflects within Protestant areas where it is difficult to get grassroots regeneration going because some local councillors don’t want to be seen within the company of [some people].
Common social and economic issues: “So there are a range of issues ongoing. Within the interface communities, through the empowerment partnerships, people started to come together to look at the issues that affected them most. And, as Frankie has already said, when people sat down and started talking about the things that affected them – not what affected the people on the other side, but what affected them – they were near enough all the same things: lack of education, lack of health, lack of social amenities, lack of employment. If you come from one of those interface communities the chances are that once you put your postcode down, you are not going to get that job. And that’s what we call ‘postcode discrimination’. But I am trying to change that to ‘post-conflict development’, to try and sort of put a positive spin on it.
Developing leadership: “So, through these community empowerment partnerships, we have started to work to address specific issues. One of the things that our community empowerment partnership does is develop leadership. That sounds a bit vague I know, but, as Frankie has already said, especially within the Protestant community, people have found it difficult to get community representatives to come out and then when they do come out and somebody says ‘oh he’s a loyalist’, or ‘he’s a paramilitary’ and then they don’t want to know you. And that whole demonisation process goes on. So it is extremely difficult to get people to step forward and step into the spotlight. But it has progressed and the work is going on. In the Developing Leadership Initiative we work across a range of issues with all the other community empowerment partnerships. One of the things we do is around developing leadership skills, and I’ll touch on that in a minute.
Regeneration process: “The other thing that we do, and hence me being the Edward De Bono person, is that the Edward De Bono Foundation has a plan to take over part of Crumlin Road Prison. Crumlin Road Prison is an old 19th century jail, some of you may have heard of it, some of you may have even stayed in it. It’s now derelict and it’s up for regeneration, and it’s on the Crumlin Road. And the idea is that the Crumlin Road regeneration process will kick-start a wider regeneration process in the whole of north Belfast. North Belfast has got some of the most beautiful scenery, some of the most beautiful houses, but it’s also got some of the worst. So the government plan is to use this regeneration process to kick-start and lift the whole of north Belfast, bring in further infrastructural developments and grants and turn north Belfast into a vibrant community.
Demands on land and new immigrants: “One of the difficulties with that is – and again it has been mentioned – the spatial demands on land. Within nationalist north Belfast, it’s overcrowded, it’s got a very young population, they’re trying to look for houses, they’re trying to stay in the area. On the Protestant/unionist/loyalist side, they’ve got an older population, people don’t want to live there, the housing stock is degenerating, and – I don’t want to say too much about the South – but a lot of southern investors have come up and bought houses in Protestant/unionist/loyalist areas, and they’re renting them out to new citizens. So on top of the traditional sectarian divide, we now have new immigrants coming in – Filipinos, Pakistanis, Lithuanians, Poles etc etc. So these are putting further demands onto the local community because a lot of these communities don’t have a tradition of going to the police, they have a tradition of sorting it out within their own area. And if you’ve got 8 Polish guys on a Saturday night unwinding after a week’s work, they don’t really understand what’s going on sometimes, the language may not be good, so there are tensions that arise from that there. And these are things that we talk about through our work.
Centre for Constructive Thinking and Citizenship: “So the prison project hopefully will help to address that. However, being north Belfast it is never easy. Girdwood Army Barracks then became available, and government decided they would use this – it backs on to the back of Crumlin Road jail. So you now have 27 acres of land for development in an inner city area. If you’re a developer you’ll be rubbing your hands. The local community is hoping that they are going to get something into that but because they’re divided, it’s a patchwork quilt of communities, it’s difficult to get consensus on what’s going to go on that multi-purpose site. So we are hoping that we are going to get part of that site and create an international Centre for Constructive Thinking and Citizenship which will become a global centre and attract people into Northern Ireland to look at the whole concept of conflict resolution, problem solving and new thinking.
Conflict resolution skills training: “So that’s one element of what I do. And, at grassroots level, I then sort of take those training skills out to the interface communities and to the emerging leaders, to enable them to start articulating what they already know and to start developing ways to engage with the intellectual interfaces, engage with the statutory organisations, engage with elected councillors and use the conflict skills that we are all picking up in our everyday work to try and resolve those kind of issues. It’s no good being able to get on with your Catholic or Protestant neighbour and then go back to your local politician and have a blazing row. You’re not really using your conflict resolution skills there. So, within north Belfast, we’re trying to address those kind of issues.
“Now I’ll give you an idea of some of the practical things that we do. As I say, the Developing Leadership Initiative enables other groups to realise their full potential. So, people will come and work with us, or we will work with them, to develop training, to develop networks, or to enable networks that already exist to move forward.
Mobile phone network: “One of the things talked about earlier on is the mobile phone network. The mobile phone network developed through interface workers who thought this would be a good way of trying to reduce conflict. Because what would happen was that a rumour spreads: ‘they’ – whoever you want them to be – ‘are coming down to attack us’. And the rumour goes through the area and before you know it you have three or four hundred people on the street, for nothing. And then one side sees three or four hundred people on the other side, so how do you resolve that? Through the mobile phone networks interface monitors can then phone each other and say ‘listen, I hear there’s an issue happening, I hear there’s a dispute happening, is this true?’ And then you can tell that person ‘no, that’s a lie’, or ‘yes, we’re trying to resolve this, don’t worry things aren’t getting out of hand’. And that kind of starts to act as a basis of trust. And what we say is, ‘I can only lie to you once, after that you are never going to believe me again, so if I tell you that something’s happening and it’s not happening, you’re not going to believe me, but if I tell you it’s happening and it is happening and I can resolve it, then you are going to believe me.’ This is where the mobile phone network has started to grow because people started to develop trust.
North Belfast Conflict Transformation Forum: “What we also have in north Belfast is a bank of experienced conflict transformation practitioners, people who have been doing this for years and years. We decided that, rather than go outside and bring someone in from San Francisco or Australia or London or Helsinki to tell us how to resolve our conflict, we decided ‘we are the experts, let’s start using our expertise, let’s start valuing that’. And from that an organisation has developed called the North Belfast Conflict Transformation Forum. And this forum is an open space for conflict transformation practitioners to come and discuss issues and discuss solutions, and also to build up trust. Because if we start working with each other on everyday issues, as Frankie said, then we start to realise ‘well, it’s not because you are a Catholic, or you are a Protestant, or because you are a nationalist or you are a unionist, or you’re a republican or you’re a loyalist, it’s because your family doesn’t have any work and you’re trying to identify potential employment opportunities, your family doesn’t have good housing and you’re trying to address those kinds of issues.’ So on the basis that two heads are better than one, we start to work on those issues. And that also cuts out the middle man, and again going back to the intellectual interfaces where a lot of statutory agencies will tell you ‘oh, we’d love to help you, we’d love to do this but we can’t because the other side …’ So they play one off against the other. And to get round that, the Conflict Transformation Forum then shares experience and shares practice.
Training: “Now one of the other things that we kind of realised from that was that, given the level of expertise within the wider group, it would be better for us to start identifying our own training needs. We all have different training providers, we have training budgets etc. But we started to look at the things such as: ‘what would make you as an interface monitor, an interface worker, a better practitioner?’ So we’ve all had those kind of Harvard law classes and courses, we’ve had people flying in from Harvard, huge amounts of money, flying in to deliver this course and then they disappear again. And we started to use that expertise and we started to apply it in an everyday setting. And what we formed out of the Conflict Transformation Forum was an educational sub-group, and what that identified was that interface monitors needed specific training in specific issues.
Youth violence: “Again this is where it comes into this ‘post-conflict development’ phase where what we are saying now is that we have moved beyond a process of inter-community violence to a process of interpersonal violence, so a lot of the time it’s kids, as Frankie said, get on Beebo, arrange to meet and hey presto you have a riot. Although some positive things have come out of that. A few months ago, at the interface up in Rathcoole, the two sets of kids had arranged to meet and the Protestant side came up and there was no Catholic kids so they got onto the mobile phones and started texting them saying ‘where are you, I thought we were meeting for a riot?’ And the Catholic kids texted back and said ‘we are in the youth club, we’ll be down after the youth club closes!’ So then the Protestant kids went back to their people and said ‘why can’t we have a youth club?’ So then that starts putting pressure on their local politicians and their local community representatives. So it’s not always looking at the bad things that come out of the conflict, we have to look to the positive things and try and sort of work with that there.
Interface monitors: “Through the interface monitors we are able to meet and discuss those kinds of issues. Ronnie [Black] is here and Ronnie is one of the interface monitors. He would look after a particular area in north Belfast and his nationalist counterpart would phone him up and say ‘Ronnie listen, we’ve heard that there’s…..’, and Ronnie would go down and have a look at that and assess the situation, find out whether it’s true or not and try and resolve it. Likewise, if there was an issue on the other side of the interface, Ronnie would phone and say ‘listen, we’re hearing that there’s a group of guys gathering’, so the nationalist interface monitors would go round and look at that. Nine times out of ten, the police contact the interface monitors before they contact the politicians. And you have this strange bizarre scenario at times where the police are sitting in their jeeps, drinking coke and eating Mars bars, and the interface monitors are down telling their sides to ‘get back and stop this messing about’. And that’s resolved so much easier. …
Prevention: “We now can calculate that if you arrest a young man, and they are predominantly young men, if you arrest a young man on the interface and process him through the criminal justice system, it costs an average of £89,000 a year. What we are saying is that we can do that at a far cheaper rate – not put that young man into a criminal justice system and ruin his career. One of the things that the Conflict Transformation Forum did last year was to develop a poster campaign – to go around the schools to try and highlight to young men: ‘this is what is going to happen to you if you get arrested; you’re going to be prosecuted, you’re going to have a criminal record, you’re not going to be able to get a job.’ So we’re trying to get through to the young people on that level. We’re not giving them all this fancy community relations stuff, we’re putting it to them exactly how it is: ‘if you get caught rioting this is what is going to happen to you, and your life will be extremely difficult from here on in.’ And this is grassroots community activists who are doing this, these are not fancy ideas thought up anywhere else, these are people in their own communities who recognise what’s needed and try and develop the solutions that can resolve them ….
Building trust: “The level of trust that has grown has enabled the growth of a trust bank. So, if I say to you that this is going to happen, I have to deliver, and if you say to me that this is going to happen, you have to deliver. Or you have to come and say to me ‘I can’t do this’ and that’s ok too because we know that we can’t do it all, but as long as that trust starts building then we start forming relationships.
Learning Consortium: “And from that Conflict Transformation Forum we developed the North Belfast Learning Consortium. That is now designing training programmes that the interface workers can use for themselves to develop and enhance their own practice.
“We have developed a relationship with Queen’s University Belfast to accredit the people who are going through that course. And just to give you a flavour of the things we are talking about:
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“first of all we are looking at understanding conflict in a divided society, so we all realise what the issues are, why we get involved in conflict,
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“the next thing we are looking at is understanding grassroots peacebuilding because what we now see ourselves as is peacebuilders, local peacebuilders,
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“then we are looking at – ok, so we know how to build the peace, how do we sustain that? So we have to identify leadership skills required to sustain new activity.
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“And then the other thing is we have to learn processes of governance so that we know who to go to, which statutory organisation, which MP, which MLA, which councillor, and get them on board. And it may be that that councillor does not really like me, or like my politics, or I don’t like that councillor or his or her politics, but we recognise that we have to work together.
Support from politicians: “And increasingly we have support from all politicians. We designed this programme last year, Rebuilding Civic Society, where we took long-term unemployed people from interface communities and gave them a job for one year and we told them ‘you’re just like me, I’m on a two-year funding contract, my contract is up on the 31st March and then I am unemployed. I have to sustain my employment by identifying funding, you have to do the same thing, you have to identify the training you need, you have to identify the qualifications you need to sustain your employability’. We had Nigel Dodds [DUP] support us in that. This was a cross-community venture, Nigel Dodds took us to Stormont. Then all the other councillors starting coming on board because Nigel Dodds supported us. Then we were hosted by Belfast City Council, they all loved it. Then we were hosted in Westminster, they loved it even more …. and then they took us to Brussels. So that was a cross- community programme that took long-term unemployed people from all sides of the divide and brought them together and gave them an opportunity. And out of those 14 people who went on that scheme, there are 13 of them still working.”
QUESTIONS AND COMMENTS
Q.1. Chair (Mike Reade): “Seán, I am conscious of the clock but can I ask you, it is great obviously that people from different sides of the community come together and are working together on a daily basis but I presume that in the evening after work they are going home to their houses on the traditional sides of the divide? And I presume that despite the knowledge we have of recreational rioting and situations being exploited for the benefit of others, that it is not necessarily safe to say that it would be safe to cross the divide and to venture out into the other community late at night?”
Seán Brennan: “It comes down to local tensions. Some interfaces you just wouldn’t want to be seen out after dark but increasingly other interfaces now, people are moving across, people are starting to make contacts and communications. The younger generation is a different generation to me. Places that I would have gone to or not gone to, the younger generation, they don’t understand it, they just go wherever they want. So, there’s an age thing here as well, and, no disrespect to my colleagues but we are all a certain age, the younger people, they will just move about willy nilly, they will go wherever they want. One of the other things we have done is we brought representatives from both sides to the Somme last October and we are going to be bringing them to Dublin in March to have a look at where we both come from historically. And one of the conversations that came out of that was that all the people’s children, their kids move about, Catholic areas, Protestant areas, that kind of dynamic is starting to change. That’s not to minimise the potential for conflict at interfaces but there is a widespread change going on and sometimes it can be extremely fraught with danger but also it can be an extreme area of opportunity.”
Chair (Mike Reade): “I wonder if there is anyone in the audience who would be conscious of where they would park in Northern Ireland or would you give it a second thought, a registration from the Republic? I suppose the point I am trying to make is that we are a long way from normalisation – would anyone disagree with that? And Frankie, if I could go back to you, and I am going to then start taking questions… you were talking about an attitude amongst loyalist paramilitaries that the war has changed. Who are they fighting if the republicans at least have given up on the war?”
Frankie Gallagher: “We sort of try to create stability and take a step back instead of taking a step forward. We have always been a very reactionary people, and it didn’t take much to get us to react to do that. We have tried to reverse that. We told most of the people we worked with in the beginning that ‘the IRA, Provisional IRA, Sinn Fein are still getting away with murder and they haven’t even fired a shot’. And that’s maybe not necessarily true but it was trying to get it in our people’s heads that there’s another way to fight this argument, this struggle, and people are entitled to their struggle but we are equally entitled to ours. And we said to them, ‘look, let’s go and get the IRA’, the way the Ulster Freedom Fighters might have done years ago which I hope never happens again, we said ‘we’ll go and we’ll face the IRA, we’ll face Sinn Fein etc’. And I can tell you through six years we still haven’t seen the eyes of the IRA or Sinn Fein because we are still struggling against unionists who are what we see as barriers to peace. There’s a middle-class or working upper middle-class – people from working-class areas who think they are middle class – working in the civil service etc in Northern Ireland, and I’m sure this is the same the world over, but they seem to be gatekeepers rather than providing us with opportunities etc. Unionist Protestants and middle class Catholics are the barriers at the minute, we haven’t even seen the face of the enemy yet.”
Chair (Mike Reade): “You need two sides to have a war. I know I am being very simplistic, and purposely so, but what is the need for weapons and military structures or forms of policing if there isn’t a visible enemy?”
Frankie Gallagher: “Well, what we are saying is that there is so little infrastructure within our community. People want paramilitaries to go away, everybody within our community has said ‘ok, that’s reasonable, let’s make that happen’, and we have had the good will of everybody so far saying ‘let’s move forward, let’s move to the day when there are no paramilitary activities, no paramilitary organisations and no criminality associated with that’. One of the things we are saying to other people is look, say for example you go an estate like Tullycarnet, where I come from, where 99% of the people through 35 years of conflict have been associated with the Ulster Defence Association at some stage of that period of time, ‘you tell them to go away, where are they going to go? Are you going to send them all to England?’ The truth is you cannot send them away, they’re part of this community, part of this country, part of this island, and what we are saying is that we have to transform. So if we transform, and make sure any structures that were there, that were pertaining to military tactics, military strategies, military options, violent options, that that option has to go…..
Mike Reade: “…. gangsters who give up their trade, and the drug money, will they need to be compensated?”
Frankie: “No no, I’m asking the government to give up their criminals in their structures … what we are saying is that there is nothing wrong with the structure that is there, if it’s transformed, working for the good of the community, fighting the social ills of unemployment, lack of education, lack of confidence. There can be no gun in the equation in any future settlement.”
Mike Reade: “So why have they not disarmed?”
Frankie: “Because they are unable to, they’re not strong enough to. They haven’t got the cohesion, they haven’t got the confidence and their community hasn’t got the confidence. One of the things that Sean was saying earlier, about the mothers, and the paramilitaries came round to the door – and this is a cycle that happens in our communities – and they said ‘keep your children in check because they’re wrecking the place’.
“They’re doing that because there’s no effective police service, or they’re unable to do it. And one of the problems we’re having at the minute, of trying to make the UDA go away, transform into something that is positive for our communities, that our communities turn around and say ‘but if the paramilitaries go away now, just like that, the drug dealers are going to come back in, the criminals are going to come back in, the kids are going to run riot and we are going to be left in ghettoes where most people are not registered to vote, where the people will then disenfranchise themselves daily and where the politicians won’t care anyway. They will ring-fence that area, and as long as the people don’t come out of that area and affect the middle-class, or affect the Cherry Valleys, or the Belmonts and all the rest of it in Belfast, then they are ok. But if they come out of that ghetto, we will put them back.”
Mike: “But didn’t the Provisionals decommission in a policing void?”
Frankie: “Gerry Adams says he had to decommission people’s minds before he got to the point where he is at now, and I think, whether you like them or loathe them, they have moved one hell of a position from where they were, to now. I still don’t see them as friends, but they had to decommission their people’s minds who were well educated, who were well motivated, were articulate, were innovative. Our people have been decommissioned years ago through what we call the unionist legacy, through 80 years of lack of leadership within unionism, they have had no education, so instead of decommissioning minds we are going to have to recommission minds – giving people confidence, and we are going to have to make sure that people have the skills to be able to move on and forever take guns out of politics, but I think Isaac wants to say something there….”
Isaac Andrews (west Belfast): “On the question you were asking, you know about why the UDA do not give up their arms, there is still the perception in the UDA and certainly in our communities that there are republican organisations out there, dissident republican organisations still hold weapons to this day. There are 3 or 4 we could mention. In one of our main interface areas I would say there are more dissidents in it than there is Provisionals. The dissidents seem to be taking over certain areas now. One of the reasons I would say why people are still holding on to these weapons there is still a threat there against them, and until that threat is totally away, I can’t see the weapons being took out of loyalist areas. Everybody thinks this is it, we are on our way now but in my eyes I see that we could have maybe a worse summer coming up with dissidents. What are the dissidents going to do coming up to the parading? Are they going to try and get at Sinn Fein to do something about the parades, creating more riots, creating more tensions? So I think there is a lot to work on before the summer.”
Chair: “Ok, now I want to open it up for questions from the audience….If you wouldn’t mind I will come down to you with the microphone, if you could just identify yourselves…”
Q. 2. Paddy Martin (Crosmaglen): “I would like to just endorse what Frankie said there, that the danger here is from the fellows who are traumatised by the trouble. I recognise that on both sides of the border there, at Crosmaglen. And it can be very dangerous and very explosive. I don’t’ know whether the victim of the killing or the perpetrator of the killing is the worse off because it takes a really hard man eventually that it doesn’t come back to haunt him. And one of the problems you touched upon there was that during the troubles both governments recruited very unsavoury characters to work as agents for them, and those fellows – the damage they did and some of the things they did have never come to light. And the reason it hasn’t come to light is that it is not in the governments’ interest. And both governments should be held accountable for what their agents did. It’s been blamed mainly on the loyalists or on the IRA, but it was a government agent that often killed and that is why we have the situation now when they are having inquiries into inquiries, they don’t want the truth about the Dublin/Monaghan bombings to come out. And the obscenity on top of it all is that barristers, solicitors who are appointed to inquire into this, are getting €300 or €400 euro or pounds an hour. That’s an obscenity…. Those are huge amounts of money. And who are the victims? Ordinary Protestants and Catholics….”
Chair (Mike Reade): “Perhaps we could put that into a question. Would anybody like to see the collusion that Paddy speaks of on either side investigated independently, perhaps at a European court?”
Frankie Gallagher: “The problem with collusion is that it will be the ordinary man who went out and perpetrated the act who will be the patsy here. He will be the one who will take the fall whereas the people who we should be really moving at is the people in power who managed it, and they managed both sides. And you could ask yourselves after the hunger strikes in 1981, that if the republicans died on hunger strike and they knew it was over then then why did it go on for so long after? We all have our theories about that. But what we are saying is that yes, these inquiries are fine, these are good because it’s all going to come out but at the minute it is just looking for the scapegoats at the bottom rung of the ladder, the person who pulled the trigger, when it’s the ones at the very top of the tree and in between that we should be looking for …”
Mike Reade: “You have all spoken about two communities which are pretty much mirror versions of the other yet when they look each other in the eye they see a monster. You spoke about the work you are trying to do to change what people see when they look at somebody from the other side of the divide, but is there something additional to what you are doing needed to be done? A truth commission or investigation of some sort or should it just be a question of chipping away at it, trying to bring people together through employment or some of the other projects now that are ongoing?”
Seán Brennan: “That’s a difficult one for me especially. In an ideal world I would love to see a truth commission and we would all find out what happened, but in reality, as Frankie said, they are just going to go and get the people at the bottom rung of the ladder and they are going to blame them. And increasingly whenever you look at it, and certainly I would sit and read the Internet and read comments and that, and you start to wonder who actually ran this? Which governments? And not just the British Government, I think there’s a number of governments that were involved. And increasingly you’re starting to hear ‘oh he was a British agent’, or ‘he was an agent’. And then you start to find out that the people who were doing all the killing were agents. And …last year when we were talking about the Disappeared, up around the border and stuff like that, a friend said to me ‘you shouldn’t be going to the loyalist or republican paramilitaries, you should be going to the British Government and asking them because it was their agent that killed them.’ And when people say that to me I find it difficult to say no to that. All right before that there was this whole kind of thing that this was a conspiracy theory, but now I’m starting to say, hold on a minute was this a conspiracy, and if it was what kind of a conspiracy was it?”
Frankie Gallagher: “Two top loyalists were talking …. one a colleague that works on the interface etc…. He was on a panel along with a top Provisional IRA man who had another hat on as a community worker, and they were asked ‘what do you think of a truth commission?’ And the loyalist turned round and said ‘I don’t think it will work because it is too fresh, it’s too hurtful, our community has still got a long way to move out of this. Because if you try to tell about things that happened somebody is going to go around and get a knife and they are going to say ‘that’s the one who killed my father’ and they will stab them, they will kill them.’ And the republican said: ‘how can we have a truth commission when we can’t even tell our own people the truth now?’ And that pretty much sums it up for me.”
Chris O’Halloran: “I must say I am just reminded every now and again just how old our conflict is. It didn’t start in 1969, it didn’t start in 1869, 1769, probably not even 1669. Our conflict is something not far off 400 years old, some people might say it’s older even than that!
Frankie: “700!”
Chris O’Halloran: “Ok, it’s a very old conflict. So there’s a few things that follow from that. One of them is that the emotions that we have about the conflict are very very deep-seated, they are generations old. And there’s another thing … like Seán, I would hear stories about young people from interface communities here mixing with people from the other interface community often in the city centre, and they are throwing away a lot of the baggage, or doing their best to. Although I would hear lots of stories like that that would sound very heartening, sometimes I hear from people who have been profoundly damaged through the conflict.
“Maybe they have lost people or they have been injured or something extremely bad happened to them or people around them, for some of those people I hear them saying things to me along the lines of – and I am not trying to blame Tony Blair wanting to get his legacy, there’s nothing wrong with that – but whether it is for reasons like that or it is political expediency, whatever it is for some people out there…. there’s almost an unseemly haste to put the troubles behind us and to tie it all up with a neat little ribbon and say ‘that’s that over now, now we can forget about Northern Ireland’. And I think for a lot of people in Northern Ireland, and perhaps in the South of Ireland too and elsewhere, it just isn’t that easy and it’s not going to be that quick. Some things just take time, quite a lot of time, and we can try to rush them and we might rush some of them but we won’t be able to rush all of them.”
Neil Jarman: “I would join the general sense of scepticism about a truth commission. We have often held up the example of South Africa as the model and looked to that, and Northern Ireland and the peace process is very different, the process is very different and the outcome is very different from South Africa. And I for one don’t think the British Government would enter into it with any degree of honesty, I don’t think the republican structures would enter into it with any degree of honesty, and I don’t think the loyalist structures would enter into it with any degree of honesty. It might be a PR exercise. And we can look at what’s been done with Bloody Sunday: you’ve got a bit more of the truth than you had beforehand but you haven’t got anything like a sense of the truth and a sense of closure… I think that’s where it would go and I think it probably does need time, I think it needs a bit of time to settle. We are still in a process of conflict here.
“Also, on another point, like Frankie said earlier on, any inquiries into collusion, as we saw with the Police Ombudsman’s report a few weeks ago, it points the finger at a few names, a few people get named in the media and a lot of people are not going to be held to account for their actions, particularly within the State services and the State forces and so on. And I think that’s a problem when you start to uncover these things: it’s easy targets that are picked on, and the people, the puppet masters if you like, who controlled the situation will walk away from it. Having said that, there may be agents out there, and there undoubtedly are agents out there, but the conflict wouldn’t have carried on for that length of time and to the degree it did if there wasn’t a lot of hostility, antipathy, anger, fear, violence between the two communities. It wasn’t all manufactured and manipulated. We need to accept that as well, that people fought for the reasons they fought for and not just because they were being manoeuvered into it, although those things happened as well.”
Q. 3 Arthur O’Connor (Trim): “… I would like to ask the panel what do you think of the outcome of the elections? Do you think they will go off peacefully or will matters be worse at the end of it? Shouldn’t it be proportional representation, you’s have a better result?”
Frankie Gallagher: “I think they will go off peacefully because I think they have all agreed it, and done and dusted it and they are acting it out at the moment. We predicted that certainly in the literature we’ve put out in the last few months to try and stabilise our community because one of the things they traditionally do is play the Green card and the Orange card, and they’re both good at it. So we tried to predict about 4 or 5 months ago that this would happen, and it’s all happening as we predicted and it’s in black and white in a magazine that was produced. And that was to try and help our community. And we went on TV and different media to let people know that ‘look, it is done and dusted, it is all about politics now, don’t fall into the trap of these people turning around and saying it’s about them Fenians over there, or them Prods over there and all the rest of it.’ They’re both pro-State, they’re both pro-establishment, and they’re going into a government.
“I also think the English-dominated government in Westminster has achieved its goal of creating a mechanism in Northern Ireland by which they can vote themselves out into a united Ireland. Their consent – that never existed before because there was never a written constitution, there was nothing in black and white from the Act of Union in 1800 all the way through. If they wanted to vote themselves out of Northern Ireland they couldn’t have done it because there was no mechanism. Now it’s there because of the Good Friday Agreement and the St Andrew’s Agreement tweaked it a wee bit here, so there’s stability as well as I think the English-dominated government has got its goal as well, their interest is back there as well. There will be no trouble, touch wood.”
Mike Reade: “Whatever about trouble is it possible that some of the rejectionist candidates will be mandated and the mainstream parties may lose out, or will it all be Sinn Féin, SDLP, DUP and UUP?”
Frankie Gallagher: “No, I think it will be Sinn Fein and the DUP, but let’s be honest that’s who should be in the chair. It’s about time they were in the chair because they’ve had the pleasure of opposition for 35 years or whatever and it’s about time they were there to deliver. I think the SDLP will struggle, I don’t think they will go down much more, I don’t think the Ulster Unionists will go down much more. I think, by and large, they’re going to end up – there’s a figure of 22% being bandied about … but you put that into RPA which is Reorganisation of the Public Administration, they’re going to shave off 22% of their councillors and different things anyway, so you know it’s all mathematically worked out!”
Mike Reade: “What about these ex-prisoners, or Republican Sinn Fein candidates, or others who would be opposed to St Andrew’s?”
Frankie: “A refreshing thing for me, my people don’t believe it yet. The refreshing thing for me is that I believe genuinely in my heart that Irish republicans in Northern Ireland now believe that violence to achieve a united Ireland is absolutely futile. And I took that phrase I said earlier from Irish republicans who said, ‘I never want to see an Irish republican ever lose his life again for a united Ireland’. I think they are right.
“And that’s why I argue that we have to go beyond consent now, we have to go beyond consent because we are going to make the same mistake as we did when we formed the State of Northern Ireland. Because there was a sizeable population within Northern Ireland who felt alienated, didn’t feel a part of it, and that’s going to happen again no matter what happens if we just leave it to consent. We have to go beyond consent, we have to give each other national recognition, national self-determination, and that’s where I said nine years ago [MPG talk 29, 5 May 1998] ‘we have to be guardians of each other’s rights’. And I think we are on the way to do that. That’s why I think the conflict now is about people, it’s only the end of the beginning. But I’m frightened the British Government is going to try and get off cheap, the Irish Government is going to try and get off cheap, and they are going to do, as Chris said, try and get it done and dusted in a nice little bow and move on. We cannot let them do that because the hurt and the pain we’ve inflicted on each other has to be addressed. We are up for doing it within the Ulster Defence Association, the UPRG and all the other elements to it, that’s what they want to do. I trust and hope and believe there will be no trouble over these elections.”
Mike Reade: “Neil, if you could just comment on that. You said we are still in a conflict situation. It remains a conflict situation at the interfaces now. If that’s true and Frankie what you said about people voting for peace, it would appear to me to be a chicken and egg situation, and I’m not sure which comes first – the politics or the change on the ground?”
Neil Jarman: “I think the thing about the peace process is that you can’t really talk about it in the singular over the last ten years. I mean there has been at least two very distinct parallel peace processes one of which is operated at the level of political parties, and one of which is operated at the level of grass-roots activists. I think probably for the last four or five years the peace is being embedded in Northern Ireland from the grass-roots upwards rather than from the top downwards. And that’s why I don’t have a sense of the people with guns really having a sense of disrupting anything. Elections very rarely cause trouble in Northern Ireland. We probably have more of them than anywhere else… I lose track of them. When you have had European, Assembly, Westminster, council elections and you had a referendum, we have had fairly regular elections and they are never about changing the house, they are just about changing the wallpaper or changing the curtains, minor details…
“I think the one thing that is interesting in this election for me is the candidacy in South Belfast of Anna Lo from the Chinese Welfare Association standing for the Alliance Party who stands a chance, I think, of getting elected because South Belfast does have a liberal vote within it, we had a Women’s Coalition candidate elected a few years ago.
“If Anna got elected – and I have a lot of time for Anna, she has done a lot of good work in the Chinese community – she would be the first Chinese politician, Chinese national background politician in Britain at that level of politics which I think would be a nice sign from Northern Ireland to have done that and to have got that position first. And for me that makes it one of the interesting things to look forward to in this election, of something starting to break the mould and starting to chip away at it. Otherwise it’s shades of wallpaper and different curtains really.” [Editor’s note: Anna Lo was elected to the Assembly on 7 March]
Q.4. Judith Hamill (Dunsany): “I would just like to thank the speakers very much… it really made a lot of sense to me. But in relation to what you were talking about, Frankie, post-traumatic stress, what is being done or what needs to be done for ex-paramilitaries? …. You talked about an ‘explosion’ – are you talking about more outward violence or are you talking about suicide? What exactly are you talking about there?”
Frankie Gallagher: “It is being effected now by suicide but these things have a way of developing and they could explode outwards, especially with weaponry still out there. And even if people decommission there’s still going to be weaponry out there, I don’t care what anybody says there is not a person in the republican movement, the Provisional republican movement, who doesn’t have a personal piece hid somewhere for their protection maybe if they need it in the future. But by and large what I am saying, it has not even got to the point of being recognised. Loyalists are not recognised. And it happens in the republican community as well. They went away to deal with it and they have been good and skilful at gaining the necessary skills around them as a safety net. Once you open that Pandora’s Box, you open somebody’s head like that there it is a Pandora’s Box, and unless you have somebody round there to catch the person, it’s dangerous.
“We don’t even get to the point of being recognised as human beings who may have this. We are still demonised as criminals, as gangsters, and that’s the problem, lack of recognition.
Judith: “Is that from your own community?”
Frankie: “Well no, not in our own community, but certainly within unionist politicians. The DUP can’t recognise the efforts of the Ulster Defence Association or the Ulster Freedom Fighters because it wouldn’t be politically correct because that would mean they would have to recognise the IRA, and the republican struggle and movement, or so they think. So even though many of them are probably members of the UDA … they have turned round and will not recognise people with those types of difficulties. It is a dangerous situation. We are demonised, we’re not even human beings. I know you all talked about different things here but I know for a fact – and Chris may want to comment on it – that what the UDA done 4 years ago in closing down the interface violence perpetrated by those criminals, had, I would say, the most massive impact on interface violence and it has allowed the lads here to develop more ways of moving out of it. So we are not even recognised for that. And that is a major major difficulty.”
Chris O’Halloran: “Just to add to what Frankie said. This is a very crude way of putting it but, generally speaking, apart from violence coming from interface communities, as far as politicians are concerned, or as far as the British Government is concerned, maybe even the Irish Government, the only way that they are really interested in interface communities is in terms of violence there. If violence stops there, they move on, that is the end of their interest. The issues that Frankie has raised in terms of post-conflict stress syndrome, the legacy of trauma, difficulties in accessing employment and facilities and the ongoing low level violence and the difficulties that creates for young people which we discussed earlier – those are largely by the by. So part of the issue, I would guess probably the four of us may have in common is a concern that with the ending of interface violence it doesn’t mean an end to the attention that needs to be focused upon interface communities. Because otherwise we are just leaving problems hidden there that just haven’t been addressed.”
Judith Hamill: “…. What is the next step?”
Seán Brennan: “I suppose a process of normality, that’s next. If you look at these elections you have to remember that any election in Northern Ireland is not about Catholic v Protestant or nationalist v unionist, it’s nationalist v nationalist and unionist v unionist. The struggle that Frankie is talking about – the problem within the Protestant/unionist/loyalist communities is that that struggle is going on and if the DUP will use its political process to sustain its control over the Protestant/unionist/loyalist right, then that’s their democratic right to do that. People do vote for them, and vote for them in large numbers. Whether I agree or disagree is irrelevant. But for Frankie, Ronnie and Isaac, people like that, the struggle that they have trying to get basic resources in those interface communities is huge because everybody recognises that there’s a problem there but, for political expediency, one political party is not going to let Frankie take the credit for bringing employment into east Belfast. That’s politics. And we have to get round that. And I think he’s right what he says about the kind of – I don’t think you’ll see a major change in the kind of ups and downs of the DUP and the Ulster Unionist Party. You’ll see a few people leave in the DUP but I think by and large, given our traditional sectarian voting systems, the vast majority will vote for the main political party – whatever that is. So if you are in a particular constituency that it is the SDLP, the SDLP will get the vote, if it’s Sinn Féin, Sinn Féin will get the vote. It will be interesting to see how some of those dissident republican candidates fare out but, ultimately, when you hear them talking, they are going to accept the political process, they are recognising Northern Ireland, they may not go to the Stormont Assembly but in theory they are recognising the Northern Ireland State by taking part in the elections. So there’s a whole lot of things that are going to happen there.
Mike Reade: “Just go back to the interface and facilities, what is the difference between these communities on the interface and working-class communities anywhere, other than a few traumatised gunmen? Realistically, I mean politically there is the lack of awareness and urgency and so on that you all point out in every working-class estate across this island anyway.”
Seán Brennan: “Yes, but that’s the problem, that you can’t allow that to go back, because as Frankie said, there are people there who know how to do things…”
Mike: “But does it justify everybody holding guns? I mean they don’t hold them in the working-class estates of Navan, or Drogheda or Dundalk….”
Seán: “Well they do, they have the drug gangs….The same thing happens right across the western world, it’s just that in Northern Ireland we have a wee bit more attention. Things are changing. One of the things that I have picked up from most people is that nobody wants that violence anymore, nobody wants to live like that.”
Mike Reade: “And obviously everybody is right they do but they don’t claim to be political organisations…”
Frankie Gallagher: “You are definitely going on the decommissioning act now, but I can’t remember Craig giving in the UVF guns after 1912, and I can’t remember De Valera giving in any guns either and certainly Michael Collins didn’t before he was murdered. So the issue of guns is a red herring but what I would say is, that you’re right to a degree, what’s the difference between an interface area where all those social ills and the deprivation is going on and those areas that don’t have interfaces where it’s the same? The difference is that, certainly in the murder triangle of North Belfast for example, there was something like 700 people murdered in something like a 3 mile square. That means there’s an awful lot of traumatised people. The people on the interfaces are traumatised because people from the hinterlands … they travel down from Tullycarnet and everywhere else down to the interface, they wreck and ruin, traumatise the people who live there, and then go home and get a good night’s sleep and leave the people there. So they are traumatised. Plus it’s also another fact that they are and have been a political gauge whenever there has been political difficulties, an impasse that these so-called leaders have been unable to fix and they have manipulated those areas for to hide their difficulties. There are all the reasons why we have to address them, and address them specifically so working-class people can’t be exploited no more in those areas.”
Mike: “Chris, I can see you want to come in but I think we will take another question first and join the two…”
Q. 5. Ronnie Owens (North Meath Communities Development Association): “I would like to compliment all the speakers for the wonderful presentations they made. To me you are kind of heroes to be working at the coal faces in these ways because it indicates the very hard thankless kind of work that has to be done with individual local people to make them aware that they themselves can manufacture their own destiny by asserting themselves to a more enlightened understanding of what it is that is going on around them. The question I would just like to ask all the speakers is: do they think that Sinn Féin finally accepting their responsibilities in the police force will be a major aspect of the solution, as opposed to the kind of work you are doing – which is from the bottom up with each individual? Do you think that that top-down recognition of everybody’s responsibilities within the community – how important do you think that is in the process coming up?”
Chris O’Halloran: “I think it’s absolutely crucial. I’m answering first because I’ve got a wee bit of an answer that I wanted to get to on the last question, about why interface communities are so important and then I’ll answer your question. Part of the reason why interface communities are so important, quite apart from the different kinds of disadvantage that characterise them, is that they are where the communities meet. They have a huge symbolic importance: they are the only places where the communities meet. So that’s the answer to that question.
Re Sinn Féin and policing: “If Sinn Féin sign up to policing which obviously they have, it is hugely, massively important. I’ve met republicans who have said to me in the past: ‘I can’t wait till we’re on that Board, telling those bastards how to police our area.’ I am speaking about people who have hated the police with a passion but in the midst of that they have recognised that if the police were better administered, managed, organised, then their areas would benefit from that. So I am pleased to look forward to the future where some of those people, or the people who they would support, are going to be in those positions.
“And they will be telling the police how to police their areas and hopefully their areas will be policed really effectively. And that’s important, not least because there’s been a huge issue in many nationalist areas in terms of the vacuum caused by the absence of effective policing – in terms of anti-social behaviour, crime, youth-led violence, vandalism, hooliganism. All the standard stuff but it’s been happening within a vacuum because it’s very difficult to have the police address it, or for those communities to feel that they can go to the police about it. And so a changed situation where people feel quite happy to go to the police about it, and their communities are represented within the police, I think that’s a hugely positive change.”
Neil Jarman: “I agree, I think it’s an important step.I think though that it’s a shame it was not done six years ago when the PSNI was set up. The police reform process has been a train in motion for six years, it’s not in the station any more. They have lost a lot of opportunity. ….And the points about wanting to shape policing. Policing is not in the same place it was. It’s more confident now than it was six years ago, it’s more assured about where it’s going and it’s going to be harder for Sinn Féin to shape it in the way that it wanted to do than it would have been if it had been involved earlier. It’s important though that they are there but I think they have missed an opportunity by not getting in there sooner. I would also say that I think there’s still a lot of room for people outside the police to continue the work that they have been doing on the ground over the last ten years. And there needs to be a way of integrating some of that work with the formal policing structures in the same way that the restorative justice programmes that have been developed at grassroots level over the years have been recognised as being valuable and they’re looking at ways of integrating them within the formal criminal justice system. I think the same sort of thing has to happen, or could beneficially happen, with some of the grassroots policing-type activities. It’s happening in other countries and I think it’s a way of working with the people…You’ve raised this issue ‘what’s the difference between interface communities and working-class communities anywhere?’ – working-class communities anywhere don’t get on with the police. The police are there to stop some of those people doing what they want to do so they’re not going to love the police. Some of the people within those communities are in a better position to work with the people in the communities and move them on and deal with some of the problems and I hope that that work doesn’t get lost in the transformation.”
Mike: “thank you, we’ll go to another question…”
Q 6. “I want to ask Frankie this question: in the very beginning you mentioned about the Penal Laws and Presbyterianism and Roman Catholicism. And the Penal Laws did affect both religions. And you also speak about the class struggle in the Protestant areas of Belfast. Now I presume you are a loyalist. I don’t know how you equate loyalism – to the monarchy, I suppose, love of the monarchy – to your working-class socialist views? You come across as a James Connolly to me, and I liked a lot of what you said, you made a lot of sense, apart from the fact ….
Frankie: “Can you record that!”
Questioner: “…apart from the fact that you said you were British. Now I’ve nothing against that at all …. It’s all the same to me really, we are all working people whether you are British, English, Scottish, it doesn’t give a damn at the end of the day. But when you look at the royal family, it’s the pinnacle of the class system, right up there, it’s a left-over. I don’t understand why…”
Frankie: “I’m a loyalist?”
Questioner: “I don’t understand how you can be a loyalist and yet hold such socialist views, I would say, you come across as a James Connolly. Please answer that for me.”
Frankie Gallagher: “I think your question has lots of assumptions in it that loyalism is – that we are all royalists. Because during the Penal days etc, the Loyalists, the Red Coats etc would have had that abbreviation to them. Certainly in the 1798 rebellion etc, the red coats and stuff. I would have seen myself as a Dissenter as much as a Protestant, coming from the Protestant family. I’m not a Presbyterian but I would see myself in that ilk. And I suppose I would identify with the ideas and ideals of what happened in 1798 because we were being treated so badly as human beings.
“I have a serious problem in terms of the argument of being British because you have got an English-dominated Westminster who have hijacked the word ‘British’ even though English wasn’t really invented until the 11th or 12th century. I feel I am part of an ancient Celtic people, and being Francis James Gallagher, I think I have a wee bit of entitlement to claim a bit of it. I see myself as a part of an ancient Celtic people who were part of the Pretani, part of the British Isles prior to English being invented. And no disrespect to anybody who is English, but I have a problem because they treat us all like Paddies. And then, when you go to Dáil Éireann, and they all fiddly dee and rub their thumbs and they all say ‘sure they will wise up after a while, they are all Irish anyway and when the English are away they will all see the sense, you know, of the way we are going. That’s not going to happen. Waken up and smell the roses! I see myself – and we are trying to structure arguments around this to move on – I’m not Scottish but I have got Scottish cousins, I don’t see myself Irish but I see myself as having Irish cousins. And I recognise those relationships. But I am something in between, I’m different, and I want to define my own self what I am culturally and how I feel as a people. And I have refined this argument, I mean my people, a lot of them would be royalists, you know, for the Queen etc but I see myself as a person who wants my own national self determination. I am quite willing to recognise the Irish nationalists’ national self-determination and protect that for them, but I want that back, and I don’t want to be put into, when consent comes about, to be put into an equation of ‘you have only one choice, you go into a united Ireland’, whatever that may be, whenever that may happen. So my loyalism is to the people, to the Ulster people, I see myself very much as an Ulsterman, part of an ancient Celtic people. And I even believe in the pre-Christian church, before Patrick and different things like there, I recognise all that. I want to explore all that and I want to add that to the diversity of this island. So I have a job to do: to convince my own people about our own background, which is fact. You may go on about Cuchulainn that he is mythical and all the rest but things that happened after that, it is pretty certain that they did happen. So I want to argue that, so my loyalism is to the people, my Ulster people.
“I believe in the Union as well by the way, I believe the ancient kingdom of the United Kingdom is a good thing, I think it is positive, I’m not sure where they’re going with Europe. I would rather have a United Kingdom than a united Europe but I’m quite willing to explore the idea of being a European as well. What I don’t want is everybody turning round and telling me what I am going to be, either English or Irish.
“So my loyalism is based in and around all that. Yes I would be a socialist, I’m also a democrat, I also would see myself as a Dissenter. And I have learned all about Jacksonian politics which formed the democratic politics in America, I would see myself as a Jacksonian as well. Quite complex, but I think many of our people within the Ulster tribe of people, if you want to call it that, have to be left and allowed space to define who we are and how we are. And we are loyalists, as opposed to unionists in terms of political and economic agreement. We see the Union as something much more different – we see it as a cultural thing as well as a social and economic thing, or a political and economic thing. So in all that, that’s what I see my loyalism is.”
Mike Reade: “I’ll move on to the next question rather than ask other people…. We are already over time. Maybe if we could have more general-based questions. I think a lot of us have been fascinated at Frankie being here and the questions like our last one that might be unique to yourself, but maybe if we could get a couple more general type questions.”
Q.7. Fr Pat McManus (Columban missionary): “Listening to all the speakers, it’s clear there is a tremendous need for forgiveness, and healing and reconciliation, and that really is to be found in the Christian Gospel which we all have in common. And the absence of the Christian churches in all your speaking was really – it kind of shocked me. So I’m just wondering if you have given up on the churches? A Protestant friend …. described Northern Ireland for me when things were at their worst. He said ‘it’s all religion but in the end no religion.’ I don’t mean disrespect by that. But, really, we can’t ignore the Christian Gospel as the source for healing and forgiveness and reconciliation. And you talked about the privileged class and the working class being forgotten. I don’t doubt that for one moment. But the Gospel speaks to the individual person, and it is in the Gospel that the individual person will find affirmation and healing and self-confidence. And I can’t see how the people of Northern Ireland are going to heal without the Christian Gospel at its best.
“And, as you pointed out rightly, it’s the individual person that matters and that’s where the Gospel stands out because the Gospel is interested in the individual person. So, I congratulate you, I worked in Northern Ireland for two years and you’re great workers, you remind me of the Jewish people – I worked in America too with Jewish people and they were really great workers I couldn’t but notice it, and the Northern Ireland people remind me of the same, both sides. But with all these blueprints, and all the rest of it, and your doubts about both governments, you really have to take charge of your own lives and of Northern Ireland. And you talked about, you are interested in history, and Christianity before St Patrick, have you given up on the churches? Because if you have, don’t give up on the Gospel.
“And if I could just draw a parallel with the talks that have gone on for the last years and years, and it’s going on tonight and it has a purpose, but they wont solve things by themselves. For example, since the Vatican Council ended we have had talks and meetings and meetings, since 1965 and it’s still going on, but the reality on the ground is we are dying out as Columban Fathers, nobody wants to join us anymore, family life is deteriorating here in Ireland, the conflict is really in the family too and marriage is being seriously threatened. People don’t bother going through a marriage ceremony, they just live together and hope that will work out, and the drug culture, it is really quite something. And the violence –I’m talking about the South of Ireland – it really is quite something. And the Gospel does say ‘by your fruits you shall know them’. So what I would say to you, with the best will in the world, don’t rely on talk shops to solve the problem that’s up in Northern Ireland. We’ve all got to go back to the Gospel…”
Mike Reade: “There was that historic meeting between Archbishop Brady and Rev Ian Paisley as well…”
Sean Brennan: “Many times, when people talk about Northern Ireland, the first thing that comes up is religion. I feel I am a deeply religious person, I believe in God, I don’t have a problem with that.
“What I do have a problem with is that sometimes people misconstrue the church and the administration of the church. And I think that, with the deepest respect to anybody who is an administrator in the church, that the church has moved on beyond the administrators sometimes. That’s not to say that the message is lost. I read quite a lot of Gandhi to make sense of conflict, and the point that Gandhi made was that ‘Christianity is a wonderful thing, it’s just a pity there aren’t enough Christians’. And I am also aware of the Brahmin tradition that says that ‘truth is one the sages know it by many names’.
“So I don’t think that we should be restrictive into a specific Christian or Muslim or Hindu or Jewish faith. I think we are all the children of God. I say to people that I am a child of God on the basis of ‘blessed be the peacemakers’. Now that’s not for me to decide whether I am doing a good job or not, but that’s where I come from, and I just think that sometimes the religious can sometimes inhibit. So we move forward as best we can, whether we are right or we are wrong. And I always say to people, because I am a human being, the first law for me, the first commandment, is ‘thou shall not kill’. And that is what I try and practise, and I find that that’s true across all religious beliefs. So for me it doesn’t matter whether you’re a Christian or a Roman Catholic or Anglican or whatever, it’s the goodness in you and I try to see the goodness in people whether they are trying to kill me or not. …”
Frankie Gallagher: “I’m not sure if I believe in God or not. I know when I was going to get done in there, killed, a couple of years ago, I prayed. Because I was sitting on my own, in the house, and it was my family I was worried about, that nothing would happen to them. So with this big you know socialist and all the rest, why did I pray? Because at the end of the day there was nobody with me, I was on my own, and I thought it was the right thing to do. But I am totally turned off the churches, most Protestant churches, there’s a lot of people in there, they’re ‘good living for a living’. They look down their noses if you are from a poor background. And it’s happened to me – all the way through my childhood you were made to feel lesser than everybody else. And I think the churches have a lot to answer for because they are part of the State, whether it is in Northern Ireland or the Republic, because how did they let their State get away with the killing and the murdering, the collusion that went on? I can’t understand that. I also find believing in God hard because there are so many people getting away with murder, getting away with stealing, robbing , and you’re saying to yourself, ‘see if you do all those things, you get away with it’. And then this is the irony, ‘blessed are the peacemakers’: blessed are the UDA then… they’re trying to develop peace! But you can’t say that.
“So it is pretty confusing, the religious picture. I think there’s a constant fight between light and dark, I don’t know if that means one thing or another, but I think we have to be strong and fight against all these things. One of the things I found, my thoughts praying that night, was that I reckoned by shining a bit of light on the people who are doing these things and exposing them was actually enough in the end, and by and large that’s what we have done in the interfaces, we exposed those who were using the structures and stuff for criminal ends and that type of thing. So I don’t think I’ve give up on it but I have to be honest with you, I’m not sure. Having said that, working in a place like this [Dalgan] and going abroad with missionaries and stuff, I see it better as a religious way of working than going sitting praying in a church. I don’t see myself ever going praying like that, I couldn’t do it.”
Chris O’Halloran: “Just very quickly, I agree with everything Seán had to say in terms of the importance of a value base for me rather than subscription to any particular denomination. Like Frankie, I don’t want to get into theological discussion – is there a God? From my experience in interface areas where we have worked, something I have noticed about the churches is that the churches are good at working with the churches, churches seem to work with other churches quite well, that’s something that has developed quite a lot over recent years – there are quite well established structures of engagement now between churches and between church congregations. I don’t se anything like as much presence on the ground between the churches and the communities, and I see virtually no engagement, in terms of my work, in terms of the churches and inter-community structures or peacebuilding structures. There’s very few of those except on a church with church basis. So maybe those are areas of work that the churches could perhaps put a bit more work into.”
Neil Jarman: “I’m an atheist, I have been as long as I can remember. I know a number of Christians who have been involved in elements of the peace process and some of them have done some very good work. I suppose that of all the groups, the group I have the most respect for are the Quakers. I think they have done some good work and they continue to do some good work …. I don’t hold other people’s Christianity against them, it’s not a plus factor for me – if they are doing good work they’re doing good work.”
Fr Pat: “Thank you very much.”
Q.8. David O’Gorman (Dublin): “What about in the South? Do we have any responsibilities in terms of contributing to solutions in interface areas of Belfast or elsewhere in the North, or do we get a free ride?”
Mike: “Before a response, I am very conscious of the time and I will take a question from this lady as well…”
Q.9 Geraldine Horgan (Kiltale): “I think it is very appropriate that you have a final question from a lady! Thank you very much for your input. As you were talking I wondered whether two groups were being left out. I was very heartened by what Neil had to say – if I heard you correctly – that there’s a possibility of a Chinese woman being elected. If she was elected, how well do you think that that would reflect the new Northern Ireland? To what extent is there a policy among your different organisations and your working areas to have a gender balance and also to make a special effort to include immigrant communities in your work? Is that an issue that’s emerging? It is certainly an issue that we are trying to deal with down here…”
Mike Reade: “I suppose they combine very well throughout the whole island, the question of demographics, gender, integration, immigration and the future for the island of Ireland. If I could ask each of our guests this evening to respond to the two questions in their closing statements.”
Frankie Gallagher: “In answer to David, We’ve had some chats long into the night, down in Glencree and stuff. You know my views on some of this, I think the government of the Republic of Ireland has a responsibility, it has a responsibility to embrace diversity up in Northern Ireland that’s coming from my community. It’s got to help try and create a space for that diversity to grow. And I think that will nurture the ideas of those people. One of the problems we are having, and I have tried certainly to embrace – and the Meath Peace Group and Glencree is another place where I would go, where you are allowed to grow, your diversity, and talk about it and get the right words to describe what you are talking about. Because it’s only through that practice that certainly I found how to do it. I feel that the Republic of Ireland has got a joint strategy with the British Government and it’s about harmonisation, it’s about trying, before that consent comes – whatever mathematical equation they come up with – that by the day that comes we will have harmonised the economics, we will have harmonised some of the political issues, the social issues and all the rest of it and they are going to get us to see sense and when it comes we’ll all say ‘brilliant, sure we are all Irish anyway’. That’s wrong. They’re going to recreate the problem that was created in 1921/22, the State of Northern Ireland – there is a sizeable population who seen that State as alien and there is nothing on God’s earth that is going to get them to see different, they were totally alien to that and look at what has happened since. That’s what’s going to happen.
“I think people need to start looking for a new Ireland. We are trying to develop a new loyalist thinking, we’re trying to put these arguments out among our own people. And they do sound socialist at times, and we sound very like other people who have fought against a state, but, let’s be honest, we’re working on the premise that the island of Ireland was never united in the first place except under Queen Elizabeth I. She configured, you know, with the 9 counties of Ulster, and took out one of the smallest kingdoms which was Breifne…. We need to grow, we need to find out where we fit in to a new thinking, and we have to have the space to do that. At the minute I think it’s a mistake being made that they’re trying to harmonise us. And that’s wrong because Westminster, whatever shape it is going to be after it gets rid of Scotland and after whatever it does with Wales, I feel they are going to make a mistake and it’s going to be our problem and we are just going to recreate the problems.
“And if the Irish people are serious about oppression and freeing themselves from the bonds of English rule and all the rest of it, then they should look up to the Ulster people and give them space and don’t do to them what they clam an English dominated history has done, what they claim has done to the Irish people. So I hope they give us space, but we need people to lobby down south for this to happen, defuse what’s going to happen in the future. It will be a new Ireland, but it may well be determined by all the people on this island and I hope it does, someday in the future.”
Racism and gender: “As far as racism and women are concerned, I live in a community that’s based on machoism, and that’s one of the complex reasons why people are killing themselves as well because they can’t go and talk to anybody, because they were the fighters, they can’t be seen to be weak and all the rest of it. And there’s not even a place, to be honest with you, for a lot of women in loyalism or, I believe, even in Sinn Fein’s republican politics as well. I know they’ve got women and all but I don’t know how much that has really got down to the bottom. I think women are still not on the agenda down south in the Republic of Ireland. I don’t think it’s there. In terms of racism with women, we have to get to the women issue to get to the racist issue. We are filled with all sorts of conspiracies that it is the Roman Catholic Church bringing all the Poles in and all the different migrant workers in because they are going to be able to vote in 3 months or 5 years, and they’re going to vote us into a united Ireland, Sinn Fein are working hard to embrace them. So we have a big big issue within my community to address that, get the truth out and shine the light on it, and get the proper facts about it, embrace people who are different from ourselves. Because we are actually claiming we are different and we need to recognise that with us, so when we do the Bill of Rights in Northern Ireland – and you have to remember as well that it was the UDA that writ the first Bill of Rights, Sammy Smith. And for his troubles he was shot dead by the INLA in 1975, because it didn’t suit somebody at the time to have a Bill of Rights then. Well, hold on, these troubles are going to go on for another 30 years, that’s too soon, you can fix it too soon. I know that’s all mixed up but that’s the way we think at the minute. We need women, certainly within our camp. We can get 12 men to go and do this, 12 good men – that sounds like a jury – but women are not even there. We are going to have to make an effort but …we don’t have the support. We are not even recognised as people ourselves to go and do these things so we have lots of issues and we want to try and address them.
Chris O’Halloran: “In terms of the Irish State, I suppose I would feel that the Irish Republic has been party to the conflict so therefore it needs to be party to the resolution. It’s not a bystander, it’s an active participant in that conflict transformation process which I suppose means that there is an onus on the Irish state to come up with suggestions and solutions and not just ask all the time. But in terms of asking, I guess part of the answer is, as Frankie was saying, to walk with people, to walk with us from the North and from England, Scotland and Wales, and see what we are thinking of this process as we are working it through, and where that might sit with the Irish Republic.
Gender and race: “In terms of gender balance and women, I appreciate that in terms of the panel maybe we could have done better in terms of gender balance and minorities! In relation to ethnic minorities, it is clear to us that there is an issue in some interface communities in Belfast. One of the features of some interface communities is that there is more dereliction, there can be more empty houses, more turnover of houses than in more settled areas which is part of the reason why in some interface communities, there’s been reasonably high numbers of ethnic minority groups moving in, and those have tended to be more in Protestant and unionist areas than in Catholic and nationalist areas. We were carrying out some interviews with community groups recently and in nationalist areas they were saying ‘we don’t have a big problem with racism’ Because they don’t have many ethnic minorities. In the unionist areas, some of them were saying ‘actually we are having a growing problem with racism, and we have a growing number of ethnic minorities’. So there seems to be a bit of a disparity there. In terms of ourselves and our project [Belfast Interface Project], we’re carrying out a piece of work to try and find out what are the experiences of ethnic minorities living in interface communities, because we are picking up that they might be almost in the worst of both worlds in some interface communities. If you imagine a Chinese family – take that as an example – are living on a front line where to the community opposite they are perceived as being different to them and so they are attacked because they are different to them, and to the community they are living in they are attacked because they are perceived as being different to them.
“So they’re just not at home anywhere. And that’s the picture we’ve had from one or two families, but we are carrying out a survey now to find out just what are the experiences of ethnic minority groups.”
Neil Jarman: “Our organisation is not quite balanced in the workforce but it is very balanced in the Board, and it has made a conscious decision to maintain that. We have also over the last seven years done a lot of work on racism and racist violence, we have done studies on migrant workers and the arrival of migrants and the impact that those communities have, and a number of areas of study relating to the growing diversity. And we have been pretty much in the forefront of trying to raise some of those issues, and other issues such as issues relating to the lesbian and gay community, and there’s a report over there on some of those issues. They are real issues and they need to be addressed in Northern Ireland.
“In relation to the Republic, I would say very much what Chris has said. I take issue with Frankie in that I don’t think there’s going be a united Ireland, I just don’t see it happening for practical reasons in a formal sense. I see it happening in an informal sense in the way that the border disappears and people move across, and a sense of building relationships between those people, and a sense of understanding, and losing any sense of threat that each has from the other. And I think there are lots of steps that you can see to start moving towards that. I think that needs to carry on. I think the point Chris made – it’s not up to us to start telling you what to do, it’s for people up here to see what they can put into. It was interesting a couple of weeks back, I think, Bertie Ahern announced investment in infrastructure of the north. I think … the boundaries in some sense are blurring on some issues. I don’t think it’s going to happen in terms of Northern Ireland leaving the United Kingdom. For one thing, I don’t think the Republic wants a Northern Ireland as part of the Republic when push comes to shove. We saw the problems that happened with German reunification. I think there are even bigger issues in Irish reunification. I just don’t see it happening but I do see a much closer sense of relationship building up over the next generations, and meetings like this and other projects are part of that process of building a sense of common understanding and making the border seem irrelevant.”
Sean Brennan: “I suppose I should start off by saying that what a lot of people don’t remember or realize is that the Belfast Agreement in 1998 was an agreement between the two government of the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland. They have made peace with each other. What we do probably is irrelevant. I think that has a major dynamic, an impact on how things are going to change over the next few years. Do I think that the British Government is going to be hounded out of Northern Ireland and with it 800,000 Protestant people? No. But what I think will happen is that we are in a new dispensation, driving down here today and watching the road coming right up, creeping up to the border, there are big changes coming here, we are a small island, five and a half, six and a half million people.We can’t afford to have hospitals on either side of the border. We have to start sharing resources. We are living in a global village that is increasingly getting hotter. Fortunately we may be a bit cooler for a while but not that much longer. I saw a report last year that said that by 2060 white people will be in a minority on this island. So, there are a lot of things happening. I think the Dublin government has an essential role to play in what happens on this island – how that happens that’s for us to decide over the next course of years. I certainly wouldn’t want to force anyone into a political situation that would then have the repercussions we had in the North for 60/70 years. I think the other thing that a lot of people haven’t realised is the increase in east-west links, between the people on the island of Britain and the people on the island of Ireland. I was at a wedding last year in England, and it was on the day that England played in the World Cup. And I didn’t see one Union Jack, and I think if you look through that whole World Cup of 3 weeks or whatever, the only Union Jacks you will see were on the Australian flags. Now that is strange. So I think we are in a completely new and different era. Physical violence that we have seen over the past 35/40 years will not return to the levels that it was at, but I think increasingly people will find the relationships – and as Frankie says, he is getting a better response here than he is in the United Kingdom political system. For him to survive he’s going to have to work with that.
“With the emergence of Anna Lo – I love Anna, Anna and I have known each other on and off for a few years and she has always talked about this and I have always said to her ‘yes, go for it’. Now South Belfast is a slight anomaly in that it is the university area, you would have a whole range of different ethnic and national identities. Probably some of the smartest people on this island live in that area ….
“So I think Anna’s going to get a good shout, I think it may create a false dawn in that people will then think that Northern Ireland is going to see stability, that we are all going to be Hindus or Muslims or whatever. No, we are still going to have the sectarian divisions that we have, but I think that places like South Belfast, you will see Anna coming through. And interestingly enough, I was just reading her article on the Internet before I came here – the first Chinese person in the UK! They’re coming from China and Hong Kong to interview her! This is a new phenomenon for us on this island. When we think about the different people who have come here from Poland, from Lithuania, from Nigeria, just to name a few, the dynamic on this island is going to change. At the minute this is predominantly white, western, middle-aged society. That’s going to change, and we are going to have to find a way of accommodating that change. And if we don’t learn the lessons of Northern Ireland then – this is a question I ask people that I meet and I’ll leave this one with you – if we don’t learn the lessons of Northern Ireland we will then be wondering has Northern Ireland turned into the rest of the world or has the rest of the world turned into Northern Ireland?”
Mike Reade: “I’m sure you will agree, it was fascinating to hear the views and share the discussions tonight with Neil Jarman, Chris O’Halloran, Frankie Gallagher and Sean Brennan. Thanks very much…. And we will probably take up some of this tomorrow on the ‘Loosetalk’ programme [LMFM radio]. Thanks for having me here as well and congratulations to the group for another wonderful meeting.”
Concluding words: Anne Nolan (Meath Peace Group): “…Just to try and finish up, it’s been a bit of a marathon session tonight, but I think we have all heard great things here tonight, and I really want to thank Mike Reade from LMFM for his constant support and for tonight, and particularly our speakers who have not only given up their time tonight but have given up their time in the past to come down and educate us and teach us. Tonight they were talking about a shared future and transformation, and going forward, and I am reminded that one of our earlier talks – over 13 years ago – was about building understanding, and so we have come an awfully long way. And I want to thank them for all they are doing on the ground and at the coal face and coming back and teaching us that there is more than one perspective. This is what we have to understand – this diversity of this island, and going forward it is all about diversity, and understanding that we can’t label and box people, that we are all individuals. So thank you very much….”
Mike Reade: “I just want to thank as always the Columban Fathers for their room tonight and for the tea and refreshments. You are all welcome to speak with the guests over a cup. Good night.”
Meath Peace Group report 65 (2007). Taped by Judith Hamill, Oliver Ward and Jim Kealy
Transcribed and edited by Julitta Clancy ©Meath Peace Group
Appendix 1: Extract from ‘A Shared Future’: Interface areas (para.2.3)
“Reducing tensions at interface areas must go beyond the ‘band-aid’ approach. It requires a combined short, medium and long-term approach that is earthed in encouraging local dialogue and communication, the sharing of resources, which is set in a wider context of social and economic renewal.” [2.3]
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“Conflict at interfaces is the tragic symptom of a systemic lack of trust rather than the sole cause or only evidence of it. [2.3.1]
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“Supporting communities in these areas to transform conflict remains an important priority for Government. Neil Jarman’s report ‘Demography, Development and Disorder: Changing Patterns of Interface Areas’ (July 2004) and the report prepared by the Belfast Interface Project entitled ‘A Policy Agenda for the Interface’ (July 2004) offer significant contributions to the emerging discussion on responding to issues in interface areas. [2.3.2]
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“The former report reminds us that interface areas are not a static phenomenon, nor a purely historical legacy of ‘the Troubles’. Rather they are a dynamic part of the social fabric of a community that is highly polarized and extensively segregated. The concept of an interface and the forms of interfaces are more complex than has previously been acknowledged.
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“The report also stresses the need to acknowledge the social dynamic in processes of segregation and the continuing pressures to further segregation in many areas. It makes the point that shared and neutral spaces come under particular types of pressure and need positive, sustained actions to ensure that they are not abandoned nor avoided, but rather that they remain shared and used by all sections of all communities.” [2.3.3]
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“The Belfast Interface Project report argues strongly for the development of a coherent long-term strategy to address the needs of interface areas and communities both through government plans and priorities and through strategies developed by local bodies, such as Belfast City Council.” [2.3.4] [Extracts from ‘A Shared Future – Policy and Strategic Framework for Good Relations in Northern Ireland’, Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister, March 2005]
Appendix 2: Biographical notes on speakers
Dr Neil Jarman is an anthropologist by training and has carried out research on issues related to policing, hate crime, migration, the management of public order and freedom of assembly, and is the author of several publications. Neil is the director of the Institute for Conflict Research, an independent research centre based in Belfast which specialises in issues related to conflict, social transformation and social justice. The ICR undertakes research work for a wide variety of government departments and statutory agencies, including studies of racism, homophobia and sectarianism; migrant workers; service provision for victims; young people’s experiences of violence; young people and electoral politics and issues related to policing, interface violence and the dynamics of mixed housing areas. The ICR previously operated under the names of: Community Conflict Impact on Children (1999-2001), The Cost of the Troubles Study (1996-99) and Templegrove Action Research (1994-96). (Neil Jarman previously addressed a Meath Peace Group talk in Oct. 1996: No. 22 – “Parading Disputes in Northern Ireland”)
Chris O’Halloran was raised in North Belfast, graduated in Psychology in 1975, studied youth and community work at the University of Ulster and took part in a pilot project in community development in West Belfast’s Suffolk estate in 1986 followed by similar projects in Milltown, Knockmore, Roden Street and Ballybeen. Chris has been employed as full-time project worker with the Belfast Interface Project (BIP) since its inception in August 1995 and is currently director of the organisation. Over this period BIP has aimed to: a) enhance and develop the knowledge base regarding Belfast’s interface areas; b) lobby for change that is of practical benefit to interface communities; c) consult, develop and support the membership of Belfast Interface Project; d) support interface communities in addressing issues relating to conflict. The BIP currently has a membership of approximately 43 community groups from nationalist and unionist interface areas of Belfast as well as associate and individual members. (Chris was a guest speaker for the Meath Peace Group transition year peace studies programme in St Joseph’s Navan in 2004-05).
Frankie Gallagher first visited Navan in May 1998 when, as welfare officer for UDA prisoners, he brought a group of ex- prisoners to the Meath Peace Group talk ‘The Good Friday Agreement’ held in St Joseph’s (Mercy) secondary school, Navan, and asked whether the Irish Government would act as guarantors of the rights of both communities, following the ratification of the Agreement (MPG talk no. 29 – transcript available on the website). He is a leading member of the Ulster Political Research Group, an advisory body connected to the Ulster Defence Association, providing advice to them on political matters. The group, founded in 2002, is largely a successor to the Ulster Democratic Party, which dissolved in 2001.
Seán Brennan is a Development Officer with the North Belfast Developing Leadership Initiative CEP (Community Empowerment Programme). The CEP is a partnership between Intercomm and the Edward de Bono Foundation NI. The CEP works to implement the Dunlop Report and address interface violence in North Belfast. The CEP works to develop local capacity by empowering people, and interface communities, to creatively engage in decision-making processes that affect their everyday life. Seán is currently living and working in Belfast and is the Treasurer of the Ulster People’s College and has previously been a member of The Wheel Core Group, Open College Network NI Board of Governors and Craigavon District Partnership Board as well as a number of local community groups.
©Meath Peace Group
Meath Peace Group Public Talks Report No. 65, 2007
Taped by Judith Hamill, Oliver Ward and Jim Kealy.
Transcribed and edited by Julitta Clancy
Acknowledgments: Meath Peace Group would like to thank the speakers and guest chair for coming to address this public talk and for giving so generously of their time. A special thanks to all who came to the talk (some from long distances), those who took part in the discussion afterwards and all those who have given their continued support, encouragement and participation through the years. Thanks also to those who assisted in the planning, organisation, publicity and recording of the talk, to the Columban Fathers at Dalgan Park for facilitating the majority of our public talks and to the Dept. of Foreign Affairs Reconciliation Fund for financial assistance towards the running costs of the talks and school programmes, and to the staff and students of secondary schools who have taken part in our peace studies programmes
The Meath Peace Group is a voluntary group founded in 1993 with the aims of promoting peace and the fostering of understanding and mutual respect through dialogue.
Meath Peace Group Managing Committee: Rev. John Clarke, Navan; Anne Nolan, Slane; Julitta and John Clancy, Batterstown; Philomena Boylan-Stewart, Longwood; Vincent McDevitt, Ardbraccan; Judith Hamill, Ross, Dunsany; Leonie Rennicks, Ardbraccan; Olive Kelly, Lismullin.
photos
Back row: l.to r. Leonie Rennicks, Sean Brennan, Neil Jarman, Frankie Gallagher, Chris O’Halloran
Front row: Julitta Clancy, Philomena Boylan-Stewart, Anne Nolan, Mike Reade
MPG talk no. 65: l.to r. Sean Brennan, Frankie Gallagher, Chris O’Halloran, Neil Jarman, Mike Reade
Meath Peace Group Talks
No. 59 – ‘Devolution and Cross border Cooperation: Prospects and Realities’
Monday, 27th March, 2006
St Columban’s College, Dalgan Park, Navan, Co. Meath
Speakers
Sean Farren, MLA (SDLP)
Francie Molloy, MLA (Sinn Féin)
Jim Wells, MLA (DUP)
Chaired by Michael Reade (Presenter, ‘Loosetalk’, LMFM Radio)
Contents:
Introduction and welcome: Julitta Clancy, Cllr Brian Fitzgerald and Michael Reade
Speakers’ presentations:
Questions and comments
Appendices:
1. Written text of Sean Farren’s address
2. Extracts from MPG talk 55: 7 March, 2005
3. Biographical notes on speakers
4. Meath Peace Group – update on activities 2005-06: public talks, schools programme and heritage study days
INTRODUCTION AND WELCOME
On behalf of the Meath Peace Group, Julitta Clancy welcomed the audience, guest chair and speakers to the 59th public talk held by the group since the series commenced in 1993: “Our first speaker, Sean Farren MLA, (SDLP) previously addressed the group in 2000 and in 2005, and has a long experience in politics in Northern Ireland. Last year when he came, his wife Patricia was injured in an accident and had to spend some time in hospital here. Thankfully she is with us here again tonight, but it was most unfortunate for them both. At her insistence Sean went ahead with the talk last year and we are indeed very grateful to see them here again. … Our second speaker, Francie Molloy MLA (Sinn Féin), first addressed the group in early 1995 and again in 2003 and we congratulate him on being elected mayor of Dungannon for the second time. Our third speaker, Jim Wells MLA (DUP), first came to talk to the group a year ago and I am delighted to say that he features quite regularly on our local radio, LMFM, on Mike Reade’s ‘Loosetalk’ [current affairs] programme.
“Now, before handing over to the guest chair, Michael Reade, I would like to invite Cllr. Brian Fitzgerald, Chairman of Meath County Council and former TD for Meath, to say a few words. Brian was involved in the early stages of the peace process, with the Labour Party and Dick Spring, going north in those very early days with Fergus Finlay, in precarious and often dangerous times….. He was also very involved in the Forum for Peace and Reconciliation for two years when it first started. He has attended several of our meetings here, and has been a great friend to this group from the beginning….. Thank you, Brian, for taking the time to come again tonight….”
Cllr. Brian Fitzgerald, Chairman, Meath Co Council: “Thank you Julitta. Good evening ladies and gentlemen. On behalf of our county I would like to warmly welcome Francis, Sean and Jim – I have just met Jim for the first time. I think the two subjects which you intend to deal with – devolution and cross-border cooperation – are very fitting. I don’t intend to comment on devolution because I know my colleagues here will have plenty to say on that. But on the other area, the area of cooperation, I would just like to say a few words.
Cross-border cooperation: “I honestly believe that it is of critical importance, that we on this island start to cooperate with each other, particularly from an economical point of view, because if we don’t we’re just going to perish separately. We are trying to attract investment into this country from America and beyond. They are looking at this island as a very small island with a very small population, relative to what they have. I honestly believe that there is huge potential in this country, in this island, if we can work together. We need to put the brains of this island together, and the area that we believe that will bring greater prosperity to the country, is whole area of research and development. The traditional industries are gradually moving elsewhere and I think that that is fairly evident in this county and in many other counties in recent times. There are certainly other areas which we should be cooperating on even more.
Health: “One area is health. During the times we did have health boards in this country – they have been abolished, something that I very much opposed – we were able to have a clear identity of where both our colleagues in Northern Ireland and in the south could come together, let it be in the North Western Health Board, the North Eastern Health Board and with our respective colleagues in Northern Ireland. That has been taken away from us and I think it is more the pity because people will suffer in the long-term because we do not have the resources separately to meet the demands of the people that require today to be met.
Tourism: “I was involved a few years ago when we were setting up Tourism Ireland, where we brought together the Tourist Board of Northern Ireland and Bord Failte. A huge number of issues had to be dealt with at that particular time. We were bringing staff together, we were bringing different cultures together, the way you do your business together. …You had even in England alone, in London, you had two different boards operating side by side. All those difference were set aside and each one was challenged and together we worked. We put together what we now know as Tourism Ireland, which is marketing this island. I believe that is an example, that if it is applied in the areas of health and in the areas of social and economic development that this country and this island can become the most prosperous in Europe.
“And with those few words I would like to wish our three speakers and Michael as chairman the very best of luck – I know he will do a fine job – and my sincere welcome to you on behalf of the people of Meath.
Chair: Michael Reade: “Thank you very much Councillor Fitzgerald for outlining the importance of some sort of resolution in what affects everybody on this island and as usual I am not going to stand on ceremony because I don’t believe that there is anything that I would have to say that would be of much interest relative to what our eminent speakers have to say….. We’ll be continuing the debate on my programme on LMFM. As Julitta said, Jim Wells is a regular guest now. Unfortunately, Sinn Fein and the DUP don’t interact directly ….. It is unfortunate that Sinn Féin doesn’t speak to the DUP or the other way around or whatever way you want to do it. ….I’ve been to quite a few of the meetings and it seems to be stalemate at the moment, I wonder if that has resulted in some sort of apathy, which is understandable, but maybe that will be kick-started in the next couple of weeks as Jim Wells again was discussing today [on LMFM] with Sean Farren. We’re going to be doing it in the next couple of weeks whether it is accepted or rejected or leads to anything or to a plan B. But this is a critical time whether people realise it or not, and I am going to be very brief, so that we can get down to the questions and answers which is the piece that I like best. So we will have about ten minutes from each of our speakers first of all.
1. Sean Farren, MLA (SDLP): “Thanks very much indeed, and again thanks to the Meath Peace Group for the invitation to be with you this evening. Just before I get into my stride there are two things that I wanted to do. First of all, in light of the accident that Julitta referred to last year that my wife experienced, I want to thank the Meath Peace Group for the concern, the sympathy and indeed the care that they expressed throughout Patricia’s stay in hospital … in Navan and then Drogheda and back again to Navan. .. But Patricia’s here and she obviously survived, thanks to the care and the attention that she received, after she had the accident.
North/South Make Sense: “Second thing I want to do very briefly is – I don’t know if the Meath Peace Group hold a library but given that the second of the themes tonight is North-South Relations, the SDLP recently published a document “North/South Make Sense” and I simply want to present it in order to put on the record with the Meath Peace Group our thinking about North/South matters in more detail than the ten minutes afforded me will enable me to do…..I notice that Jim with his typical missionary zeal has been spreading the gospel according to the DUP amongst you! [DUP document North South East West]. Unfortunately I didn’t think that I would be matched and more than matched by the likes of Jim and I only brought one copy along, but if you visit the SDLP’s website, you will find the full document there. And I suppose if you are like me nowadays, you get fed up receiving so much written material that the web is the place to go, so that you know what you want to keep and what you don’t want to keep.
2005 – what has changed since then?: “Now to the themes of tonight’s discussion. Very helpfully we were provided with some extracts from things that were said last year [see Appendix to this report, extracts from MPG talk no. 55]. I am looking at what I am reported to have said and I just wonder whether or not I shouldn’t have dug out the script I had last year and use it again, because the little bits that are here are as apt today as they were twelve months ago!
“I am quoted as saying: “We may well as politicians” – and here the politicians are us in the North – “be faced with a sense of ‘a plague on both your houses: you had the opportunity and you didn’t take it’” – and that is in bold if you have the document that was circulated in front of you. And then further down the same paragraph, again in bold and I think quite relevantly in bold: “maybe we do have to be forced to take more responsibility for ourselves. I think the pressures on ourselves to resolve our problems have not been such that they have impelled us with a greater sense of urgency towards addressing those problems.”
“Well, all that has changed in the twelve months since I was here and made those remarks is that the time is fast coming when it does seem as if we are going to have to face up to the responsibilities that we have as politicians, elected remember at an Assembly election in November 2003, an Assembly which at that time was already more than a year in suspension so that now we are into the fourth year of suspension! The three of us here – I don’t know what their memories are like, the other two of my colleagues – but some of the memories are fast-fading of that experience of attempting to work our institutions and if we don’t take the offer that is going to be made available to us and if we don’t try to use it to the best of our capacity, then we truly will have failed the people that elected us in November 2003.
Good Friday Agreement: “It would seem as if next week, almost on the eve of Easter, and Easter has all kinds of resonances – indeed you are going to have a debate on the anniversary of the 1916 Rising [MPG talk no. 61, 24 April 2006] – but Easter remember was also a time when the Good Friday Agreement itself was signed, Good Friday morning. Many of us were awake all night the previous night trying to cobble together the last remaining details of the document that became the Good Friday Agreement and we triumphantly emerged on Good Friday with what we thought was going to be the beginning, hoped was going to be the beginning, of a new era in terms of our politics. And indeed after 18 months we managed to put the Executive together in the Assembly. We managed to put the North/South Ministerial Council together and then we really thought we were on our way.
Downsides of failure: “I am not going to revisit the problems that we encountered, all we need to know is that we are now being given another opportunity. It may well be beyond us to turn that opportunity into the full operation of all of the institutions of the Good Friday Agreement. But if that is what happens, I think we should consider for a moment some of the downsides to that.
Economic prosperity: “You visit the North today. You will probably be struck by the fact that there is a considerable degree of economic activity. There is an air of reasonable prosperity. If you look at the statistics – they pale into significance in some respects with the degrees of prosperity, economic development and so on that is being experienced here – but the North has degrees of normality, degrees of progress about it, which certainly become apparent to a first time visitor.
Deep divides continue to exist: “But scratch the surface and things are not as cosy and not as progressive as they might appear on the surface. Big and deep divides continue to exist. We live still and increasingly so in a highly segregated – residentially speaking – society. And despite many of the efforts, the kind of efforts the Meath Peace Group and others like you have been involved in, inviting people down and others up the North inviting people from across the divide to meet and to engage with each other, there are still considerable levels of segregation, where wearing the wrong t-shirt, the wrong school uniform, can have fatal consequences sometimes. Where transporting people from sporting events, the buses doing so frequently being subject to attack if they pass through or close by another neighbourhood, a neighbourhood of the other side. And where we still, and maybe increasingly so, jealously measure the investments and initiatives that take place in the other community against those that take place in our own, in case we see that there are investments and initiatives being taken which are not being replicated in our own, whether some kind of advantage is being granted to the other side. That ‘them and us’ mentality remains deeply, deeply ingrained.
“And the failure to recreate, re-establish, our own political institutions in which representatives from both sides can be seen to work together in partnership – not to dissolve our distinct identities, not in a sense to pretend that I as an Irish nationalist can somehow or other abandon the aspirations that I have or that Jim and his colleagues can be made to ignore or abandon even their aspirations and their sense of identity – but …partnerships which transcend and bring together the best of both sides in the greater interest of the whole community.
Benign form of apartheid: “Unless we provide those kinds of role models in terms of political leadership we will run the serious risk of entrenching those divisions and what at best may emerge is what I would describe as a benign form of apartheid, where everyone has equality before the law, but the links and the relationships are tenuous between us. That is certainly not the kind of legacy that I want transmitted to the next and succeeding generations. It certainly doesn’t match my aspirations for bringing the people of the North together, not to talk about bringing the people of North and South together, because if we can’t create positive relationships within the North, what chance have we of creating positive relationships across the whole of the island?
North-south cooperation:“And so to the second part of the theme that we were asked to address tonight, north/south relationships. The Good Friday Agreement- the Belfast agreement as Jim might label it – provided for politicians North and South to come together to create mechanisms, and to foster mechanisms for cooperation, and to foster cooperation for the mutual benefit of people on both sides of the island. And Brian in a sense has referred to this particular thrust and has exemplified it by referring to the establishment of Tourism Ireland, which has done a remarkable job, given the constraints within which it is obliged to operate under the terms of suspension.
“And indeed the same could be true of several of the other North/South bodies. They are not realising by any means their potential. They have considerable potential and, on two parts of the island have together great potential, not just in terms of the functional relationships that we created to foster economic development, to foster community contact, but in promoting a greater sense of understanding and ultimately reconciliation between both parts of the country.
Opportunity created by the Agreement: “Because ultimately what I see the Good Friday Agreement having done, maybe even if it did no more than this, it created the opportunity, an opportunity that was availed of for the people of the whole of the island, for the first time ever to endorse a set of political institutions in which they could all operate and operate comfortably knowing that their identities and their aspirations would be respected and that this island could take it’s place alongside our neighbouring island in fostering more positive relationships and take our part together in the new Europe and indeed in the new global order that is emerging.
“All of that – or a considerable part of it if not all of it – is being put at risk, certainly is being stalled, and if we don’t take the opportunities that are going to be available to us in the next few weeks, we will pass over responsibility to the two governments. They will make their best judgements as to how to manage the situation but that is a far different situation to one in which we as the political representatives together with political representatives down here and indeed across the water can join together and try to do as democratically elected representatives of the people.
“It will give me no pleasure to see Dublin taking responsibility along with the British Government for the affairs of the North. Maybe it is the best that can be done in the circumstances, but it is certainly far from what the Good Friday agreement intended should be the case, so let’s hope that we do face those responsibilities, that we don’t point excuses and that whatever challenges are there, we will work to the best of our ability to overcome them. Thanks very much.”
Chair (Micheal Reade): Thank you, Sean. I am sure you all have the handouts that Julitta made available to you and there is a background to the speakers there so I won’t take up time. It will mean we have more time for questions and answers later on. Our next speaker is Sinn Fein’s Francie Molloy:
2. Francie Molloy, MLA, Mayor of Dungannon (Sinn Fein): “Good evening, thank you very much for the invitation back to Meath. I am sort of mixture of Tyrone, Armagh into Meath. It wouldn’t matter what foot you’re kicking with, you’re going to be kicked on for being on the football field! But it is great to be back here and the Meath Peace Group have certainly done good work in putting together various different talks and discussions.
“Devolution and Cross-border cooperation: I think we’ll look at that and then talk about the prospects and realities. Certainly with the Good Friday Agreement, people actually thought the prospects were good, that things had moved on, that people had actually come to that compromise that would allow us to develop and to build throughout that compromise the structures which would take it into a new era. From a republican point of view….. I feel particularly let down because I was arguing within Sinn Féin that we actually needed to be in there, we needed to be making our case in there and that the opportunity was there, whenever we had a mandate and the people had spoken, that the government was really under an obligation to let that mandate run.
Experiences before suspension: “And one of the difficulties was that the Assembly was slow in getting running. It was there for a short period of time in between times. But I know that there was really good work done and the Assembly itself was popular. There were people on the ground, they were getting decisions made, maybe not full power as they would like. But really we were just in the learning curve before the whole thing was closed down again. And we are back into the conspiracy theories where that happened and all that happened around it. But within the Good Friday Agreement we actually had the possibility of building the trust within the Assembly, working together with the other political parties and building the structure which would develop an assembly for the people to have their say within it.
“We had the All-Ireland bodies ….. and from Sinn Féin’s point of view while we would be in the Assembly we weren’t going to go into a six-county partitionist settlement in any way whatsoever which didn’t have the opportunity to build the All-Ireland structures within that.
“And to have that ministerial contact between ministers of the North and ministers of the South, and building the all-Ireland structures for implementation of the Agreement and development of the Agreement and that will go along.
Assembly Committees: “There was cooperation within the Assembly, when you look around the various different committees that we were operating. Sean was Finance Minister for a number of months and I was Chair of the Finance Committee and we had obviously different views on different subjects. But the thing about it was that the Finance Minister was coming to the committee and the opportunity was there to cross-examine and to deal with the issues around budgets and around all the issues of finance. And that kind of thing was developing as we were going along, and we were starting to get the power of those committees in a joined-up approach: to be able to challenge and to become like the official opposition within the Assembly in actually trying to scrutinise and to develop the structures. So I think there was good work done within that and that developed as we went along.
Suspension and aftermath: “We then had the reality of the situation on the ground, that we have basically been in suspension since the last election. If that was happening in any other country in the world, where the government was elected and then it wasn’t able to meet for four years, then you would start to ask questions about where was the mandate and how was that respected within it. The government never called together a meeting to see if it would go up or not. Now obviously there were problems within that. But in any government where you try to put together a coalition, and you can’t do it, you can’t elect a Taoiseach or you can’t elect a Prime Minister, then you go back to the country and you look for another mandate. Then either the people get tired or the politicians get tired as they start to lose their mandate and you develop within it. So we haven’t had the opportunity of meeting. And I attended a number of meetings there, talking to educational people and … when you are talking to groups from other parts of the world they can’t understand why the Assembly members are not coming in and doing their work…and not getting on with the business. And then you explain: well the government actually don’t allow it, they haven’t actually called it together, so we can’t do that at the present time. That … certainly brings home to people just the reality.
New opportunity: “Now they are going to have another attempt to put it together. I don’t know whether that will work, but the one thing that our party has actually made very clear is that we are not going into a shadow form. We have a mandate there. There has to be… [an Executive] in place and we have to have structures in place to allow it to develop in the way the Good Friday agreement put together. So without taking …changing that around, we need to deal with the realities on the ground. Now bringing together the Assembly …. Let’s see what happens, because there is an opportunity for the public, for them to make the decision to go back to the public and either the mandate will be reduced/increased or satisfied, but I think the people have the right after this period of time to say: ‘you have done a bad job, you haven’t delivered on the mandate you agreed’……
Local government – power-sharing experiences: “At the other level of the situation we have the District Councils that have been operating right across the political divide, have been doing a good job on the ground delivering at local level. Ok, they haven’t got the responsibility that we’d want them to have with the power, but there is a reason for that. The reason is that it was misused in the past and some would say ‘well that is in the past, let’s move on’, but my first political activity on the ground was …in the Civil Rights campaign when Dungannon Council allocated the house…and I am wondering what has changed, because if you look at Lisburn Council today, the DUP in charge, and Unionists in charge, no allocation of posts to the Sinn Fein councillors, limited I think to other parties, but certainly, the roll-out of power-sharing or of cooperation or responsibility doesn’t exist. The same applies to a number of other councils where you have unionist control and particularly where you have DUP control within that.
“As president of ….. the Northern Ireland Local government Association I was invited to speak at Newtownards Council, on the whole issue around the new council model that is coming in ….. The unionist councillors decided that they wouldn’t allow me to speak … there was a chief executive but they wouldn’t listen to me as president because I was a Sinn Féin councillor. That’s why the wee clippings of television…. looking back over the number of years would show that the present situation is really no different when it comes to local government.
Dungannon Council: “And yet we find in our own Council, where we have all parties within the structure, DUP, Ulster Unionist, SDLP, Sinn Féin, we have a good working relationship within the Council. We run the d’Hondt system, in fact the DUP would have got the Mayor and Deputy Mayor at the end of this term, because of the d’Hondt mechanism and because of the power sharing within the arrangement, and that is as it should be.
Cross-border cooperation:“…We actually have a good relationship between exploring cultural diversity between Dungannon council and Donegal council. There is a cooperation across the border in developing that and building the structures in political terms and most of the councillors meeting together, developing projects …. bringing together the rugby, football soccer, whatever the case may be, into the various different councils on sporting days and also then sharing the tourism experiences …. and between Kinsale and Cork and Donegal and Killybegs and Dungannon trying to share the experience of bringing together two different projects and people working together …
Immigration: “And within Dungannon – Sean and I were speaking at several different meetings together some years back so he would have heard this before – for the first time since the Flight of the Earls 400 years ago, we actually have people coming back into the country, people who had emigrated were now coming back bringing their expertise with them and bringing their financial reward with them, but also workers coming in. 400 years ago O’Neill was forced out of Dungannon and fled to Portugal and Spain and now we have a thousand Portuguese in Dungannon! So we had the return of the Earls back into Dungannon in that situation.
Heritage and history as a means of bringing communities together: “We looked at how do we use that situation and how do we develop from it – to use the Flight of the Earls as a period of history without rewriting it and focus the council and the council members on bringing people back into Dungannon to get the tourism going, trying to get that sense of focus within the council and also then tying that in to the Plantation of Ulster. Because, after the Flight of the Earls – it was a number of years later – the Plantation of Ulster happened, and instead of looking at it from a nationalist point of view as in the past, and without rewriting history, but to look at the potential that came out of that situation, the new towns that were developed, the structures that were developed around it. I am quite certain in O’Neill’s day we wouldn’t have had a great sort of experience either, if we were the ordinary peasant on the ground, we would have still been the peasants on the ground. At least now we have an opportunity I think of focusing the council, to look at the Flight of the Earls and the Plantations and to use that as a means of pulling both communities together, both celebrating. ……
Cross-border cooperation: “So I think we do need to look at the structures of how we build that communication and cross-border cooperation, the cooperation that is required, because there are vents there for both communities, for all communities within it and the structures of the councils are one way of doing it because they have the links there at grassroots level, we have the support on the ground, we have the good working relationship which is in all the councils and the opportunity to actually develop that there. Now it is a small island. … It is possible to … eradicate the border in economic terms within that and I think we shouldn’t let that opportunity pass. Otherwise we in the North will continue to suffer because of business coming out, and particularly in the present time with the Ministers [from Westminster] ….the water charges coming in, all the different sort of bad government and more bad government.
Challenge to us all: “Peter Hain’s answer is ‘well if you don’t like it, then get into the Assembly and change it’. And that I think is the challenge to us all because if it continues the way it is at the present time, then you will see more interested in moving to the south because of the taxation and the rates and the various different things are going to be to costly in the north, so they will go across the border. So there is an opportunity I think at local government level and at Assembly level to take control of the situation, an opportunity for the future, and we can start to develop as an island economy and within that to build the structures. Without being outdone within both the two spheres, we actually have Sinn Féin’s proposals … on Irish unity which we are asking government to actually take on … I have a brochure – there isn’t one for everyone in the audience, but there are certainly a number of copies for the Meath Peace Group. Thank you very much for listening. ….”
Michael Reade: “Thank you. Just before we move to Jim Wells, can I ask you to clarify the plans to be published in two weeks or so, it is believed that the proposal be a restoration of the assembly, an attempt to form an executive. … and if a further attempt to form an Executive isn’t reached by the autumn, then it is all bets off and salaries will be pulled and so on. Is that acceptable?
Francie Molloy: “Well I think one big thing is that we try continue to run the Assembly as it is. I don’t accept that members are not doing anything. I certainly think that members maybe go a bit harder in constituency business, than they would be in the Assembly, but I think there is a situation developing where if the Assembly members don’t want to take control of the situation, if the unionists – and the DUP particularly – don’t want to share power with the rest of the elected members, then I think the option there is to go back to the government, to seek a new mandate or scrap the Assembly and move on to the next stage: the two governments starting to take control of the situation. That is not the ideal option. I want to be part of the decision-making process at local level. But I think the options are not good for us at the present time. ….”
Chair, Michael Reade: “… Let us hear from our final speaker now, the DUP’s Jim Wells.
3. Jim Wells, MLA (DUP Environment Spokesperson): “Thank you….. As you all know, I am affectionately known as the ‘green wing’ of the DUP and that is a very lonely existence …. I am also perhaps the only vegetarian of the DUP. ….It reminds me of the May 2004 European election, when I knocked on the door of a prominent Ulster Unionist – now that is a very rare and endangered species, Ulster Unionists died out quickly but there are still a few left – and an altercation occurred and eventually [the lady] got so angry she came and booted my car and left two other sizeable dents in the door and I rapidly reversed as quickly as I could out of her laneway. And about a week later there was a band parade – a unionist/loyalist band parade, ie one you wouldn’t have in Dublin, but we have in South Down – and I went up to one gentleman and explained to him what this lady did and he said to me: ‘Jim, I am not surprised, in fact she is a complete lunatic – I’ll tell you how mad she is, she is a vegetarian!’
“….I also do a wee bit of broadcasting on wildlife as well as politics in Northern Ireland. That causes a bit of confusion. I did a piece in March on the wildlife of Belfast Lough for the BBC … A couple of days later somebody in Banbridge stopped me in the street and said he really enjoyed it – I spoke a lot of sense, ‘unlike that other fellow called Jim Wells – that bigot from the DUP!’ And it was a wonderful experience explaining to him that the guy he was talking to and the bigot from the DUP were the same person!
DUP a logical, democratic party: “Now I hope that one of the things that we have been able to do from coming down here and speaking on ‘Loosetalk’ [LMFM current affairs programme] … in fact my wife is getting very suspicious because at 8 o’clock in the morning, Kate from Loosetalk rings me and asks can I appear on the show, and my wife wants to know who Kate is! …. So what we hope we try to do from this is to explain that the DUP don’t have horns and a forked tail, that we are a logical, democratic party that produces very sound policies and that if people in the Republic would listen you would realise that it makes sense what we are saying.
Belfast/Good Friday Agreement: “Indeed I spoke recently at Glencree [Reconciliation Centre] and somebody came up to me afterwards and said, ‘you know that is eminent sense, it is brilliant, but it is not the Good Friday Agreement’. And…. the problem that Sean [Farren] has is: each morning Sean gets up and bows and he makes sacrifices and supplication at the temple of the Belfast Agreement. The Belfast Agreement is infallible holy writ. What you have to remember is that Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the Ten Commandments and the Belfast Agreement. It is holy writ, it is perfect. Anyone who should dare criticise one comma or one jot … there should be a jihad against those who would dare to question the Belfast Agreement!
There is a better way: “But what we are saying is there is a better way. There is a better way in dealing with cross-border bodies and cross-border cooperation and there is a better way for devolution.
DUP view on cross-border cooperation: “Now what is the DUP view on cross-border cooperation? I think it is a bit like if my wife strikes up a friendship with a rather burly good-looking young man who lives next door, I am not so much worried as to what they are getting up to, but what is his motivation?
“Now if his motivation is to help my wife to cut the joint hedge that separates our two gardens and they are working together in close harmony in order to manage that area of common interest then I am happy. But if I discover that his motivation is perhaps that he is after my wife, then I become worried. And I must say I hear all these great claims of looking to have better cross-border cooperation between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland and I think what is the motivation? Is the motivation genuinely to meet, doing better tourism, better lighthouses, better inward investment? Well maybe, but is that coming from the same Irish Republic that for 60 years claimed jurisdiction over us, who in fact claimed that we are the lost six counties, that really if we were talked to and persuaded of the error of our ways that we would want to rush back to the fold of an all-island republic? I think perhaps …the events in Dublin a few weeks ago [February 25th riots] would indicate that maybe it isn’t the great [republic] that it claims to be…. But the point is we believe in cross-border cooperation and I think if there was a settlement you would be pleasantly surprised just how cooperative the DUP would be.
DUP tests: “But we have five fundamental tests for any cross-border institutions and …..cooperation. First of all, is that cooperation in the interests of Northern Ireland? Is it being done for some party political dogma or is it being done as a practical and beneficial change which benefits Northern Ireland? If we are going to build a motorway from Belfast to Dublin, it might be helpful if both ends met at the border. If we are going to drain a river along the border, well then it might be good sense if we had our diggers on one side and the equivalent body in the Irish Republic had it’s diggers at the other side. There are issues where clearly for practical purposes…it is important that the two governments have some form of cooperation. …..
Practical benefit or political motivation? “Are they of practical benefit or are they merely politically motivated? I believe much of what is being portrayed as cross-border cooperation has nothing to do with the best interest of that function. It is being done out of political motivation and of course it is logical, because if you give power to free-standing bodies – such as the implementation bodies established under the Belfast Agreement – and you give them power over inward investment and tourism …. and then you think of other issues where you can have joint policies, perhaps planning or roads or whatever, and bit by bit you hand over those controls to free-standing bodies without democratic control, eventually you reach the stage where so much has been handed over to those bodies, that in fact you have a de facto United Ireland situation, because if independent governments can’t control those functions, then the effect is they have lost their sovereignty. So we will have to decide are they practical or are they politically motivated? …..
Accountability to NI Assembly: “Cross-border institutions…..must be answerable to the Northern Ireland Assembly, and I am glad to say that this is an issue which we negotiated on in December 2004 and, against the opposition of Sean Farren’s party, we won the point. All future cross-border institutions will be accountable to the Northern Ireland Assembly and in the Assembly we can vote to stop it and that is a major concession that has been made and won by the DUP.
“In other words if there is something, say a fishing licence for instance and the majority of anglers in Northern Ireland don’t want it, then the Assembly can vote to stop it. Now no other Western democracy would tolerate a situation where its own internal affairs are controlled by external free-standing bodies which are under the control of an outside government, that is totally unacceptable! So let’s have cooperation where we decide the rules and we decide if things have gone too far. It would have to be accountable.
Respect for NI’s constitutional status: “Do they respect Northern Ireland’s constitutional position within the United Kingdom? I am glad to say on various interviews recently with Dermot Ahern [Minister for Foreign Affairs], he has actually discovered the phrase ‘Northern Ireland’. Well done. Maybe he will discover that the city on the Foyle is called Londonderry. Maybe RTE would discover that we are not ‘the North’, ‘the 6 Counties’, and that the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, is not ‘the Northern Secretary’. So we are making some progress bit by bit, but I must say it does hurt me greatly, when under the Belfast Agreement, the Irish government is supposed to have respected our position as a part of the United Kingdom and yet you still come out with this language which clearly indicates that you just regard it as the lost 6 counties. [Peter Hain]… is not the ‘Northern Secretary’. He is ‘Her Majesty’s Secretary for Northern Ireland’. And it always will be ‘Londonderry’.
“If we started to call you ‘the Free State’ or ‘King’s County’ or ‘Queen’s County’ you would quite rightly be annoyed. Similarly with us. So it has to respect our constitutional position and most importantly it has to be value for money.
DUP policy: “So those are the tests the DUP has established for future cross border-cooperation and we have our document here [North South East West] – ours happens to be red and white….I will just indicate what we want.
Border poll: “We want a referendum, a border poll which establishes a decision on behalf of the people of Northern Ireland, as to where they want to go constitutionally. I believe the vast majority of unionists – 99% of them – would vote to stay within the United Kingdom and a very significant proportion of the Roman Catholic population would also vote to stay within the UK. We have a phrase in Northern Ireland: ‘everyone wants to go to heaven but nobody wants to die on Tuesday!’ There are an awful lot of ordinary nationalists who may have some mystical thought in their mind of a United Ireland, but if they thought it was coming next Saturday they would vote against it. I talked to some Roman Catholics in Banbridge the other day. One said to me: ‘my wife works in the bank, I am a teacher. A crisis in our life is whether we have two weeks at Christmas in the sun or three, that is a crisis. If this is 60 years of misrule and British oppression, we will have another 60!’ And there are many other Roman Catholics who are not unionist but who realise that there are enormous benefits to them and their familes in remaining within the large country that is the United Kingdom, a strong economy, a strong democracy, a world power. And they will not be voting for a United Ireland. So therefore we are confident that if we put that message to the people of Northern Ireland, there will be a very significant majority who will vote to stay British.
No further border poll for 30 years: “That having been achieved, we will then say ‘no more referenda for 30 years. Let’s put this aside for an entire generation. Let’s give the unionist community, the entire community, the confidence to know that there is going to be no further testing of their constitutional position for a generation. And I believe if that issue can be set aside and buried, as it were, then we can move forward with confidence.
Constitutional contract: “Following that we want a constitutional contract, where the leaders of all the parties sign a document which says there is an unalterable situation which will remain for a generation: no change in Northern Ireland’s constitution….. That doesn’t mean they have to set aside their long-term aspirations, but it means that that issue which causes so much uncertainty in Northern Ireland, will be put to the side forever or at least for my lifetime.
New body needed to represent totality of relationships: “Then we believe that rather than having the present institutions which are prevalent in the Anglo-Irish and Belfast Agreements, that we have a new system and that system, instead of having two bodies – one which looks at the relationships between North and South and the other which is East and West – that we combine them and we have a body which represents the totality of the relationships between London, Edinburgh, Cardiff, Dublin and Belfast ….. with its own secretariat. Because the problem at the moment is that the institution which deals with North-South relationships has met five times more often than the institution which deals with East-West relationships. Yet Northern Ireland sells more produce to Scotland than it sells to the Irish Republic! The vast bulk of our trade, our communications and our day-to-day affairs are heading east, rather than heading south. So therefore we need to build up that relationship within the totality of the British Isles and I know that is not the phrase that maybe everybody likes, but it is the commonly used phrase for the United Kingdom and the Irish Republic. So we don’t get this imbalance … that we have at the moment of concentrating far too much on North-South. I believe if we put in other structures into place you will be very pleasantly surprised how well Northern Ireland unionists and Republican Irish could get on.
Improved relationship between DUP and Irish Republic: “I have been up and down the motorway to the Irish Republic that often and the only thing I could notice is if I stood in the road, I could run over other DUP delegations coming down the same road. There has been a [warming]…of relationships between the DUP and the politicians in the Republic in this last four or five years, and I don’t believe people have been given credit for making those brave steps of going down and talking to the Irish Republic about important issues of mutual concern.
“And I believe if we had the confidence that we know our position is not under threat, you will be surprised just how much cooperation there can be, but based on issues of mutual interest rather than any attempt to take over one side or the other. Now that I see as important.
No prospect of executive in foreseeable future: “But of course none of that is going to happen unless we have some major change in the present political structures in Northern Ireland. It is quite clear the penny has dropped in terms of the two governments. There is absolutely no prospect of a full-blown executive coming about in Northern Ireland in the foreseeable future. We have to accept that. The position where Martin McGuinness could ever get back in control of our children’s education seems to me to be very much on the long finger, because if we are still negotiating about decommissioning – and frankly I don’t believe that full decommissioning has occurred, I have to be honest with you and many, many ordinary unionists in Northern Ireland believe that as well.
Sinn Féin links to criminality: “But even if that did happen, we have still got a party that is inextricably linked to criminality. We have still got a party that won’t support the security forces. We have still got a party that won’t sit with the police force. Now we have a ridiculous Alice in Wonderland situation here in relation to ‘Slab Murphy’. Slab Murphy’s home was raided by the Assets Recovery Agency and congratulations to those bodies who took part in that raid. £600,000 was found in his hayshed! He has properties in Manchester worth many millions of pounds and yet we have the leader of Sinn Féin trying to portray him as white as the driven snow! If you listened to Gerry Adams you would think he was the chairman of the Crossmaglen choral society instead of being widely acknowledged as a leading republican, who like many others has lined his pocket with vast amounts of wealth as a result of criminality. Now I ask the simple question – and I am relying on the chairman to keep me right for time: if the Progressive Democrats or the Greens or the Labour Party in the Irish Republic, if it was discovered that anyone of their prominent members was involved in the same level of criminality that many Sinn Féin members were involved in, would they survive in a coalition in the Irish Republic for five minutes? Of course they wouldn’t, they would be driven from office immediately.
Alternative proposal: “But what many are saying to us, those who worship at the temple of the Belfast Agreement, they say that we must accept individuals who are up to their necks in criminality in our government. The answer to that is no, it can’t happen. Now the old penny is beginning to drop, it’s quite clear it is beginning to drop, and the government I believe are going to put forward new proposals which is going to have some form of alternative assembly without an executive. And the DUP have been saying all along that there is a vast chasm between direct rule and full-blooded executive devolution and we are happy to try and explore that chasm and try and find some way of making progress which doesn’t represent the optimum, but at least represents progress. I would suggest all sorts of models that we are prepared to negotiate on, to try and bring that about and that would bring some degree of accountability to the situation of Northern Ireland, represent real and tangible progress, but would not be the Holy Grail of an Executive.
Dublin Corporation model: “Now I will give you an example and people laughed at me, when I suggested this when I was down in Dublin recently. Dublin Corporation runs Dublin, it has a similar population to Northern Ireland under its control and a similar budget. It doesn’t have an executive. There is no Minister for Roads in Dublin Corporation, no Minister for Education. There are 50 or 60 individuals who meet in a room and make decisions for roads, hospitals, social services and unfortunately planning – we will not go into that issue! But they make corporate decisions on behalf of the people of Dublin. No one is demanding that Sinn Féin becomes Minister of Education in Dublin, because there is no minister. Why for instance in Northern Ireland, can you not have a corporate assembly making decisions on those important day-to-day issues? Why?
Belfast Agreement won’t work: “Again, people say to me: ‘it’s a wonderful idea, but it is not the Belfast agreement’. The mantra keeps coming out time and time again: ‘it’s not the Belfast Agreement’. Now folks if you are looking to the Belfast Agreement or nothing, it will be nothing. The unionist people in Northern Ireland have made it very clear they have had it up to here with the Belfast Agreement. Since we last met, we have had a stunning election victory, where the DUP won 9 Westminster seats and the Ulster Unionist Party won 1. It leads to the joke: ‘what’s the difference between the Ulster Unionist Party and a see-saw? A see-saw has got 2 seats!’
“They were absolutely decimated during that campaign and the unionist community wreaked a terrible revenge on those who negotiated away so much of what they perceived to be their rights, so therefore the unionist people have well and truly made their views known.
No decision in Northern Ireland can proceed without the DUP: “That question came up on ‘Loosetalk’ [LMFM] today: ‘can you not go ahead without the DUP?’ Well you can’t because even the Belfast Agreement said that nothing can proceed without the majority of the unionist community supporting it. The DUP is in such a strong position that you can’t bypass it. So therefore it is absolutely clear that the DUP holds a whip hand, and sometimes the electorate have an awful habit of coming up with decisions you might not agree with. But you cannot ignore the mandate of the DUP obtained last May. So let us see what is coming up. The DUP are …prepared to study it, we are prepared to go in there and we are prepared to try and see what we can do that’s best for the people of Northern Ireland, in the difficult situation we are in
Republican criminality continues: “Am I any more hopeful than I was on 5 March 2005, that Sinn Féin are going to detach themselves from the criminality? Not a bit, because I can think of 26.25 million good reasons why I am not completely confident, because they haven’t handed back one pound of the loot they took from the Northern Bank in Christmas 2004. It is quite clear they are still up to their necks in criminality. Why is it for instance, that recently the four biggest oil companies in Europe – BP, Shell, Texaco and Burmah – all announced that they were pulling out of Northern Ireland? Because they could not compete with the vast amount of fuel smuggling and diesel laundering undertaken by friends of Mr. Molloy on the border, republicans who are making vast amounts out of that sort of illicit activity. So therefore there has been no change.
DUP prepared to work for benefit of all the people of NI: “We have to accept that we are not going to get change in the foreseeable future, but we must move on, come up with something which is not what everybody wants. Everybody believes that full-scale devolution is the aspiration we should all aim for but accepting that that is not going to happen, then we have to come up with something which is second best, but which represents progress and the DUP are prepared to get in there and do our best to achieve something which brings benefit to all the people of Northern Ireland. I am hoping when that happens then we can implement our policy on cross border cooperation and I think you will find that unionism is a lot easier to deal with on those issues than you think so.
“It is a privilege to have been here today to speak to you, I was the first person from my party ever to set foot across the border and speak at a meeting in the Irish Republic in 1987. I came back alive! I reported that they didn’t try to poison me, they didn’t try to beat me up, they were actually quite friendly people and since then, there have been many of us down ever since. And I have always been treated with great respect and very courteously, unlike my colleagues from South Down who were down in Dublin recently [February 25th] which I think is a blot on your landscape and unfortunately does consolidate the view that frankly the expression of Protestant culture in the South is not one that is welcome. So thank you for listening and … I think that normally in these situations the audience often speak with more sense than the speakers and ask much more searching questions and make very valid points. Thank you.”
QUESTIONS AND COMMENTS (Summary of main points)
Q.1. Chair (Michael Reade): “Obviously the idea now would be to hear from you, whatever questions you may have based on what you have heard. You have heard every end of the spectrum there.
While I am waiting for a first question, Francie Molloy – would you care to address what we heard there a moment ago in relation to cross-border smuggling and Thomas Murphy[‘Slab’Murphy]? He is under investigation but who is he? We know he is a ‘good republican’ and that he has ‘played an important part in the peace process’. What does that mean?”
Francie Molloy: “Well I don’t know the gentleman that you are talking about, so I can’t enlighten you any further on it. But I know the statement that Gerry Adams made, that he was a ‘good republican’ and that he had known the background … so I could just take it on that line. And certainly I think there has been a lot said about him. But there was lots said about various different issues that actually happened as well. If we take it on the lines of the Stormont [raid], that Sinn Fein were bugging Stormont and then it turned out that there was a British agent, that the British had an agent working within Sinn Fein! …
“So I think sometimes you have to deal with this and often republicans will say, ‘well that is a conspiracy theory’. But I think that some of our conspiracy theories actually have been proved quite right recently and I think more of them actually will come to be proved right.”
Michael Reade: “But you don’t know if he is a member of Sinn Fein?”
Francie Molloy: “I don’t know the man.”
Michael Reade: “But you wouldn’t know anything other than what you saw on the TV?”
Francie Molloy: “No.”
Michael Reade: “It is remarkable to think that with such a high profile story that nobody in Sinn Fein has consulted with the Party President, isn’t it?”
Francie Molloy: “No, there is nothing unusual about it. If you put all the different people who have been libelled by the newspapers on very intelligent sources…
Michael Reade: “I am not talking about anybody libelling the man now. I am talking about the statement made by the party president in relation to a high profile sting operation, behind that then lie these allegations. But the statement that your party president made that he was a ‘good republican’ and a huge ‘contributor to the peace process’ or words along those lines, surely somebody in the party would ask, ‘well Mr. Adams who is he?’”
Francie Molloy: “Well I obviously haven’t had the opportunity to do it to start off with, but secondly I think the word has been spoken from someone who actually does know him or is clear enough within that. So I think the issue is, for instance what you are talking about earlier in light of – or what Jim talked about – a number of properties in Manchester. I think that already has been proved to be erroneous and the legal documents that are produced around that proves [that]…. So I think as this story starts to develop and be revealed it may be red faces on different organisations and different parties, not Sinn Fein’s.”
Michael Reade: “Apparently.”
Sean Farren: “Very little has been proved under any legal test as to whether the association with Manchester has been proved and I raise my eyebrows when I hear that, I am sure …. Unless I have missed the evidence the suspicion is still there and the gentleman from Crossmaglen has been in the news on many, many occasions. He took a case against the Sunday Times and historically lost the case and the evidence … there certainly seemed to convince an awful lot of people as to what his associations were. I am not going to get into the debate. In one sense, I think it is a bit of a distraction.”
Michael Reade: “But isn’t it remarkable? If Mark Durkan made a similar statement about somebody who had been involved in a high profile sting operation, cross border smuggling etc, would you ask him….?
Sean Farren: “Yes, I would want to ask Mark Durkan why did he express the opinion that he expressed. I mean what is the evidence for it? And certainly he would want to. I am surprised that over all the years that Mr. Murphy’s name has been in the public arena that somebody like Francie Molloy hasn’t inquired as to the man’s health or background or anything about him and he tends not to know anything about him. I am very surprised at that. But ‘Slab’ Murphy is a bit of a distraction for tonight’s purposes. It is maybe more about the issues that we have to face over the next few weeks that we should be concerned.
Disappointment with DUP position: “If I may just take a brief opportunity to comment. I must say I am very disappointed with what I heard from Jim tonight because on the one hand, he says ‘if it is the Belfast Agreement or nothing, then it is nothing you will have’. But on the other he seems to be saying ‘unless you are going to take the DUP analysis and the DUP set of proposals, then it is nothing!’ Because he dwelled a lot on what he sees as the shortcomings of north/south and indeed of the operation of the Assembly and the Executive and all of that and then says that they have got a magic formula which is going to work without any negotiation with anybody else. It is the DUP set of proposals.
Good Friday/Belfast Agreement not holy writ: “As for the Good Friday Agreement – I have never said that it was the last word. I never made any analogy with Moses coming down with the Ten Commandments. I have always said the Good Friday Agreement is a living document and, like any living document, constitutional or otherwise, it can be modified and changed in the light of experience. In fact in the recent exchange that I had with Nigel Dodds a year ago …. you would see that I am expressing tonight the very same views that I expressed in a set of exchanges with Nigel. The review of the Good Friday Agreement showed that there were many lessons to be learned about making its operation much more effective. I deal with the DUP, we have proposals, we will sit down and talk to them but we are not going to take a DUP bible and simply say ‘yes’ and genuflect to that. I certainly don’t get up every morning as he tried to suggest. I am a much more intelligent politician than that seems to suggest, that I get up and bow to the Good Friday Agreement even though I know he is probably exaggerating to make a point. The Good Friday Agreement in it’s completeness as an Agreement written in 1998 is not holy writ to the point where operationally and in some other respects it is not going to change. The Irish Constitution was adopted in 1937 as a Constitution that probably seemed to answer all the questions at the time. It has been modified many times since. The American Constitution has been modified. Any country with a constitution modifies it in the light of experience and new requirements that society throws up as it changes and develops. So why don’t we regard the Good Friday/Belfast Agreement in those terms?”
Michael Reade: “Well obviously not all of us do, but was anybody in the room not shocked about what Jim Wells had to say about the Good Friday Agreement?”
Q.2. Robin Bury (Dublin): “No, I wasn’t a bit shocked to be honest with you. I think there is a huge amount of scepticism around now in this country about the Belfast Agreement. It has just dragged on and on and is it four years since the Assembly fell?”
Michael Reade: “Three and a half.”
Robin Bury: “Three and a half years and there have been so many efforts to try to get people to talk, in order to get it up and running again. And just finally Suzanne Breen who works for the Sunday Tribune. She was on ‘Questions and Answers’ [RTE television] recently and she said: ‘believe it or not, people in Northern Ireland are actually quite happy going along every day of their life peacefully with no Belfast Agreement and with Direct Rule. It is a point she made and she is a Catholic and a republican.”
Michael Reade: “True but I suppose as we said I don’t want to keep talking about it. … This man here has a question…”.
Q.3. John Keaveney (Ratoath). “I take your point that you have a veto basically…. but what about the point that so have Sinn Fein? We are back to the old tired argument: you can’t do anything without Sinn Fein or the SDLP, they can’t do anything without you. It is the old veto politics again. What would you say? I am not saying this now…. But it seems to me that you have a failed political entity again because you have a veto on progress but so have the other two here. And are we not at a stalemate?”
Jim Wells: “Well we are if we believe that the only solution is to try and rehash the Belfast Agreement. ….. for instance, what would happen the Irish Republic if there was a similar situation? You would have a series of behind the scenes negotiations to form a coalition. That is what would happen. The Greens or the PDs or whatever we drag along and you bring together a mishmash, rainbow coalition or whatever and you form a government. Well why not have that in Northern Ireland?”
John Keaveney: “Because the divides are sectarian, it is sectarian.”
Jim Wells: “Yes well a voluntary coalition would have a strong representation of the nationalist community, i.e. the SDLP. But what it wouldn’t have is Sinn Fein. Sinn Fein would be the opposition. Now you are saying to yourself that isn’t acceptable, why? Well for six years it was perfectly acceptable to exclude the DUP from that Agreement because you knew that if the DUP were excluded, we wouldn’t go and bomb anywhere. That we’d go and send out more literature, put an ad in the paper ….
“But you know that if you spooked Sinn Fein, you would run the risk that they would go back to killing and bombing and shooting. That is what is behind that question.
“And that is why people still are not convinced that Sinn Fein have completely got rid of their violent past and that is the fear. Now Sinn Fein still only represent 25% of the people of Northern Ireland. The DUP represent far more than that. We don’t have the cutting edge of an armed wing that could still be revived and that is why they are demanding an all-inclusive Executive. Why not have an Executive representing 75% of people of Northern Ireland – which is more than any other coalition anywhere in Europe – representing Protestant and Catholic and let Sinn Fein be the opposition until they get their act together and become democrats? “
John Keaveney: “I am not disputing. I am not demanding anything. I am only pointing out the impossibility basically.”
Michael Reade: “Ok you will have to give him the answer. So we will need a response then from Sinn Fein. Why will Sinn Fein not give a guarantee that there will never be a return to violence?”
Francie Molloy: “Well Sinn Fein actually have given guarantees. Within the document it is very clear as well. The position is that you have …within the Good Friday Agreement and for years unionists actually said they needed the issue of consent, that until you had the recognition of the consent of the people of the north for a change, until that actually happened you couldn’t have agreement. We had that. All parties signed up to the Good Friday Agreement, accepted the issue of consent. There will be no change until the majority actually want it.”
Michael Reade: “But we don’t need an armed campaign by the IRA?”
Francie Molloy: “Well I can’t speak for the IRA obviously, I don’t know who can. But what I am saying is, unless we provide the alternative political structures then who knows what the future is? It is not that long since Jim Wells’s colleagues were walking about with red berets and importing weapons into the north. So those weapons never have been legal at all … ‘Ulster Resistance’. And they were brought around the town halls where Paisley and his colleagues were in the red berets. So no, I can only deal with Sinn Fein …. Sinn Fein have a very clear mandate: to represent and also a mandate that actually said we have to make politics work. So that is what our job is to do.”
Michael Reade: “If somebody somewhere …. close to the IRA, speaks on their behalf … would that make much of a difference?….
Jim Wells: “It would have to be proved over a period of time: the ‘Proinsias de Rossa test’, whereby after a period of time, we prove beyond a shadow of a doubt, that you have genuinely given up violence. But on your very programme [LMFM], you put that question to Arthur Morgan [Sinn Fein TD for Louth] several times: ‘Can you guarantee me that the IRA will never return to violence?’ Do you know he squirmed and he prevaricated and he never would say it. So here is the situation where exactly the same things happen to Mr. Molloy. He will not stand up here and be recorded and say ‘the IRA will never return to violence’. What confidence does that give the unionist community when they won’t even do that?”
Francie Molloy: “But there is a clear line. I cannot speak for the SDLP and I can’t speak for the DUP on what they are likely to do in the future, so how can I speak for the IRA? I don’t represent them.”
Micheal Reade: “Can we just hear from Sean Farren on this, because the SDLP would have been sidelined to some degree during the talks as an acting representative of a political party because you couldn’t represent the IRA regardless of what other people thought.”
Sean Farren: “Well I certainly can’t speak for the IRA, but look if we’re going to look for cast-iron guarantees about everything and particularly about fundamental issues then we will never be satisfied. If the DUP are going to demand that Sinn Fein or the SDLP or anyone demonstrate that they are whiter than white we are seeking perfection. That is never achievable. We had the observations and reports from the Monitoring Commission of significant decommissioning. We have had an IRA statement saying that, as I understand it, instructing their members – whom I never believed had a mandate to do what they did over thirty years of murder and bombing – to turn to the political approach.
“Sometime we have to start working on the assumption that that is how it is going to be for the foreseeable future. I can’t give a guarantee that in some time in the future some members of the SDLP are not going to start recommending that violence be used for whatever political purpose they seem to be very incensed about at the time. Nobody in any political party can give a guarantee about the future. All they can do is commit themselves to a set of values at the present time and then hope that those values and those commitments will be accepted. Otherwise there is no basis at all for moving forward. Now I recognise that the republican movement almost – if I can use a completely inappropriate metaphor – ‘shot themselves in the foot’ over the issue of decommissioning. They prevaricated, said it wasn’t necessary, said it was a red herring and then in the heel of the hunt they turn around and do a massive – if we believe General de Chastelain – act of decommissioning, something they said was unnecessary and just a distraction from the whole process! If it was such a distraction, why on earth in the end did they carry it out and lose the impact – if they had done it earlier – of carrying it out during the term when the Good Friday Agreement said it should have been carried out, within two years of the signing of the Agreement?
Criminality: “Ok that is all history. We are over that hurdle. Now I recognise that the suspicions about criminality are serious and that it is up to republicans to demonstrate that they have no hand, act or part, they certainly don’t wish to have any hand, act or part in it and if they were to support the police that would be a significant move to demonstrate that they are totally against crime and want to dissociate themselves with it, in whatever form they have been associated with it up to now. But they haven’t done that and that leaves room for suspicion on the part of people like Jim Wells. Certainly it leaves suspicion on my part.”
Q.4. Ray (Dublin): “…I think I must be the only person in the audience here to actually know ‘Slab’ Murphy. But if anyone wants to ask me….”
Jim Wells: “Well I’d be happy …. [to know about] that £600,000 in loose notes and sterling lying in bales of straw…… ”
Ray Kelly: “I don’t know anything about these things. The only people that are privy to that are the Garda Siochána
Chair: “Do you believe them?”
Ray: “I don’t know anyone here that knows where the man lives. Have you ever been in Crossmaglen, anyone here? Have you ever been around the area where he is in? It is pretty rough … I am very much involved in the music industry, my personal interest was in Irish traditional music and I spent a huge amount of social time in Mullaghbawn, in Crossmaglen and that general area. There is a huge amount of music in that area … There is a lot of culture going back hundreds of years and that is why I went…. The border runs right through his house. Now who put the border there? It was the most gratuitous thing that ever happened to the man. Who changed the difference in the rates of excise on fuel? It certainly wasn’t Slab Murphy! …. I know the man, I know his brother too from a different point of view, nothing political, and he is a decent sort of fellow. He is the sort of fellow that I would expect to find down in Kerry on the side of a mountain, a wiry old fellow. … I don’t wish to digress here but did you ever wonder, you probably know this Jim, because there is a lot of Italian names [involved in smuggling] …….and on the southern side of the border. They were there way before Slab Murphy. So if foreigners could come in and make a penny I’d say well done to you Slab.”
Q 5: John Clancy (Meath Peace Group): “I don’t know how you can follow that! I am going to just ask some added on questions to Jim. …Last year I felt we were making steps in getting towards a hopeful situation. We did have your scenario in front of us but it seems that the set has changed and it is still far, far away. And yet, from our perspective, a lot seemed to have happened in the meantime. There are two questions I really have: 1) If Francie Molloy is correct in what he stated – that within the local authorities controlled by Sinn Fein there is power-sharing … and that in the DUP-controlled councils there is not power-sharing particularly with Sinn Fein and the SDLP – why is that the case? And, if it is the case, how can you maintain the case you are putting here that if you have an authority [like Dublin Corporation] that you will be generous and accommodating and all of that?
2) “The final question is this. You were talking about Sinn Fein [providing a guarantee re IRA violence]….. Are you prepared to say that the DUP could never take to violence? They are the two questions I want to ask.”
Jim Wells: “Well first of all can I say I am in Down Council which is SDLP-controlled with some help from Sinn Fein. For 27 years we were given absolutely nothing: never a chair, never vice-chair, never chair of a committee, never sat in any deputations, never elected to any outside bodies. There were 776 appointments over those years and the DUP never got one of them. So when the boot was on the other foot we were treated as badly as you are alleging.”
John Clancy: “I wasn’t alleging, I was just asking the question.”
Jim Wells: “But in places like Banbridge we elected three SDLP mayors, Lisburn – we elected an SDLP mayor no problem whatsoever so don’t lecture the DUP.”
John Clancy: “No I am not lecturing, I am just….”
Jim Wells: “And it was only after we goaded the SDLP for dot number of years, and I bet you out of pure embarrassment they gave us the crumbs from the table as it were …. It is the same as discrimination. Discrimination was as bad in nationalist-controlled councils in fifteen years as it is alleged to have been in unionist-controlled councils, only the other way around. That is the first thing. Secondly, would the DUP ever return to violence? The DUP never was involved in violence.”
John Clancy: “Would you resort to violence?”
Jim Wells: “We wouldn’t. The only situation where we would resort to violence is if someone tried to impose a United Ireland on us against the will of the majority.”
Michael Reade: “So you would?”
Jim Wells: “But that is the situation where our democratic rights would be completely destroyed. But what I am saying to you is, if the DUP were ever convicted of being involved in any form of violence or even alleged violence or any form of smuggling on the level that Sinn Fein are involved, then we are not fit for the government of any part of the United Kingdom including Northern Ireland. We should be immediately expelled. For instance if Peter Robinson and Nigel Dodds were caught laundering 300,000 litres of diesel fuel here and lining our pockets with a vast amount of money, lying in cash at our hedge gates would we be fit for government? No. But a leading republican ‘Slab’ Murphy was and there was an opportunity there for Sinn Fein last week to come out and say: ‘we disown this man, we want nothing to do with criminality or smuggling or any form of criminality’. What did they do? They portrayed him as a quiet boy and that is why unionists still do not trust Sinn Fein. We believe they are up to their necks in criminality and there are tens and tens of millions of pounds being taken out of the British economy by these characters and they control the cartel for smuggling on the border, drugs, protection rackets, you name it. They are up to it.”
Michael Reade: “Gerry Adams did say as well that smuggling is wrong.”
Francie Molloy: “I also said that criminality was wrong and Peter Robinson is the one person who has been convicted on this side of the border for trying to take over a Garda station in Clontibret so there have been acts of violence and criminality on the part of the DUP … Dr. Paisley was out of the country at the time and Peter stood down …. but he got himself into court and got fined for it and paid his punt to relieve the problem. On certain occasions the DUP has been involved in acts of criminality and violence. As Jim says, forced into the situation and I found this one time, discussing around community relations that whenever you force certain people into certain positions it is surprising the number of people who actually would themselves become aggressive, become violent, when the situation was as they found it the last resort. As Jim says the DUP as a last resort to the situation would fight to defend what they see as the north and their control of their north.”
Michael Reade: “OK we will take another question.”
Q.6. Sean Collins (Drogheda): “Just one or two points before the question and I have to congratulate you Jim – you are a unionist in the true style of Carson, because he was the first man to advocate violence in this country …. ‘you’re introducing Home Rule so that is the reason we will fight you’. That was the bottom line of unionism in this country. Listening to your points tonight is what I have come to expect from the DUP over the years and that is not going to change and I am used to that at this stage. Well I have been involved in welcoming groups down south … and I was a little bit disappointed with your comments in relation to our ‘blotting the copybook’ in Dublin about three weeks ago with the events that took place which I certainly could not condone [February 25th riots]. But I have a problem with the fact that the man that worked to present that walk in Dublin [Willie Frazier] – he used the platform of the media down the south – LMFM for instance and the Sunday Tribune. Twelve months before he was refused a gun licence in Northern Ireland by the authorities because of his known association with loyalist paramilitaries. Was I supposed to go out and welcome him? I couldn’t find anybody I deal with particularly in the unionist community in Northern Ireland -even the Love Ulster group in Belfast. They wouldn’t attend it, they wouldn’t come because of him……you know it was a sad occasion…. Why did you not come yourself?
Jim Wells: “I was speaking at a conference in Scotland and I certainly would have been there if it wasn’t for that occasion. …There is absolutely no proof whatsoever – that allegation against Willie Frazier. Secondly, could I say that I doubt if those who were attacking that parade were doing so because of some deep personal problem with Willie Frazer. It was quite clear from the vox pops that were done in Dublin that day that an awful lot of Catholic nationalists in Dublin did not see the right of a group of Northern Ireland unionists to have any right to march anywhere in Dublin. I heard some very surprising and very sectarian comments and I have to say folks that I wasn’t dreaming it up – that was on CNN, it was on BBC World Service … and that showed up Dublin I have to say as being a very bigoted, anti-Protestant, anti-Northern Ireland unionist city. I have to say that and I know that maybe it wasn’t representative of Co. Meath or Dublin generally, but it was vicious, it was nasty, it was sectarian and it was anti-Protestant.”
Michael Reade: “Was it the fact that Willie Frazer’s licence wasn’t granted because it was suspended?”
Jim Wells: “If Willie Frazer hadn’t been there I am still convinced exactly the same thing would have happened….”
Michael Reade: “But he wasn’t given a licence. It wasn’t removed because of suspected associations?”
Jim Wells: “That is what the police told him. Yes I perceived that as well. What I am saying to you is he denies that. I don’t believe for one minute that is the reason why a thousand republicans launched a vicious attack on that parade.”
Sean Collins: “In that case, do you believe the police in this instance – of Willie Frazer being refused a licence?”
Jim Wells: “No.”
Q.7. Clare Norris (Dublin): ‘….Why in the interests of the stability of the people of the North of Ireland will Sinn Féin not join in supporting the PSNI?”
Francie Molloy: “We actually have said that when the conditions which have been sought are right – accountability of the PSNI to the Assembly and Policing and Justice transferred to the Assembly – that Sinn Féin with the right conditions will recommend it at a special Ard Fheis … and Sinn Féin would then make a decision. I can’t predict what that decision will be or whether they would actually support the PSNI or not. But there is a lot of history around that particular issue of policing and I don’t think the issue has been dealt with completely and I think there are many issues that have happened since the setting up of the PSNI, which indicate that there is no great difference between them and the RUC. Of course there wouldn’t be any great difference because most of them are the same people. There is just a different uniform and a different name. So Sinn Féin would have to be convinced and I am not convinced at this stage that there is any difference or any change.
PSNI raid on SF offices in Stormont: “And that goes for a number of different instances that happened, in particular the way that they allowed themselves to be used in the raids at our offices in Stormont where you had a large number of landrovers and PSNI personnel to raid an office that was open. Also, 24 hours a day the security was in there, they could have searched any number of nights or days that they actually wanted to. Then to come out with one disc which was more an issue with the computer itself, nothing to do with the content and they handed that back the next day. So it was a PR exercise which was designed to create the image of Sinn Féin being the problem and also to save David Trimble. So they had to close down the Assembly. That is what it was about. So if the PSNI were allowing themselves to be used as a political tool in that way, then there is nothing to indicate that their masters or their direction has changed.”
Sean Farren: “… the idea that the raid was designed to save David Trimble I find absolutely unbelieveable. But in a sense what we have here is this: Francie calls for a police force that is whiter than white. Jim calls for a political party that is whiter than white. Perfection is never going to be reached…”
Francie Molloy: “We want an accountable police force and that is not saying lily white. That is saying we want it accountable to the Assembly and we want Policing and Justice transferred to the Assembly. Now a lot of republicans actually say: ‘what do you want to give Policing and Justice to the Assembly for?’ But because of the change of political direction there within it, you can create that within an accountable Assembly.”
Sean Farren: “Of course, and we had it at the time when the Policing Board was established and you faulted. We had the beginning of accountability by the establishment of a Policing Board which contained political representatives to which you were invited to participate along with the SDLP. You fluffed it then and you are finding excuses. …”
Francie Molloy: “You called it wrong then.”
Sean Farren: “Please don’t interrupt me.”
Francie Molloy: “You called it wrong.”
Sean Farren: “If I have misquoted you, you can come back and correct me and I’ll accept your correction, if that is what it is. Look, we’ve got to show political leadership on a lot of issues, and if we wait until the last member of our constituency is ready to jump with us, we will be waiting for ever. Political leadership means making a judgement that the time is right to do something for the sake of the people that we represent and indeed for the wider community, that it is necessary, indeed essential to do so. And what I fear is: ‘oh yes, we’ll wait and we’ll wait and we’ll wait until the last colluding or alleged to be colluding policeman is removed from the police force.’ Now we are going to be waiting forever and that is what we are being condemned to: a future in which one party sees you as having to prove you are so white that you will never be able to match their criteria for whiteness and you looking for excuses with respect to policing, that the police will never be able to match in terms of demonstrating their whiteness to your satisfaction. And we’ll end up, as I said in my opening remarks, with the two governments unfortunately taking responsibility and representatives of the people being left to one side and if that’s the case we deserve to be cast into outer darkness. And any prospect of any movement on your part towards what you believe is your form of a United Ireland is absolutely unrealisable in the short or longer term. And any sense that nationalists are going to enthusiastically remain or embrace the UK and all that it connotes, is also not going to be achieved.
“We have got to compromise together, without sacrificing principle if we are going to move forward. That is what the Good Friday Agreement began to offer us the hope of doing and it is almost my last word.”
Michael Reade: “I think most would agree that Sinn Féin has given a lot over the years of this process in terms of compromise, because compromise requires giving by two sides of the dispute. If Sinn Féin has done its part …. has it got to a stage that you think it can’t give any more without getting something back first?”
Francie Molloy: “Well I think it’s not just in the mind of Sinn Fein … what Sinn Féin have done is that they have convinced others to make make moves at different times to try and secure that and to keep the Assembly going and to keep the institutions up and running and that wasn’t successful a number of different times. Some soul-searching had to go on from a republican point of view. But we said from the very start of this whole thing that if this was about the surrender of republicanism then we weren’t up for it and we weren’t going to surrender, because we had nothing to surrender for. I think what we have now is a continuous line and we predicted this at the start that it would be on line of weapons. …. and then the next step would have to be policing…..and there is nothing to say that even if Sinn Fein signed up to the Northern Policing Board that it would change anything whatsoever or that it would be more acceptable to the DUP…. Jim started off talking about five conditions that the DUP put on any sort of progress and then he want on to add to those five and I counted about ten more conditions that actually had to be met before they reached that situation… so I think there comes a point where you say …”
Michael Reade: “Give us one condition for taking your place on the Policing Board.”
Francie Molloy: “I am not putting any conditions on it at all. What I am saying is that you create the conditions where there is accountability within the Assembly and that you have Policing and Justice in the Assembly where local people have the control of it and local people can start to develop that and that immediately builds the trust within it. But that is not putting a precondition on it. That is saying we actually should move to get the Assembly up and running and get the local institutions up.”
Q.8. Nuala McGuinness (Nobber): “Do any of you think that you might become redundant now that we are becoming a multi-cultural and multi-racial society?”
Jim Wells: “Northern Ireland isn’t as multicultural as perhaps you are becoming in the Republic. But what I can say to you is that I hear all these people who tell me that there is great surge of support for the middle ground and people want to hone in on issues such as health, education etc. and that is said before the election and then the vast majority go out and vote for the four main parties which are the SDLP, DUP, UUP and Sinn Féin. Now indeed the whole middle ground is becoming totally squeezed. They are just losing seats time after time and the Alliance Party, if it wasn’t for the fact that there are a few prominent individual personalities, if they weren’t there it would just simply collapse. So don’t think that there is pluralism occurring in Northern Ireland with the middle ground spreading. It isn’t happening. If you look at the sectarian geography of Northern Ireland – in terms of people living in solely Protestant estates or solely Catholic estates – Northern Ireland has never been more polarised. So this great Belfast Agreement hasn’t brought the pluralism that you think about. Will I be redundant? Well I could well be within 6 or 7 months. I have been through the process in 1986 when the old Assembly collapsed…….. But will that change my view one iota about my stance against this Agreement and my view of the need to replace it with something better? Not one bit. …….I will need to refer back to the choices that I am facing, that that will not be moving one inch. I will simply come up and down this road as an unemployed politician rather than a paid one!”
Nuala: “I am referring to all the foreign people coming in from all over the world to this island and it’s going to change in the next ten, fifteen years and I just wonder… you are experienced politicians. Do you feel that Irish society will change, that you will all have to change? But to get back to the Agreement. I didn’t vote for the Good Friday Agreement, I am one of the 5% here that didn’t vote for it. I am a Northerner, although I have lived around here for a number of years. I voted this way as a matter of conscience because I felt that one side got too much and the other side got too little and I have a lot of unionist colleagues and neighbours from my previous existence there. They all feel they have been caught and cornered.
25th February parade and rioting: “I was at the parade in Dublin. In the past few years there have been two attempts to stop Orangemen walking in Dublin. It’s a crazy situation. And I would just like to draw attention to the St Patrick’s Day parade in Dublin every year.
“You have bands from every country in the world, half-naked girls – why they didn’t all get pneumonia this year I do not know – and still we cannot let a few top class musicians from North East Ulster come down. Can we not forget all the past? It is just ridiculous that in a St. Patrick’s Day Parade there are bands from everywhere and you can’t let a few people from North East Ulster parade in Dublin.”
Michael Reade: “And there are big St Patrick’s Day parades, big celebrations in London as well.”
Nuala: “Exactly. I mean we are supposed to be a democracy…. I was there at great uncertainty, but I am a veteran of riots having experienced them in the past, inadvertently I might add, in Belfast, Newy and Armagh, and I felt hatred and venom and I removed myself very promptly to get off the street. But I am sorry I also have to say that I experienced venom and hatred in Armagh round about 1968/9 when Paisleyites came to a demonstration in Armagh and only that I was with a cousin, a male cousin who is a Londoner and he had an English accent. I said ‘for goodness sake will you start talking and get us out of here’ and he did and we got out safely. … And that was a long, long time ago and I would hope that the Paisley people have changed, I think they have. But certainly the parade in Dublin was a fiasco. You do not have a government in the south of Ireland and you do not have a democracy, and they should hang their heads in shame and I speak as a Northerner…..”
Q.9. Cllr. Brian Fitzgerald: “Quite honestly, this is the probably the most frustrating and depressing night I have put in here in this hall for quite a long time. I am old enough to remember when … Captain O’Neill was ousted out of office by your leader [Rev Ian Paisley] when he met with Sean Lemass. I am old enough to remember that when Brian Faulkner took risks to try and bring together the people of Northern Ireland he was driven out of office by your leader. ….Had the Sunningdale Agreement survived, the IRA would not have been the force that it ended up being over the following 20 odd years, if there was a little bit of give from the person who leads your party today. But no that did not happen, the IRA grew and grew. But also the UVF grew, the UDA grew and every one of their offshoots grew and we saw over three thousand people dead and thousands upon thousands maimed in one form or another.
When David Trimble came along after all of that and tried to do business on behalf of the unionist community with the SDLP and with Sinn Féin – who themselves had to take serious risks, risks from their own people as much as people from outside – he was also ousted from office as a result of your leader who continuously said ‘no’, ‘no surrender’, ‘not an inch’.
“We are now in a situation that he is the leading party leader of Northern Ireland and I don’t believe he has the guts to do what Brian Faulkner did, to do what Captain O’Neill did or to do what David Trimble did and I believe he is prepared to sacrifice all the people of Northern Ireland and all the efforts that people like John Hume and many, many more like him who have devoted hours upon hours and years and years to try and resolve the difficulties in Northern Ireland. And we can all sit here tonight in the belief that violence will never return to Northern Ireland. You know and I know that that is no hard guarantee by anybody, so for God’s sake will you start having a look at yourselves … and try and do something for the interests of the people of this island so as they will have the luxury of living in comfort and not in fear for the rest of their lives and the generation to come. Quite honestly what I am listening to here tonight is just what I listened to as a young boy in the early 1960s when Captain O’Neill and your party leader came on the television for the first time. Nothing has changed and the sooner you realise that yourself the better. You are a young man. So are many of your party. For God’s sake, don’t be looking back. Look forward and try and do something for everybody’s sake and not get us into another 25 year cycle of war with all sides involved.”
Michael Reade: “Let’s start here with Sean Farren.”
Sean Farren: “Just very briefly, picking up some of the points that have been made a few minutes ago. In response to what was said about the Dublin riots, I believe that while they may have been unrepresentative in terms of the majority of the people on the island the fact that on two occasions now the Orange Order, or those associated with it in whatever form – and I know the second proposed parade was not strictly speaking an Orange parade – have been unable to march is something that we – I say we because I am a southerner originally – have to examine and consciences have to be examined.
“And particularly as we are embarking on what seems to me very likely to be a decade-long commemoration of 1916. Simply looking back at 1916 is not adequate and sufficient for the needs of our society today. 1916 – without opening a huge debate – took place, in my view, without any real consideration as to the implications for relationships with the north or within the north. And for all the high-minded and idealistic expressions that the Proclamation contains, it – and the events that happened in the few years afterwards – copperfastened partition. Partition wasn’t a product of 1916, because it was there from 1914 in the Home Rule Act, but it certainly cemented the attitudes that we have lived with, and if you think about it, as I said earlier, not until 70 years later in 1998 did the people of Ireland come together.
Good Friday Agreement: “I am prepared to accept that there are imperfections in the Good Friday Agreement. At least an overwhelming majority of people expressed high hopes that day. In my constituency and in many, many others, more people voted on that day than ever turned out in any popular test of opinion before or since. In North Antrim the majority of people may have voted against the Agreement. But 59,000 people voted in the referendum. The average turnout for other elections is about 46,000 and that is repeated across all the constituencies and in the overwhelming majority of them, the vote was in favour and … many people haven’t obviously voted since. We have let them down. But as we embark on the decade long commemoration of 1916, we might begin to reflect on 1916, 1998 and the whole concept of national reconciliation or reconciliation – Jim mightn’t agree with me – as a new debate and discuss and reflect and look back and maybe we are doomed to failure and the odds are not great. In the discussion with me this morning on the radio [LMFM], I heard Jim say it was 1000:1 against any Executive being formed and maybe slightly less, but nonetheless very significant odds against anything significant happening. Maybe we need to reflect on how we can re-engage with ourselves, because I believe that even if the Good Friday Agreement is in Jim’s mind dead and we were to start again, I don’t think we would end up a million miles away from what we signed on that Good Friday, eight years ago. It might be called something else. Now I am not suggesting that we do so, because I think it would be unnecessary to do so. It is a living Agreement. It can be modified and developed in the light of experience and everybody within the Assembly would have an opportunity to contribute to that process of modification in the reviews that the Agreement makes provision for.
Need to take risks: “But if we don’t take risks and if we simply say it is our set of proposals – as unfortunately I think, certainly in the very beginning of his remarks, Jim seemed to suggest very clearly there is only going to be one set of proposals and he talked as if the DUP represented the whole of Northern Ireland. There are other people living in Northern Ireland as well, with whom Jim has to develop a relationship. Unless the DUP – and what I say about the DUP I apply also to myself, my own colleagues and to other political parties – unless we are going to approach this in a spirit of wanting to create real partnerships within the North, and between North and South as John Hume frequently said and indeed between east and west – and north and south does not preclude east and west as Jim seems to suggest would be the motivation – unless we are prepared to do that… I mightn’t be around when we are celebrating the centenary of the rebellion or whatever, but we may still be going around the same issues and whoever is leading the Meath Peace Group will be organising a similar symposium to tonight and actually ending up just as frustrated as many people feel and I certainly feel quite frustrated tonight.”
Michael Reade: “Is that what you are going to make Julitta do, Jim Wells?”
Jim Wells: “I hope our leader will be around for 2016. I am sure he will! Could I say first of all, just the comments made by the Chairman of the Council. I take it from your comments that I haven’t won you over by my earlier contribution. That having been, said remember this: Ian Paisley has stood at election after election, he has never lost an election since 1966. He has held the highest personal vote ever recorded in any Western European election, in the five European elections which he stood in. At the last election the DUP returned the largest number of seats to Stormont … Whether you like it or not, Ian Paisley …. puts his policies to the people and the unionist people return him with an overwhelming majority. Now I know democracy can throw up results you don’t like, but no-one is going to tell me that that election held last May wasn’t an exercise of democratic rights. He walked it, his party walked it and I have absolutely no doubt: for me, Ian Paisley is a hero, let’s not beat about the bush. The reason I am in the DUP – I was attracted to the policies of Ian Paisley. I am attracted to the personality of Ian Paisley and walking down any street in Northern Ireland, they are coming out to slap him on the back, to shake him by the hand, bring out their children to meet him. He is an extremely popular politician. So don’t think that he is some megalomaniac that is leading people astray. He is loved and cherished and honoured by a huge proportion of the unionist people in Northern Ireland. Now David Trimble put his policies before the people in May and he was thumped electorally, absolutely wiped off the floor by Ian Paisley. So that is the unfortunate thing you have to accept.
“And the thing that Sean has to accept is he keeps bringing out this whole chest of ‘the vast majority of people of Ireland voted for this in 1998’. But the vast majority of people voted for Fine Gael in elections in the early 1980s. What happened five years later? They were totally vanquished by Fianna Fáil. People keep coming back for a fresh mandate. You put a party in. You test them. You see if their policies are effective. Garett Fitzgerald said they weren’t effective, so they voted him out. Here we are eight years later and they are still bringing up the same result. Let’s have another referendum now on the Belfast Agreement and see the result, because people’s opinions have changed. I am not saying the set of proposals I outlined tonight are the only ones. What I am saying to you is, there are lots of options between full blood devolution and direct rule and we are prepared to sit down and explore those. ….
DUP not anti-republican: “And finally let’s nail this lie that we are anti-republican, that we are anti putting republicans into government. For fifteen years we had a party in Northen Ireland called the Irish Independence Party … They were very strong in Londonderry, Omagh and in Fermanagh. We sat with them, we negotiated with them, we shared power with them in councils, we socialised with them, because the Irish Independence Party had exactly the same political philosophy as Sinn Féin but the difference was they didn’t reserve the right to kill people. Our problem with sharing power with republicans is not because of their ideology. It is because Sinn Féin reserves the right to use violence and criminality to obtain their aims and that is absolutely unacceptable. That is the route they have gone that cannot be crossed and I have asked this question several times tonight and no one has answered. If the PDs were up to half of what Sinn Fein are up to, would they be in the coalition? And all you did when I suggested that is you looked at your toes, because you know the answer. You know it would never be acceptable in the Irish Republic to let a bunch of gangsters in to the running of your country!”
Michael Reade: “But Michael McDowell ….”
Jim Wells: “…Michael McDowell has been very clear because he has said that he wouldn’t be in a coalition with Sinn Fein/IRA. Now is there anyone in this room who will defend the right of gangsters to be involved in a coalition of any Western democracy?”
Michael Reade: “ … [Sinn Fein] are politically and philosophically miles apart from the Progressive Democrats….”
Jim Wells: “Well the Greens or Democratic Left or Labour – would any of those parties be accepted if they were involved in gangsterism in a coalition in the Republic? They wouldn’t last a weekend if it came out, if any of them were caught. So therefore, nobody has yet put up their hand to say it is right to have criminals in the government of any Western democracy.”
Q. 10. Cllr. Conor Ferguson (Sinn Fein): “I am sorry to disappoint you there. I have no criminal record. None of my party has any criminal records. My grandfather came from your area in the 1930s, which is supposedly a quiet time…. The other points, policing and things like that. Would the police or the army, who you support, your government supports, would they have been allowed into the police down here? Would they be allowed into the Irish Army to carry on the way they went on, I won’t say for the last 30 years, for hundreds of years? Would they be allowed in?”
Jim Wells: “I see no reason why not….”
Conor Ferguson: “… OK we will go another way. The killers of Pat Finucane. You are saying your party had no militia like Sinn Fein. …. We will have our different opinions on that. Your militia was the B-Specials. Your militia is still going on … the young lad that was killed there maybe three, four years ago, stabbed, and the British Army won’t go and arrest the people they know did it. They won’t go and arrest them, because they are British agents. The people that caused Pat Finucane’s murder, five of them, all British agents. And you are telling me, the best way to have it, the best thing in Ireland is British rule. Is that it?
“Another thing, I can go back to the polls the same way. I can visualise people are going to vote for the DUP, I can visualise it. I can visualise people voting for Sinn Fein and the SDLP, but when they are actually voted in, I expect them to go and sit at a table. I expect them to talk. That is what I put them in for. That is what they are elected to do. Has anyone an argument for that? They are elected to go and talk and speak for the people they represent. What you are saying is anybody who voted for Sinn Fein, is a second class citizen, a second class vote. We are not …..and Francie cannot say, nobody here can say that in another ten, fifteen years, if you keep going the same way that you are going now, that some young fellow is not going to say will I put up with this. I am being treated as a second class citizen … I have a right to want a united Ireland and so has everybody else. I believe a Tyrone man is as much an Irish man as a Kerry man. …. The pictures there behind you, the barbed wire, it reminds me of the Civil Rights …. and the barbed wire your country brought in. It was enforced, your state has been enforcing us. You are a minority within a majority. Now the Good Friday Agreement is not working. ….I didn’t want to see Sinn Fein going into Stormont. I don’t want to be in Stormont. I’d rather that Ireland be led from Dublin, but Sinn Fein went into it. They pushed for the dropping of Articles 2 and 3 and the same again with the decommissioning. There we are again. It was a red herring, because you are going to keep throwing things up the whole time. Your job is to sit down and talk. I mightn’t agree, I don’t agree with a lot of the things people would say to me at the political table. The point is I have to talk to them. But I’d still like to welcome you down to Meath and say thank you for coming South.”
Michael Reade: “I’m going to take a couple of questions and come back to you and then finish up. I am just conscious of the time. It is about a quarter past ten and usually at these meetings, people have long distances to travel back.”
Q.11: “I can endorse the anger that is reflected in Brian Fitzgerald’s comments that we should rightly be angry about this intolerant language that we are hearing, particularly from the two far right sides here. Sean Farren speaks conciliatory language I think in general. But I want to pinpoint maybe a couple of things in terms of intolerant language. Francie is quite happy to dismiss criminal activities or whatever of individuals, that is fair enough. But he is not entitled to say that the IRA’s business, is the IRA’s business. The IRA are very, very closely associated with Sinn Fein and he must at this point say there is no place for an Irish Republican Army. If they decommission their weapons, well that’s it. The IRA should be gone, they should be prepared to say they are gone, there is no need for them now for as long as we can see into the future. Now that is just an example of that kind of intolerant failure to concede that there must be peaceful language and hopeful language for the future.
“In relation to Jim Wells, there is no point in endorsing the doctor. …. I found it quite interesting that Paisley is now getting the pseudonym ‘Doctor No’. And that is the language of never entering into negotiations. I think that the last man conceded that Sinn Fein at least went into the talks. One of the reasons the DUP are disenchanted about the Good Friday Agreement is that they refused to go into the talks and they are now five, six, seven years later saying ‘oh these are discussions, affairs, agreements and we want to renegotiate them’. But I will just give you an example of the kind of language you came out with. You uttered five conditions about Cross-Border Cooperation. This is interesting. The very first one you quoted, you said you’d only enter into those bodies if it is in the interest of Northern Ireland. Now you didn’t see the obvious omission that it should also be in the interests of southern Ireland. …”
Jim Wells: “It’s not our country, it is your country.”
Questioner: “But you talked about it in the context of Cross-Border Cooperation. There must be equal and participative benefits to both people. Otherwise you don’t sit around the table. There are benefits to be gained from both parties sitting down talking to each other. But your language in all the conditions you had, it is all veto type language, that everything has to be accountable back to me. There are other people in your community besides the ‘Doctor No’ kind of philosophy. That is why I think that polarised language has got to be stopped and we should rightfully be intolerant of it. And that is why if I can say anything tonight, I think it is that people should be rightfully angry at that intolerant language. It is very important to get together and start talking, to get out of this continuing mess.”
Michael Reade: “There are a number of points there Francie Molloy, that you might want to pick up on?”
Francie Molloy: “Yes, I think the point is – and the last speaker referred to it as well – Jim talked about sitting down and negotiating … but he won’t sit down with all the parties. He will only sit down with three or four of the parties. He won’t sit down with Sinn Fein in the room and actually negotiate this out. An elected member, whatever party they come from, has a mandate to speak on behalf of the parties. I don’t accept that it is the two extremes, because whether we like it or not and Jim quotes one side of the result on the night of the DUP vote, it’s up to the largest unionist party, Sinn Fein is also the largest nationalist party. That is not the two polarised, that is actually the centre now and what needs to be done is to develop and to negotiate that situation. So we need all the parties sitting around the table and to start to work.
“….It is not an occasional situation of saying I can’t speak for the IRA ….. I tell you I was speaking some time ago on behalf of Sinn Fein and said the wrong thing and got suspended from the party for a while, so I wouldn’t like to start to speak for the IRA on what they did. But secondly I think the IRA have said themselves that the war is over, the weapons have been disposed of and they have advised their members to become involved in the political process. So I think that is as clear a statement that we have ever had on the line of the war over and moving on and getting involved in politics and trying to make politics work.
“And one thing I think you will find in any political party or organisation or anything else that wants to take a particular strategy, it is a long-term strategy. It is not something that you’re in for six months and try it and then simply revert back. And I think that is very clear in this situation and there is one statement I have often been quoted for … on the lines that ‘if everything else fails, we will go back to what we do best’ and of course the statement ends there. …. The next line is we will negotiate ….. because it is about negotiations. It is about everyone starting to develop and to build on the strategy and going into Stormont from Sinn Fein’s point of view was all about working with the other parties, building that trust at local level, developing to deliver to our own communities but also to all the communities because everyone of us representatives for a constituency represent all the different interests within that constituency, not just our own, the people who voted for us. In the same way effectively, TDs would operate like that…
“I came into this whole particular thing through the Civil Rights movement. That was people looking for a passive way of dealing with a situation, looking for very basic rights. Those rights were denied and the State couldn’t deliver those and one thing added to the other, and you got into a situation then of an armed struggle. The Civil Rights campaign had very basic demands of a house and a job and the right to vote, those things were denied because the State was built around gerrymandering.
“So when Jim talks about the majority, he is talking about the majority in the 6 Counties, he is not considering the rest of Ireland as part of the country at all and talking about two countries. It is one country and you can’t deny that situation. If you took any part of England, Scotland or Wales and took a wee section out of it and said: ‘we are the majority here, we are going to hold on to that’ ….
“Now we have even gone further ….. to try and move the situation on we actually did go within the Good Friday Agreement to recognise that there would be no change unless there was a substantive majority of the people in the six counties. So that is a very clear endorsement of the whole situation. But unfortunately as people feared, particularly at the start of this whole process, that unionism would pocket everything, that they would demand, take the good out of it and then demand more. And that is exactly what we were getting tonight again – that everybody else has to jump to the tune of the DUP.
No recognition of movement made: “And there is no recognition of the movement that others have made of any political parties, because they have all moved to some extent to actually try and accommodate and to deal with it. …. I believe if you are looking back on the last twenty years, no one would envisage that we actually would have had the situation that we have today, that the republicans have disarmed. They have moved into recognising the North as regards its own entity and then moving in the situation of sitting in Stormont. And those were all big steps for republicans whatever others may think about it. And big steps have been taken, pain has been gone through, but we find now that there is no change, that the situation is demanding more and more and more.
Stage 2 scenario – an All-Ireland community: “…If you continue to demand more, people just give up and what then are the options? If unionists don’t want to share power within the Assembly with Sinn Fein and with republicans and with nationalists, well then let’s not worry about the Assembly. Let’s move onto stage 2 which is what we want to get into anyway and that’s definitely the “All-Ireland”, because in that way then the two governments can actually put the mechanisms together to implement the Good Friday Agreement, to deliver that, to build a cross-border development with ministerial responsibility north and south and then to start to build and to eradicate the border completely not just in economic terms. And I think maybe we have reached that point. Maybe it is now time to move into the next stage and build those structures of All-Ireland community.
Michael Reade: “…. I am going to take the final question of the evening and then ask for you to respond to the final question ….”
Q. 12. Julitta Clancy: “Thank you chairman, it is not really a question. I suppose like Brian I also feel a bit depressed hearing some of the things tonight…. And we in the Meath Peace Group have only been 13 years at it, you three have been many, many, many years at this and it must seem like ‘groundhog day’ over and over again. And yet there has been some progress. One of the things we got involved in over the last few years is meeting victims’ groups from all sides of the community, who have come down to Meath and have told of their pain in private and in public, even in classrooms. We have to keep bearing them in mind because it has been a pretty intractable problem …..
“So there is a bigger picture here and let us focus on that. Unlike Nuala I was one of the people who voted for the Agreement, because I voted in all sincerity and in all hope, that the commitments that I was reading there would be delivered on over a period of time, not immediately, but over a period of time, that there was the will there. I think a lot of people felt that good will within the Agreement coming out of a period of terrible suffering. But I am very disappointed not only with people in Northern Ireland who might not have delivered as much as I think they should have, I am very disappointed with ourselves down here. Take the rioting in Dublin [25th February]: it has been said that it wasn’t representative of us, that they were a minority, but it was an indication of the lack of work we have done. We made commitments in that Good Friday Agreement to understand and to respect the different identities, the different allegiances. …but we have never delivered on those in this State….. So we are not doing the education work that is needed to build respect and understanding ….
“We had a discussion in one of the schools in Navan recently [MPG transition year schools programme]: a unionist man who was working with a victims’ group representing families of the security forces, discussing with the students, and they got into the whole question of identity in the middle of it all, a huge discussion, and at the end one of the foreign nationals in our classroom asked: ‘what is the point?’ She wondered why people were getting so heated over this issue. And the speaker replied: ‘yet so many have died because of this’. The fact is that this new immigration into this country is asking questions, challenging, and they are showing us up. The peace process has enabled the economy to develop particularly in the south. We need to get our act together. There are issues we should be addressing.
“And I often wonder: in the Good Friday Agreement, did we put the cart before the horse? After the long period of pain and centuries of hatred, were we asking for too much in expecting the parties to get together in a power sharing executive? Should we not have gone a little bit slower in terms of educating our own people on the ground and healing?
“And as for talking to people: one of my grandfathers [Diarmaid Fawsitt] was involved in the old republican movement. He wasn’t active in 1916 as far as I know but he was deported at one time in 1915 for his activities and he went to New York. Recently I came across a box of his papers. I didn’t know till then that he was also in the IRB in 1913 but I did know he was one of the founders of the Irish Volunteers in Cork in 1913. In 1921 he was given a position [with the Ministry of Economics in Dáil Éireann] and in that year he went to Belfast to meet unionists and members of Belfast’s business community, and he left a report which indicated that many he had met were open to some form of political understanding with the rest of Ireland. There is a letter in his report from a member of the Ulster Unionist Council, a prominent businessman, which indicated …. that if the violence could be put away, the threat removed, that there would be a willingness to work with us, a willingness to cooperate.
[Editor’s note: the following is an extract from the letter: ‘We have been long enough in learning the lesson, but if there be any political wisdom left in us, surely we shall learn it now. There is no hope nor help for Ulster in English politics… there is no hope for us in English political alliances…. It seems to me certain that if we are to negotiate, and if our very life is the subject of negotiation, than we should be far safer negotiating with an avowed enemy than with a false friend… I believe Ulster is in a strong position. I believe Sinn Fein is desperately anxious to win her over… It seems to me certain that Ulster would gain her ends much more easily and much more certainly by negotiating with Sinn Fein direct…. Of course the great difficulty in the way of such direct negotiation is the very natural exasperation of Ulster caused by Sinn Fein tactics. The Boycott is a horrible piece of stupidity… the Ulsterman is the last man on God’s earth to be intimidated… What an effect might be caused in Ulster were some friendly advance to be made to her now – were the boycott to be called off and a real and lasting truce to be proclaimed? I verily believe that the one moment of all the centuries has been reached in which north and south might understand each other. …’]
“…Despite the obvious difficulties he met people who were willing to talk with him, knowing his background . … ”
“There have been over thirty years of dreadful pain…… Jim said that Rev. Paisley only used democratic weapons. But he also used a terribly powerful weapon, fear, and in my view he stoked up fear and he stoked up resentment….. Now we were brought up also ignorantly in the south …. So there is a lot of work to be done here and I don’t want to harp on it. I am just appealing to you to just remember the bigger picture: that terrible hurt and pain that is there and remember the willingness that is also there to build a better island to live in peaceful coexistence and to heal the wounds that are there……
“But thanks to all of you very much for all you have done and I wish you well in the coming months very sincerely.”
Michael Reade: “If we could ask for closing statements from Sean Farren first, then Francie Molloy and I will ask Jim Wells to finish.
Sean Farren: “At this late hour, I will try to be very brief. I think one thing that we are very bad at – and maybe this is true among politicians elsewhere – we are very bad at asking ourselves what is it that the other side requires of us in order for them to move forward and to bring their constituency with them. In other words, putting ourselves from time to time in the shoes of the other person. …Or maybe put it this way: what is the least that I and my colleagues have to do to help Jim Wells and his colleagues move their constituency forward and is that least too much for me and too much for my constituents? Does it breach some fundamental principles that I just couldn’t concede or is it something that I can move to accommodate? Because if we don’t appreciate what the others need of us, then we constantly simply move when they have conceded to us what we demand of them.
“I said this to Francie – remember he said we were both speaking at a conference up in Limavady the other day. Jim may not agree with me when I say that my assessment – at the time of the Good Friday Agreement being put together – of what the unionists most needed in order to be able to move, to call on their constituents to endorse the Agreement, was that they knew and knew as clearly as possible, that the war was going to be over. I never heard unionists out championing the need for power-sharing or cross-border institutions as their first priorities. They knew those were the prices they would have to pay in order to get us and Sinn Fein to agree. So in a sense we made, and had always made them, our priorities. But for them the knowledge that the siege was going to be over, was as far as I could read it, the most important demand or requirement. And the fact that decommissioning didn’t happen – to them it was the sign that the war was over, it was the outward sign of inward intent – meant that they were disappointed. I am prepared to concede this illusion.
“If we are going to put the thing together again, we have to have some sense of what the others require, the least that they can give, the least that we can give. We can hopefully be more generous than giving the least. We hope that they can be more generous than giving the least. But unless we are able to identify that and I think that applies when you are making any kind of contract in any aspect of life, you need to know what is absolutely key to delivering the whole package, not key just in terms of what you are demanding, but also what they can give.
Leaving it to the two governments not the best option: “I just don’t accept, I disagreed a lot with what Jim has been saying, but Francie’s last point that we leave it to the two governments. Maybe that is what we will end up with. It holds no attraction for me. It denies me and my constituents a direct say in affairs both within the north and between north and south and as a democrat I just find that unacceptable. I may be obliged to live with it, but it is only living with it because nothing else is on offer. But it is not something I would wholeheartedly embrace, because I don’t see it.
United Ireland: “And this was another point Francie made: maybe he can but I can’t, I don’t see it as laying any other paving stones in the direction of a United Ireland. I just don’t, because they are not certainly going to go along with it, if that is the direction in which they feel it is going to be pushed by either one or other of the governments.
“And so we are left back with the requirement, work out our own salvation together in the north and between the rest of us on this island and if we don’t do that, we make an uneasy peace. But it will be an uneasy peace and if that is our legacy, ok not a very satisfactory one. You might say it is the one that 1921 bequeathed to us for all the years since then, but it had very unhappy outcomes. Let’s hope that if that is what we bequeathed at least the unhappy outcomes won’t be the same as they proved to be in the last thirty years in the north. That is my final word on it.”
Francie Molloy: “Well first of all, I would make the point that was made earlier on … about keeping an eye on the issues: victims, families, all the people who may have lost people in deaths and all this hurt they went through over the last thirty, forty years and even before that, since partition. I had a little gathering the other night with eleven families, all who had lost one or more of their family, and they were telling their story. It wasn’t the politicians or anyone else talking to them. It was them telling their story and the issues that were actually involved. It was … them talking and just trying to get their opportunity to tell us what exactly the last thirty, forty years meant to them in the loss of loved ones. And it was emotional and moving and if we are to repeat that right across the north and even the south, with families in Dublin, bombings in Monaghan, various different locations where people are victims within it and the same story really comes out, because these families lost loved ones. … And the big picture is the very same. We have to make sure that doesn’t happen again and I don’t know what assurances we can give or how you can actually predict the future.
Civil rights: “But the only thing that I would say is that I came into this whole thing looking for basic civil rights …. and defence. The first sign that I saw of the ugly side of it, was whenever I was in Armagh in a civil rights march, when I was met with … pickaxe handles and nails and at the other side … a police charge. That was on peaceful protest. No arms, no weapons, no nothing except people just linked arm to arm and that continued for a number of years, and I believe that Paisley thought that the State couldn’t give those basic rights to people, because they would maybe stay then and they would outvote or maybe get a job, and they would be independent and they would have a house and they would again have the right to vote, because everyone didn’t have the right to vote at that time. So I think it is important to go back to, I think the difficulty is and Sean touched on it…. from whatever side or a political party to actually try and reach out. Because the DUP have been saying ‘no’ for so long that I can understand it is very hard now when you are in the majority to actually turn around to your party and say: ‘well now, we now want you to enact the Agreement and start making this work having said no we are doing nothing. And no to this and no to that and turn that around.’ It is like a juggernaut. It is very hard to turn around at times. That is one of the issues. There is the time also that you have to start and lead and develop the public because the onus is on the two large parties…. all the parties but particularly the responsibility is on the DUP and Sinn Fein and SDLP to try and deliver that. And sometimes I think that the DUP want the image of power, of going into Stormont, being seen to be in control of Stormont, but actually not take any responsibility, to let the British government make the decisions, to let the British government make the decision on water charges, to make a decision on the rates, to make a decision on bread and butter issues so that they can avoid the hard decisions. So responsibility also goes along with the mandate.
“Willie Frazier [‘Love Ulster’ group] talks about it. I can see no reason why these people couldn’t walk down O’Connell Street, I have no problem with it. I started off as I say walking on the streets and demanding that I can walk on a street, so I wouldn’t deny it to anyone. It has to be done in a proper way of course and around the Orange marches, you have to talk to the residents and deal with it and accommodate within it. But I have sat in rooms with Willie Frazier and I have discussed and debated the issues. I have also sat in rooms were he walked out in protest because the cameras were there, because it was Sinn Fein. But I have been invited to meetings and had discussions and we agreed to differ.
“Also as part of our programme [n Dungannon] in 2007, which we talked about earlier on, we have also included in that programme the 12 July in Dungannon as part and parcel of the programme of events for 2007. Sometimes it is hard work, because sometimes I find in councils particularly that you are continuously trying to make it not difficult for others, to try and accommodate and try to find ways of not backing people into a corner and they keep coming out and saying no. For instance, last week in Dungannon …. giving out achievements awards….. I found the DUP wouldn’t accept a prize from me because I was a Sinn Fein mayor of the council. Now either there is acceptance of democracy or there is not acceptance of democracy, because while you can shout about your mandate on one side, you also have to recognise the mandate of the other party as well and that I think is accommodation working. But we shouldn’t make it difficult where people are backed into corners. We should try and accommodate, and I think we can do that, but we also need the safeguards of the structures within the Good Friday Agreement, d’Hondt, and the various mechanisms that are there to safeguard and protect the rights, until we build that trust…. So that’s all I can do, I’ll say reassurance, sit there and don’t reserve any political right of armed struggle. We actually are saying we want to make politics work and letting politics work is working on a democratic mandate and that is the only assurance I can give you.”
Michael Reade: “Can we get an optimistic note to finish, Jim Wells?
Jim Wells: “Unfortunately not, because I have heard comments tonight that frankly I would never have associated with people who attend the Meath Peace Group. Heaven help us if this is moderate Irish nationalism! Some of the comments made vitriolic attacks on my leader, on my party, frankly what I would expect in some darkest part of North Kerry, because if this is the opinion of ordinary middle-ground Irish citizens about the DUP, well then we have got problems. That is the first point.
No balance in Belfast Agreement: “Secondly, we are told that the overwhelming majority of people North and South voted for the Belfast Agreement. I believe that I was absolutely right not to vote for it ……..What happened to relieve the fears and concerns of the unionist community? We lost the RUC, we had Sinn Fein in government, we had cross-border bodies with executive power. We had the removal of all traces of the British system in the court system. We have now the destruction of the Royal Irish Regiment. It went on and on and on. The gravy train of concessions all went the wrong way. There was no balance in the Agreement. There was no attempt to assuage the fears of unionism by at least making sure that the ‘goodies’ were served out evenly. The unionist people who voted for the Agreement felt betrayed and the electorate wreaked a terrible revenge on the people who supported it, i.e. David Trimble and his party. He looks a very forlorn, forgotten figure today.
“So therefore there was none of the reassurance Sean talks about in the Belfast Agreement. Everything has been a one-way gravy train of concessions towards Sinn Fein. Now we talked here about Sinn Fein being denied democratic rights. Remember this is the organisation that murdered 1800 totally innocent people, many of whom were Catholics. They were responsible for Le Mon, for Enniskillen and so many more… So when I refuse to be photographed with Mr. Molloy, and my colleagues in Dungannon refuse to receive awards from them, it is not because we are anti-republican, it is because we are anti-terrorism. And Willie Frazer was not a member of the DUP. Willie Frazer has no connection with the DUP. Many of those accusations were made, were made against people who had absolutely no connection with the DUP! If I or any member of the DUP was to go around intimidating or shooting someone, or blackmailing them, they would be expelled immediately it happened. Quite rightly so. So we have democratic rule for our party. Our weapons are our fax machines, our statements, our press releases. So don’t feel for one moment, that we align ourselves to anything like that.
“And remember even recently we were being reassured that Sinn Fein had decommissioned. I make absolutely no differentiation between Sinn Fein and the Provisional IRA, absolutely none. They are exactly the same people. Although we were told that they had decommissioned, what had they planned? The Northern Bank Robbery, the murder of Robert McCartney and of course all the recent escapades with criminality in South Armagh. We still have not reached the position where they would get a full boxful of Protestants in Northern Ireland, who would believe that Sinn Fein are a democratic and legal party.
“So we have a long way to go, but remember the DUP have come a long way this last thirty years. A few years ago, it would be absolutely unimaginable to have me speaking in this room tonight … absolutely unheard of – a DUP MLA sitting talking with the Meath Peace Group ….. Maybe it was a bad decision to come down in the first place. But I still believe that what was said wasn’t totally representative of this group. There were some fairly extreme comments here tonight against my leader and all we stand for. We have come a long way I think but … the chances of us getting into bed with Sinn Fein and forming an executive are so remote, it is not going to happen.
“So therefore we are going to have to have something which is second best in terms of devolution and therefore we are going to have to sit down and come up with something that is a halfway house. I took part in rolling devolution in 1982. Could I thank the person who said I was a young politician. I have been in the DUP for 31 years, and I sat in the 1982 assembly! … But anyhow, I sat in that Assembly – rolling devolution. It didn’t roll, because Sean Farren who was also a member of that Assembly refused even to come in and talk to his fellow Ulstermen in that Assembly. That is how narrow-minded the SDLP were at that time, so at least they have come on a fair bit since then.
“Now we need to go back to some form of rolling devolution where it moves forward with some momentum and to give Sinn Fein/IRA the time it desperately needs to prove to me and to any other Protestant in the street, that they have changed. That is a long, long way away and there are so many things they have to do. But please – the question I have asked this audience all night and no-one has answered it: is there anyone in this room who believes that if the PDs were up to what Francie Molloy and his party were up to, that they would have a right to be in a coalition government of the Irish Republic? The answer to that has to be emphatically no, so why impose it on us?…
Brian Fitzgerald: “I think there are plenty of other reasons why they shouldn’t be in government.
Jim Wells: “Yes exactly, but that is the fundamental point. We have economic policies as well. But if it is not good enough for the Irish Republic, why is it good enough for the people of Northern Ireland? Nobody can ever square that circle with me. You all look at your toes. Nobody is prepared to answer, because it is an unanswerable question.
Q.13. Jim Nolan (Enniskillen): “Sorry, you are not comparing like with like.
Judith Hamill (Tara): “Yes exactly
Jim Wells: “Why?
Jim Nolan: “Different country, different issues.”
Jim Wells: “…. explain to me why they are not acceptable in the Republic, but must be inflicted on us.”
Q. 14: “So Willie McCrea didn’t share that platform with Billy Wright?
Jim Wells: “Did Willie McCrea murder anybody?
Questioner: “Can you agree that Willie McCrea did share a platform with Billy Wright?
Jim Wells: “Has he ever murdered anybody, has he ever robbed a bank?
Q.15: “Jim did say that… his party would take up arms to defend their constitutional position, no more than the IRA took up the arms with what they thought was their constitutional position…
Jim Wells: “What constitution?….
Questioner: “You said that your party would take up arms to defend what they could perceive was their current constitutional position. So you cannot call the kettle black. You are ready to take up arms yourself. That threat is there. That threat is there in your own words. So that is one of the reasons why people find it difficult to sit down around the table and talk with you.
Jim Wells: “What constitutional position was defended by the burning alive of twelve dog handlers in La Mon in 1978?
Questioner: “That is not acceptable.
Jim Wells: “Totally unacceptable, there can be no justification for burning La Mon and going into a church and murdering three people who were singing Gospel hymns. ….Now the difference is in 1912, the unionist people of Northern Ireland said that if you are going to force us against our will into an all-island Republic, we reserve a constitutional, democratic right; we have to resist that with any means. That is the only time that there is ever any justification where the will of the majority, as democratically expressed is overridden ….That is the only time that that can be justified. But we are not in that position and the DUP has no intention of being involved in anything which is remotely criminal or terrorist related. But the problem is finding half a dozen unionists in Northern Ireland who don’t believe that Francie Molloy and his party are still not up to their necks in criminality and to some degree still involved in terrorism.
Q.16: “When is the Ulster Resistance going to disarm?
Jim Wells: “It happened years ago.”
Questioner: “When did it happen?
Brian Fitzgerald: “… As I said earlier here tonight, it is very frustrating listening to what is going on. There is a huge effort that has been put in by a considerable number of politicians on this island to try to break the cycle of violence which we have all had to become accustomed to. A huge effort was put in by the likes of John Hume and many, many others.
Michael Reade: “I think we will have to call a halt because we are not going to find agreement. We wish you the very best of luck in finding agreement if at all possible. I hope regardless of what you thought about tonight, it was really a true and honest debate and that speakers this evening travelled long distances to be with us and I hope everybody appreciates that. Before we leave, Julitta wants to mention some future events …..
Julitta Clancy: “Thank you. Just to mention that we have a talk on April 10th on the Conflict Trauma Resource Group in Belfast who have done a study on the needs of UDR families. This is an example of the work that we are doing: we are looking at all sides and aspects of the conflict and all the pain that was there. Then on 24th April we have a talk on Easter 1916, the context of that legacy. I feel personally that rather than have jumped into the 1916 theme, this State should have prioritised how to work at building understanding and respect for all the traditions and how we give a more generous definition of Irishness than we have been giving up to now. But thank you very much and thanks to our three speakers and Mike Reade for chairing.” [Editor’s note: a further talk was held on 12 June ‘ Irish Involvement in the Great War’]
ENDS
Meath Peace Group report 2006
Taped by Judith Hamill (audio) and Jim Kealy (video)
Transcribed by Judith Hamill. Edited by Julitta Clancy
©Meath Peace Group
APPENDIX 1: Written speech of Sean Farren
Devolution and North-South Relations: Address to Meath Peace Group, 27 March 2006
“The prospect of some movement towards restoring the institutions of the GFA is now imminent. Before Easter the challenge will be put before all of the parties as to whether or not they want to participate in those institutions. The first step will be convening the Assembly elected in November 2003. We don’t have a very good record when it comes to facing such challenges but the coming opportunity is likely to be the last for some considerable time. Failure to achieve devolution and the restoration of the other institutions will amount to a significant lost opportunity. But it will not be a cost-free lost opportunity. Failure will mark a backwards step which will see key aspects of the Good Friday Agreement put on ice mean. More negatively because of the failure to develop political partnerships even deeper levels of apartheid than already exist are a likely consequence.
For some these may not be unwelcome outcomes. On the one hand there will be no requirement to power-share or develop partnerships with representatives of the other community. Secondly no commitment to participate in policing arrangements will be necessary. Furthermore, with direct rule ministers continuing to take decisions the difficulties of which will not have to addressed by local parties, the latter can continue to play the role of an irresponsible opposition. As long the economy continues to provide virtual full employment the levels of public dissatisfaction with direct rule will probably remain low. Indeed with the considerable injections of public funding promised over the next few years this is highly likely to remain the case. However, efforts to improve relationships between our communities will lack the example of public representatives making decisions together for the mutual benefit of all. Instead of working together we are very likely to continue regarding each other through the prism of our age-long suspicion and enmities.
In the event of failure to grasp the coming opportunity to restore our political institutions, similar comments can be made about North-South developments. In that situation North-South developments will focus almost exclusively on functional outcomes but will lack the transcending aim of promoting reconciliation and closer relationships between the people of Ireland, one of the key objectives of the Good Friday Agreement. The pace of North-South co-operation has undoubtedly intensified over the past decade. Evidence is to be seen in increased volumes of trade, the success of Tourism Ireland in boosting tourist numbers, the development of the Belfast-Dublin road and rail networks, the increasing number of cross-border hospital contracts for service provision, movement towards a single energy market for the whole island and plans to create an integrated North-South gas supply. Even cross-border roaming charges have figured as an important issue with Ireland leading the way for the rest of the EU on this matter.
These initiatives – and many others – highlight the ‘normalisation’ of practical co-operation with mutually beneficial outcomes. Indeed, the success of North-South co-operation in recent years is such that there is no longer a question over its capacity to deliver economic and social benefits on both sides of the border. But like the challenges facing us in terms of relationships between our communities, the scale of North-South co-operation is seriously constrained by the absence of the Assembly and of the North-South Council.
Moreover, this part of the Agreement has been disproportionately affected by suspension. Executive business is conducted by Direct Rule Ministers. British-Irish Council business continues. The SDLP is determined to ensure that that the potential of the North-South agenda is realised and that co-operation does not become a hostage to political stalemate. We want to see North-South co-operation raised to a new level of development – and we want as much of it as possible achieved under the auspices of restored political institutions. Beyond the political and practical case for broad-based North-South co-operation, there is growing acknowledgement of its importance in building trust and good relations between our communities within the North and across the island. As Co-operation Ireland has stated – “The promotion of effective North-South co-operation is an integral part of building peace on the island of Ireland.”
To maximise the benefits of North-South co-operation a step- change towards a much more integrated planning and delivery of projects is required. Nowhere is this more needed than in infrastructural development where between 90 and 100 billion euros are to be spent on the island’s infrastructure. We believe that unprecedented opportunities exist for not only the joint planning of projects but and for their joint delivery as well. We can do more together to get more together in terms of both more strategic outcomes and procurement and delivery gains. Obstacles of many kinds continue to impede North-South co-operation and partnerships, some minor, others of a substantial kind. These range from double charging and unnecessary delays in effecting financial transactions, to roaming charges and taxation anomalies arising from residence in one jurisdiction and work in the other. These need to be tackled with a real commitment to resolving the problems caused and removing barriers to mobility in people, goods and services throughout Ireland. The SDLP’s detailed proposals include plans for a new Transport and Infrastructure body, an all-Ireland Research Alliance, Marketing and Investment Co-operation, a Public Safety body and a joined-up anti-poverty strategy. In addition there are many other recommendations covering issues in health, education, the environment, agriculture, energy, etc. where enhanced forms of co-operation would yield enormous benefits. When it comes to such proposals, the real question has to be ‘why not?’ more than ‘why?’ But North-South can answer both questions and should no longer have to work so hard to justify itself or get a political start.
Because North South makes sense – and the arguments against it lack substance. It can deliver benefits to all of us: as consumers, as public service users, as workers, as entrepreneurs and investors, as service providers and as taxpayers. Not just along the eastern corridor between Dublin and Belfast, but for people living West of the Bann and West of the Shannon as well – where real investment is most needed. We can – and should – have a shared economy, shared spatial planning, shared approaches to community and social services, shared cultural experiences, shared health and educational services, etc. – all shared in a spirit of mutual respect and a common commitment to upholding human and civil rights in the manner set out in the Good Friday Agreement. It is critical that in meeting the challenge of the coming week we reflect seriously on the opportunities which are on offer for the people we represent and on the consequences if we fail to meet that challenge in the most positive ways possible. “
ENDS
APPENDIX 2: Extracts from MPG Public Talk No. 55, “Where do we go from here?
7th March 2005, St. Columban’s College, Dalgan Park, Navan
Professor Paul Bew (Dept. of Irish Politics, Q.U.B.): “We are in a new place. .. It may possibly be that the credibility of this process has taken a tremendous hit among ordinary people to the point that it actually becomes difficult to maintain. Even before all this happened, the NI Life and Times Survey showed that two thirds of Protestants and 50% of Catholics didn’t care if Stormont never came back”. And within the Irish Republic there is a crucial issue which is the survival of Irish democracy “because it is quite clear that the scale of what was going on was greater than the Irish Government believed last Autumn.” The institutions of the Agreement have only worked 19 months since 1998, he said. There were long delays on decommissioning and the present suspension was caused by the “extra-curricular activities of republicans”. Very few people now believe that the institutions would be restored this year but “there are people in the DUP who want to do this deal” and the republican movement has the incentive to come up with another form of words and to make some moves on the policing issue and IRA links. New ideas may have to be explored, said Professor Bew: “It doesn’t mean a deal without Sinn Féin in the governance of Northern Ireland. It means a new British-Irish Agreement. And there are certain things you could catch: the acceptance of the principle of consent, the fact that within unionism ‘north-southery’ is no longer as neuralgic in the way it once was, and that is one of the long-term achievements. That whole fear of the south within unionism has been drained, and therefore the possibility of putting together a package of North-South cooperation which was actually sustainable on a cross-community basis is there.”
Sean Farren, MLA: Former SDLP Minister, Sean Farren, agreed that there was widespread disillusionment which was shared to a considerable extent on both sides. “We may well as politicians be faced with a sense of “a plague on both your houses”, you had the opportunity, you didn’t take it.” The NI electorate could be called a cosetted electorate “when you think of the number of Assembly Members (108), the number of MPs (18), the number of local councillors (560) and 3 MEPs. All for a population of 1.7 million! Maybe we do have to be forced to take more responsibility for ourselves. I think the pressures on ourselves to resolve our problems have not been such that they have impelled us with a greater sense of urgency towards addressing those problems’. …He reminded the audience of unionist expectations from the Agreement. “At the top of their list would have been deliverance from a 30-year war, that, despite the rhetoric of it being directed against the occupying forces, was borne in much of its viciousness by the unionist/Protestant community.” The Agreement failed to build confidence in that particular aspect. “Commitments were made which were not delivered on. Some steps were taken. But they were always under pressure.” There was the Robert McCartney killing, and ‘on top of that the whole money-laundering, and the scale of criminality that is now beginning to unfold. This is not new. Underneath that there is a degree and a scale of criminality which is represented in diesel laundering, cigarette smuggling and so on. …So I believe that where we are at now is a watershed, a watershed that doesn’t require us to return and rewrite the Good Friday Agreement, but a watershed that is going to require a very firm stand on the part of the Irish Government. ….the scale and extent of what is now being revealed makes that, I believe, impossible for the Irish Government in a country the size of Ireland, to have a mafia-type organisation operating. And the big challenge that that poses to Sinn Fein in its association with that organisation is how to separate itself, can it separate itself?
The biggest problem is the whole future of policing arrangements. ”The new arrangement has worked remarkably well, given the circumstances … it is working remarkably well, it is transforming. And the number of southerners who are coming up to join the PSNI is quite significant.” However, a lot depends on the May election, “not least whether or not we can move into something that would revive, renew and maybe give us the prospect and the hope that some of the expectations that I referred to earlier can come back to motivate us in politics.”
Jim Wells, MLA: DUP environment spokesman, Jim Wells, MLA, said that in May 1998, “the vast majority of Ulster Unionists were prepared to make enormous concessions and to give up a tremendous degree of ground in order to stop their community being tortured by the Provisional IRA. It is difficult to comprehend the hurt and grief that has caused to the Protestant community and the extent to which they were prepared to go in order to take that terror out of the community.” However, he believed that all the DUP predictions about Sinn Féin/IRA intentions in May 1998 have proved to be right. “There’s one fundamental iceberg that you cannot get around. Is it right that any political party affiliated to terrorism and gangsterism should have a say or a place in any democratic society? I believe that no western democracy would tolerate it, and indeed your own Taoiseach said that there was no place for Sinn Féin in the government of the Irish Republic because they have a private army. “Should we allow the entire political process in Northern Ireland to grind to a halt because one party cannot divorce itself from criminal elements? We believe it shouldn’t.” There are other options, he said, including a voluntary coalition with the UUP, the SDLP and the Alliance Party with Sinn Fein in opposition. That would represent 75% of the people of Northern Ireland, a much higher proportion than the present coalition in the Irish Republic.” Such a coalition would, he believed, bring stability to Northern Ireland, and it would remove the veto “which Sinn Fein/IRA effectively has over all progress. If we’re going to have to wait until Sinn Fein/IRA decide to redeem themselves and go down the route of normal democratic politics, we could wait for decades. And indeed the really frightening scenario is that despite all the bank robberies and criminality and terrorism that Sinn Fein were covertly involved in these last seven years, their vote actually remains the same or increases.”
The DUP would in certain circumstances go into government with Sinn Fein but Sinn Fein would be ‘a totally different anima’: “Sinn Fein would have had to completely divest itself of any shred of weaponry… …the whole army council structure, the whole cell structure, would have to be completely dismantled. There’d have to be a complete resolution to the Disappeared and to those who have been sent out to other parts of the world, who have been excluded from the island of Ireland under the threat of death. There would have to be major major changes. And then there would have to something like a sanitation period to prove that they’ve actually done all that, and there would have to be a mechanism where if it were proved that they hadn’t , then we could revert to some form of control of our affairs which excluded them… we have an absolute ultimate bottom line. As long as Adams and McGuinness are armed to the teeth and involved with criminality we are not going into an executive with them. Absolutely never! And I don’t think any democrat can say anything different.”
ENDS
APPENDIX 3: Biographical notes on speakers
Sean Farren, MLA (SDLP) was elected to the new NI Assembly for North Antrim in 1998 and re-elected in 2003. He was Minister for Higher and Further Education in the Executive from November 1999 until December 2001 and from December 2001 to October 2002 he served as Minister for Finance. His previous career in politics included membership of the Assembly for N. Antrim (1982-86), and SDLP chairman (1981 to 1986). He was a member of the New Ireland Forum in 1983-84 and was a negotiator in the Brooke-Mayhew talks from 1991 to 1992. Elected to the NI Forum in 1996, he was an SDLP talks delegate in the multi-party talks 1996-98 which concluded in the Belfast Agreement.
Francie Molloy, MLA (Sinn Féin), Mayor of Dungannon, was elected to the new NI Assembly representing Mid Ulster in 1998 and was re-elected in 2003. He chaired the Finance and Personnel Committee in the Assembly and was also a member of the Agriculture and Rural Development Committee. He has been active in his area’s political and community life since his teens and was one of the first people in his area to join the Civil Rights Movement. During the 1981 Hunger Strike, he was Director of Elections for Bobby Sands and Owen Carron. He was elected to Dungannon Council in 1985, was mayor of Dungannon in 2001 and was recently re-elected to the Ard Chomairle of Sinn Féin. Francie is chair of the Sinn Féin Equality Commission and party spokesperson on Finance.
Jim Wells, MLA (DUP) was elected to the new NI Assembly in 1998 representing South Down, and was re-elected in 2003. He is the DUP group secretary at Stormont and the party’s spokesperson on the Environment. He served on the Assembly’s Enterprise,Trade and Investment Committee and is the DUP representative on the Assembly Commission – the body which manages the Stormont building and its staff. He is known in Stormont circles as the “green wing” of the DUP. He has a long record in local government, having served on 3 separate councils since 1981: Lisburn, Banbridge and Down, and is currently a member of Down District Council. Jim was the first elected member of the DUP to speak at a public gathering in the Republic. The occasion was the Glenties Summer School in 1988.
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APPENDIX 4: MEATH PEACE GROUP: ACTIVITIES 2005-06 (September 2006)
(short summary of our work over the last 2 years)
A. Public talks 2005-2006 (continuing the series commenced in 1993)
54. Feb. 25, 2005 “The Good Friday Agreement: the Future”. Dermot Ahern, T.D., Minister for Foreign Affairs, Dominic Bradley, MLA (SDLP) and John O’Dowd, MLA (Sinn Fein). Chaired by Michael Reade (LMFM)
55. March 7, 2005 “Where do we go from here?” Paul Bew, Professor of Irish Politics, QUB, Sean Farren, MLA (SDLP) and Jim Wells, MLA (DUP). Chaired by Michael Reade (LMFM)
56. May 9th, 2005 “Bombings and their aftermath – Birmingham and other experiences”. Michael Nangle, Lord Mayor of Birmingham, Jacinta de Paor, L.I.V.E. Coordinator, Glencree Centre, Gareth Porter, H.U.R.T. Group, Lurgan, Co. Armagh. Chaired by Michael Reade (LMFM)
57. June 20th, 2005 “Paramilitarism, Criminality and the Good Friday Agreement”
Michael McDowell, TD, Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform
Chaired by Michael Reade (LMFM)
58. Nov. 14th, 2005 “Who Can we Trust?” West Tyrone Voice Victims’ Group. Dr Hazlett Lynch, Billy Harpur, Gamble Moore, Raymond Finlay. Chaired by Roy Garland
59. March 27th, 2006 “Devolution and Cross-border Cooperation: prospects and realities”. Sean Farren, MLA (SDLP), Francie Molloy, MLA (Sinn Féin), Jim Wells, MLA (DUP). Chaired by Michael Reade (LMFM)
60. April 10th, 2006 “The Legacy of War” – experiences of UDR families
Martin Snoddon (Director, Conflict Trauma Resource Centre, Belfast) and Rosemary McCullough and Teena Patrick (former ‘Green Finches’). Chaired by Roy Garland
61. April 24th, 2006 “Easter 1916 – the Irish Rebellion” Dr. Charles Townshend (Prof. of Modern History, Keele University, author of “Easter 1916 – the Irish Rebellion”) Chaired by Brendan O’Brien (author of The Long War)
62. June 12, 2006 ‘Irish Involvement in the Great War, 1914-1918’. Professor Paul Bew (Q.U.B.) and Tom Burke, MBE (Chair, Royal Dublin Fusiliers Association). Chaired by Cathal MacCoille (RTE). Held in Ardboyne Hotel, Navan
B. School (Transition Years) Programme (conducted by Judith Hamill and Julitta Clancy)
1. St Joseph’s (Mercy) Secondary School, Navan and
2) Colaiste Phobail Rathcairn (2005-06)
Programme conducted in Spring 2005 (St Joseph’s ) and Autumn 2005 and Spring 2006 (both schools):
Workshops and discussions on Identity, Prejudice, History of the conflict, Victims, Violence, Sectarianism, Non-Violent action for justice, Healing and Reconciliation, Prisoners and prison conditions, Fair Trade, World Trade, Immigration, Parades, Interface communities. The students at St Joseph’s also organised a Fair Trade seminar and exhibition (May 2005) which was attended by parents, teachers, members of the Navan business community and local political representatives. Guest speakers in 2005-06 included: Sean Ó Baoill (Mediation Northern Ireland), Conor Maskey (Intercomm, N. Belfast), Anne Carr (Community Dialogue, Belfast), Michael Murray (An Tobar, Ardbraccan), Michael Nangle (Lord Mayor of Birmingham), Gareth Porter (H.U.R.T. victims support group, Lurgan), Grainne Prior (Irish Commission for Prisoners Overseas), Pat Magee (republican ex-prisoner), Martin Snoddon (Conflict Trauma Resource Centre), Meath Probation Service, Garda Siochana (Navan), Joy Eniola (Oxfam), Michael O’Sullivan (Dalgan Park), Chris O’Halloran (Belfast Interface Project) and the Samaritans (Drogheda).
Study visits to: Ulster Museum, Belfast (Conflict exhibition), Intercomm and New Lodge area, Belfast, Collins Barracks Museum (study of contested spaces, talk by Geraldine White), Mountjoy Prison (male and female prisons, talk and tour conducted by prison officers), Maze Prison (tour of compounds and H-Blocks) and Conflict Trauma Resource Centre, Belfast (Martin Snoddon)
3) Dunshaughlin Community College (May 2006) – visit to Northern Ireland Assembly, Stormont. Tour of Assemby buildings, talk by educational officer and meeting with Patricia Lewsley, MLA (Chair of SDLP). Afternoon: visit to Intercomm Group, Belfast (talk and tour of New Lodge Interface area by Conor Maskey of Intercomm group)
C. Heritage Study and Networking:
Recognising the key role that heritage can play in the work of reconciliation and building understanding, the Meath Peace Group organised and facilitated several heritage days for Northern groups, visiting sites in Meath and Louth. Groups who took part included victims’ groups (such as the H.U.R.T. group, Lurgan) and community groups (e.g. COSTA South Tyrone groups). In addition, members of the Meath Peace Group participated in the monthly dialogue meetings and other events organised throughout the year by the Louth-based cross-border and cross-community group, the Guild of Uriel (founded 1995) including weekend visit to Enniskillen and Rossnowlagh, and also took part in meetings of the Healing through Remembrance project (Belfast) and events organised by many other groups.
Update compiled by Julitta Clancy (September 2006)
Meath Peace Group Talks
No. 57- “Paramilitarism, Criminality and the Good Friday Agreement”
Monday, 20th June 2005
Ardboyne Hotel, Navan, Co. Meath
Speaker:
Michael McDowell, TD (Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform)
Chaired by
Michael Reade (Presenter, ‘Loosetalk’, LMFM radio)
Contents:
Welcome and introductions: Julitta Clancy and Michael Reade
Michael McDowell, TD
Questions and answers
Topics of questions:
1. Murder of Cllr. Eddie Fullerton
2. Immigration/asylum law
3. Federal/confederal state
4. Search for the Disappeared
5. Criminality allegations and due process
Condemnation of republicans
6. Ardoyne disturbances
Have Sinn Féin lost control?
7. Westminster election results
Amnesty for on-the-runs (OTRs)
8. Will extremists be brought into democracy?
9. Bobby Sands
10. Rights and responsibilities
11. Fear and polarisation
Reclaiming republicanism
Reconciliation
12. Reclaiming the spirit of the GFA
Interface tensions
Appendix A: Biographical notes
Appendix B: Meath Peace Group news
[Editor’s note: over 110 people attended this public talk including representatives of groups such as: West Tyrone Voice and the H.U.R.T. Group (Lurgan) – victims’ support groups based in Northern Ireland, the Guild of Uriel (Louth), Drogheda Cross-Border Focus, Reform group (Dublin), Cavan Family Resource Centre, the British Embassy in Dublin, the Ingrid Betancourt Appeal Committee. Political parties represented included the SDLP, Progressive Democrats and Sinn Féin. Representatives of various media (North and South) were also present and excerpts from the discussion were broadcast on LMFM radio every morning for over a week following the event. Parts of the discussion and exchange, particularly between the Minister and Sinn Féin representatives were also quoted in the NI press].
WELCOME AND INTRODUCTION
Julitta Clancy (on behalf of the Meath Peace Group) “Good evening ladies and gentlemen and thank you very much for coming on this summer evening. Unusually for us, we have gone into the end of June and we are not in our usual abode, in Dalgan Park. We would like to particularly welcome here tonight, the British Ambassador, Mr Stewart Eldon, and Mr Patrick Reilly from the British Embassy, and a special welcome to those of you who have come very long distances …
We also welcome the media present: LMFM (local radio), the Meath Chronicle, BBC Northern Ireland and RTE, and we would like to especially thank the Minister for Justice, Michael McDowell, for coming to Meath in the middle of a very very busy time for him, to fulfil a promise and come to talk to us. We very much value that. He came here three years ago [Public talk no. 45, 30 September 2002] just before the Stormont Assembly collapsed, and we are looking forward to hearing him again tonight. I hand over now to our guest chair, Michael Reade, of LMFM radio.”
Chair: Michael Reade (Presenter of ‘Loosetalk’ on LMFM radio): “I am not going to take up much of your time but I do want to congratulate Julitta and the group on this and all of the talks that have taken place. They really are most interesting and worthwhile and I’m sure tonight will be exactly the same… The Minister will speak for about a half an hour and there will be a question and answer session immediately after the Minister’s opening address. I’m going to ask you to think about what you would like to ask the Minister. I know a lot of people are here for a purpose and we are going to be as strict as possible with you in that we are going to ask for one question per person at a time. The reason for that is obviously to give everybody a chance to speak. So without standing on ceremony I would like to ask Minister Mc Dowell to begin…”
Opening Address of Michael McDowell, TD, Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform
“Thank you very much. Mr. Convenor, distinguished guests and friends, it is three years since I was invited to speak to the Meath Peace group in Dalgan Park and a number of things have happened since then, a number of things have changed profoundly since then and a number of things haven’t changed at all. And therefore when Julitta wrote to me and asked me would I come here this evening, I did the usual thing and said: ‘you have given me a long period of notice before this meeting and things may have changed’.
Situation in 2002: “So once more I venture onto the stage here before you in circumstances where there is great uncertainty. Can I just remind you – if you weren’t here when I was at Dalgan Park – of what the situation was then? Paul Bew and myself were speaking to a meeting in Dalgan Park and the issue of that time was what the prospects were for the political process in Northern Ireland – whether there should be election or should not be elections. What Paul Bew’s prognosis was for the political parties in Northern Ireland, he at that stage was very pessimistic about the future for the SDLP and effectively considered they would be the major casualties of an early election, and he was at the same time defending the position of David Trimble and outlining the difficulties that he had come across.
Unfinished business: “Things have changed, obviously, and I’m not going to attempt a synopsis of recent electoral outcomes in Northern Ireland. But what the last year has demonstrated beyond any doubt is that the fundamental issues which have bedevilled the Good Friday Agreement and it’s implementation remain unfinished business and that until they are addressed in their entirety and comprehensively, we are not going to have further political progress in the restoration of the democratic institutions in Northern Ireland, in particular the Assembly and the Executive.
Republican philosophy – reconciliation of Orange and Green: “I come before you this evening, as I came before you then, as an Irish republican. By that I mean that I believe in the establishment of a republican society on this island, that I believe in the unity of the Irish people, that I believe it should be brought about – and that I believe that it can only be brought about – on the basis of the very implication of the tricolour, which is that there has to be a reconciliation between Orange and Green and the society that merges in Ireland must be one with which both traditions are at home and are reconciled, one with the other, in developing a society which is both pluralist, tolerant and inclusive – one based on equal respect for all and based on a mutual respect for each others traditions.
Anti-republican political ideology: “My claim to be an Irish republican is I think sometimes challenged by those who use the term to describe their own form of politics. They believe that republicanism involves use of violence, use of force. They believe that it involves bringing an armed conflict to the heart of Northern Ireland and dealing with the unresolved business in Northern Ireland by the use of force and that form of political ideology is in my view anti-republican and the people who espoused violence in those circumstances are in my view not entitled to use the term republican.
Polarisation politics a betrayal of republicanism: “And I’m also strongly of the view that they are people who have set back the cause of reconciliation between Orange and Green and have betrayed the fundamental vocation and challenge of the Irish tricolour. They have damaged and seriously undermined the inclusive and progressive republicanism of Wolfe Tone and of Thomas Davis and of so many other people who served in their own way the cause of the establishment of an Irish Republic. I make no apology for being critical of the Provisional movement because I believe in my heart the only way in which this island can be united, and the only way in which the people of Northern Ireland can achieve a fair and reasonable way of life for them and their children, is the reconciliation of Orange and Green. And I believe that politics which is based on polarising Northern society, rather than reconciling it is retrogressive and, as I say, a betrayal of genuine republicanism.
Personal and family background: “Can I just put on the record my own background? I am 54 years of age, I am a barrister, I was brought up in Dublin. My forebears came in the main from Northern Ireland. The MacNeills came from Glenarm in County Antrim. Eoghan MacNeill was the youngest son, the one for whom there was not much money left to spend on his education. His elder brothers were sent to Belvedere in Dublin and he was sent to St Malachy’s in Belfast. They got good jobs and he had to take a job as a clerk in the Four Courts in Dublin. Of his £2 a week he spent 10 shillings receiving Irish grinds because of his interest in Irish nationalism and the Gaelic movement. That was in the 1870s, 1880s. He was a co-founder of the Gaelic League. He was a man who was passionate about two things: the separate identity of the Irish people and their culture. He married a woman called Agnes Moore, and some of you may know that the Moore family is another Belfast family who descended from Presbyterians but they became Catholics in the mid-19th century. Brian Moore, the author, was my mother’s first cousin and his grandfather was somebody who regularly had his house stoned in Ballymena at Orange demonstrations in the 1850s and ‘60s.
“On my paternal side, they were from Belfast as well, Whiterock in County Antrim, McDowells. He was an editor of the predecessor of the Irish News in Belfast. He was a Parnellite, he came to Dublin and became editor of the Freeman’s Journal. So that was his kind of politics, they were more Redmondite than Republican or separatist in the MacNeill sense. Eoghan MacNeill’s eldest son Niall was an officer in the Free State Army as was his third son Turlough, but their middle son, Brian, was killed on the top of Ben Bulben fighting for the Republican side in the Civil War in what would now be generally described as a ‘shoot-to-kill’ policy or incident. He was one of Sligo’s ‘noble six’ and I have on my office wall in Stephen’s Green the funeral flag which lay on his coffin, a tricolour with a large black sash sewn onto it.
“And on my wife’s side, my wife’s grandfather was a Fianna Fail TD and before that he was a Republican hunger striker during the Civil War in Mountjoy Prison and yesterday, on the occasion of my wife’s mother’s death, one of her relatives was showing to me a letter which he had written on hunger strike in Mountjoy, on the Republican side, to his parents.
United Ireland: “I say all of those things simply to say this: I have a real appreciation of history like most people in this room. I do not come from a point of view which is hostile to republicanism, I classify myself as a republican and I believe in the unity of Ireland and I believe that Irish people, Protestant and Catholic, nationalist and unionist, will eventually be reconciled in a single society in Ireland. I want to say on top of that that I believe it makes good sense that that should be so, that the interests of the present majority in Northern Ireland coincide much more with the interests of the rest of us on this island, and that their economic future would be far better developed and progressed through a closer relationship with the rest of us, and that their interests in the last analysis are interests which coincide with ours.
Inclusive view of Irishness: “And I make one last point in relation to the general philosophical points that I want to make, and that is that it is much much easier to portray yourself as an Irish patriot by struggle and violence sometimes, than by doing the much more difficult thing and that is setting out to reconcile Orange and Green on this island, as Tone and Davis had as their ambition to do. And it is much more difficult and more challenging to advance a view of Irishness which is inclusive and which is open to all of the people on this island, which recognises the complexity of Irish history and which recognises that there is validity and respect due to both major traditions on this island. That the Protestants who fought at the Boyne were not simply people trying to tyrannise Catholics.
“They were people who in their own minds were honourably fighting for what they thought was civil and political liberty against absolutism. And that the Protestant tradition in Ireland, whereas it has been traditionally portrayed – and with a good deal of truth – as being closely linked to the notion of English Ascendancy, is at the same time a tradition which is a rich part of our heritage. Yeats, Synge, all our architects, Swift, all our great institutions, that these are part of the heritage which we as republicans should value rather than despise. And that the complexity of Ireland, whether it is from soccer playing, rugby playing and Gaelic playing, is something to be revelled in rather than to be regarded as evidence of a mutation from some pure national strain of Gaelic nationalism.
Polarised politics easier than politics of reconciliation: “What I want to emphasise is my driving spirit and my vocation as an Irish republican in the opening years of the 21st century: that the task which is now before us, which is the process of reconciliation which justifies and requires and demands implementation of the Good Friday Agreement, is a very challenging task. It is not something that is simple, it is not something for the namby-pambies, building centre ground in Northern Ireland is not something for the soft-hearted or the soft-headed. It is the most difficult task to create bridges between the two communities in Northern Ireland. It is far more difficult to do that than to go out in front of a microphone and give out about which side was right or wrong when violence breaks out at a parade of this kind or that. It is far more difficult to talk about those values of reconciliation than it is to talk about community grievance one way or the other. And it is far easier to engage in polarised politics, be it the politics of the DUP or the politics of the Provisionals, than it is to engage in the politics of reconciliation. And that the politicians who pose now as Mandela are frequently closer to Mugabe.
Recreating history verging on fascism: “That those who stand up now and advance the views that they are part of history and making history, are in fact in many cases shredding history and trying to recreate history in their own mould. And I want to say in particular, and this I want to say particularly about the Provisional movement, that the notion that we can recreate history, and we can incorporate all that they have done, as part of a central expression of Irish nationalism and the essence of Irishness, is a very dangerous one and it is one that does verge on the edge of fascism – this notion that you can recreate history now to your own likeness and pretend that things have been moving inexorably towards where you want them to go and in fact they have been quite different.
Monuments and commemorations: “And all across Ireland now there are many monuments erected and many demonstrations held, particularly by Provisionals, around the country in the memory of volunteers, as they put it, who have died in the course of their campaign. But there aren’t memorials, and there are no parades, to the Protestant workers who were taken off the bus at Kingsmill and machine-gunned. And there aren’t memorials, and there aren’t parades, to all the people who were shot down in cold blood. There’s no memorial anywhere to the proxy bomber who was strapped into a truck and blown into pieces together with a checkpoint. There’s no annual commemoration of Jean McConville, there’s no annual commemoration of the Disappeared, there’s no annual commemoration of the many hundreds and thousands of victims of violence. We are in danger, in other words, we are in danger of creating a new history of this island which is false and which seeks to elevate one set of people to the status of heroes while abasing everybody else to the level of people who just did not understand or were obstructive. And that’s wrong in principle and it’s something which I think we should stand up against.
1905 Sinn Féin party not the same as Provisionals: “I’ll give you a very simple example. This year it has been claimed by the Provisional movement that we are in the 100th anniversary of the foundation of their party by Arthur Griffith in 1905. Nothing could be further from the truth! In fact, it is curious that in 1948 that very issue was brought to the Irish High Court. I have here, and I will leave it with Julitta, a decision of the Irish High Court [Buckley and Ors. v. Attorney General 84 I.L.T.R. 9] as to whether the party which, through several splintering processes, ended up in the Provisional movement today, was in fact the movement founded by Arthur Griffith. And the High Court judge who heard the case delivered a very powerful judgment examining the whole history of the party and came to the conclusion that it was not the same party and could not claim to be the same party that was founded in 1905. So we do live in an era where appearances are hugely important, where spin is everything, where PR is hugely important, but we have to remember that our history is slightly more complicated than all of that. And those of us, as I say, who are Irish republicans, should not either yield the tricolour, or the term ‘republican’ to those who have abased those terms and betrayed them, in my view.
Provisional criminality: “I want to talk about another difference that came to light in the last year. Some of you may recall that approximately 15-18 months ago I had to use on the radio a somewhat uncomfortable phrase, I have to say, because it smacks slightly of arrogance – ‘I know what I know’. And the context in which I had to use that was when I was asked to stand up my proposition that the Provisional movement was engaging in major criminality in the Irish State. And I can tell you now what I was talking about then. In Dublin there had been a Dublin brigade of the IRA active, fund-raising for the Provisional movement throughout the ceasefire period, and a number of its senior members were suspected by the Northern command of the Provisional movement of actually hanging on to some of the money. And they were brought north of the border, to South Armagh, and there shot in the legs, and the Dublin Brigade was stood down as a fund-raising unit. And many people thought that this was part of a graduation away from criminality, but the truth was slightly different, the truth was that the adjutant of the IRA in Belfast began to organise major robberies in the South, directly using proxies in the South. As a result, a series of major high value goods robberies took place in the Dublin area which were eventually detected by the gardaí and the involvement of the senior Provisional command in Belfast in their organisation was laid bare. That’s what I was talking about at that time.
“Time passed and in Northern Ireland a series of major robberies – the Makkro robbery, the Gallagher robbery, the robbery in Strabane among others of a similar kind – took place. We are now talking about the period running up to the summer of 2004. At the same time we were being told that the Provisional movement was asking Dublin and London, in accordance with the Joint Declaration, to advance the Good Friday Agreement.
Acts of completion negotiations, autumn 2004: “And so it was that in the autumn of 2004 the two governments put together a package which was designed to bring about acts of completion of the Good Friday Agreement process, to enable the restoration of all the democratic institutions in Northern Ireland and the full implementation of the Agreement. Unfortunately at that time, and at the time of the Leeds Castle discussions, the Provisional movement systematically rejected efforts by both governments, and particularly the interlocutors in the Dublin government, to formulate words which the IRA would agree to issue and publish which would indicate a complete and total end to violence and criminality of all kinds. Eventually the negotiations produced a formula that henceforth the IRA would respect the rights and safety of all persons. And when the red line went through that particular phrase it became clear to a number of us in government that we had a serious problem with the Provisional movement, that it was intent on keeping ‘elbow room’ to endanger the rights and safety of other persons, to engage in other words in criminality and the threat of violence.
Northern Bank robbery: “We did not know at that time that the Northern Bank robbery was being planned by the Provisional IRA, but what we did know was that An Garda Siochana were keeping under surveillance at that time the development of a channel of money laundering, which development they did not understand themselves at that time but found in January and February of 2005, this year, was the means whereby a significant portion of the Northern Bank money would be attempted to be laundered within this State. And again, senior Provisional figures were involved in that.
“So when it came, first of all, to the attribution of responsibility to the Provisionals for the Northern Bank robbery, and, secondly, when proof positive of the involvement of the Provisionals in the laundering of the money came some time later with the magnificent Garda operation in Cork, Dublin and other places in Ireland, it became abundantly clear and it is now beyond contradiction that the Provisional movement had been looking for that elbow room with a view to being able to continue fund-raising in that way.
Fund-raising: “And those funds, my friends – 26 million of which the Irish State has recovered or accounted for in burnings roughly about 5 million euro – those funds were being raised for the purpose of financing the Provisional movement’s next phase which was the political phase. And we have no doubt that it is their intention to get rid of their heavy armoury of weapons, hundreds and thousands of Kalashnikovs are of no use to them, neither are tons of Semtex, but what is of use to them is the resources which violence and criminality produce to fund their political campaigns North and South. As free democrats in a free society we in this State believe that that is a mortal threat to Irish democracy and we will stand up to those people who engage in it. We will not engage with politenesses or excusatory language, we will not engage in fictions that the Provisional movement were not involved in these matters, and we will not ignore the reason for which they were raising that money which is to progress what they call their revolutionary struggle for the creation of a socialist republic on this island.
Robert McCartney killing [January 2005]: “Now, I want to say in relation to the McCartney killing, that the McCartney killing was one which was perpetrated, not for the purposes of the Provisional movement obviously, but it demonstrated that if areas of particularly nationalist enclaves in Northern Ireland fall victim to the reign of fear and subjugation which the Provisional movement have carried out whereby what they call civil administration units of the IRA can summon people to Sinn Féin offices, warn them about their behaviour and, if ignored, take them out and break their legs, shoot them in the hands, torture them and beat them up with baseball bats and the like. That is the kind of reign of terror that gave rise to the feeling of invincibility among those who murdered Robert McCartney and attempted to murder his companion on that day, that they could get away with it, that they could subjugate a community and terrorise a community into not testifying or cooperating with the police, and that they could do their level best to abolish the forensic evidence that might be available if there had been an uninterrupted police investigation. And it was the Provisional movement that called out the youngsters onto the street to try and make the immediate follow-up operation impossible, and it was members of the Provisional movement who carried out the process of cleaning up the pub in question to prevent their being any evidence found, and it was the Provisional movement which intimidated the people who stood up against them in the Short Strand. And it also was the Provisional movement who issued the public statement offering the McCartney sisters the doubtful honour of having the perpetrators shot by the Provisional movement as retribution for the acts in question.
Intentions of Provisional movement: “And all of those events call into question now the intentions of the Provisional movement. And I am very hopeful that the logic of their situation now, and the fact that they are facing into a cul-de-sac if they don’t give up criminality, if they don’t give up paramilitarism, if they don’t …[tape break]… accept the rules of democracy, that the logic of all that is going to force them sooner or later to make the requisite declarations and to deliver to the Irish people what the Irish people were always entitled to on foot of the two referenda adopting the Good Friday Agreement. I am hopeful that that will happen, and sooner rather than later.
No concessions needed to end criminality: “But I want to say this: that when it does happen it’s not a matter of further argumentation or further dealing or further negotiation. It’s ours as of right that this campaign should end. And no one needs concessions to end brutality, criminality and the like. Nobody needs concessions, nobody is entitled to concessions for that. Republican democratic politics don’t require to be bought by concessions to end that kind of thing.
Present situation: “If you ask me therefore where I feel we are now, I believe we are in a different position from the one that Paul Bew described three years ago. Obviously, the SDLP didn’t have the demise that he predicted for them that evening in Dalgan Park, obviously his own party took a bigger tumble than he imagined likely at that time. Obviously, the Democratic Unionist Party is not going to be outflanked on the right of unionism, if I may use that phrase, and is a more formidable group of people for the Provisionals to have to take on politically than perhaps the middle ground of unionism was.
DUP: “But I believe, again optimistically, that the Democratic Unionist Party will engage with the other parties in Northern Ireland to bring about devolution in Northern Ireland. And there’s only one basis in which devolution will come about and that is the Good Friday Agreement. I believe that, whatever else its characteristics might be, the Democratic Unionist Party is a devolutionist party. It is not a party of, how would I put it, integration into the United Kingdom, political integration, it does believe that the people of Ulster, as Ian Paisley would put it, have the right to determine how their own society is run and I believe will act on foot of that.
Optimism: “So I am not pessimistic, I’m optimistic that the Good Friday Agreement’s institutions will be put back in place. I’m optimistic that the North-South institutions provided for under that Agreement will be made to work and flourish, I’m optimistic that economic interests North and South will increasingly emerge as united. I’m optimistic that in the Republic and in Northern Ireland a new spirit of reconciliation can be built. I’m optimistic that those of us who consider ourselves to be republican will be able to use that term without offence or threat to those people with whom we aspire to be reconciled. And I’m optimistic that the Ireland of the next 10, 15 and 20 years will continue to be a place which is growing in prosperity, which is developing in a normal way, which offers a good place to live to all its people – whether they are immigrants or people here of long standing, whether they are people of the nationalist or unionist tradition – that this island will become an increasingly warm place for all and a cold place for practically nobody.
Tribute to Meath Peace Group: “Those are my optimistic views tonight. And what I want to say to all of you, particularly in the Meath Peace Group, is I want to salute all the work you are doing for reconciliation because that vocation that I mentioned about reconciliation is the true vocation, not merely of Christians, not merely of patriots, not merely of people of good heart, but, as I say, of Irish republicans. And those of us who have noticed what the Meath Peace Group has been doing for so long, can only now feel a great sense of gratitude for your constant and unrelenting pursuit of reconciliation and mutual understanding. That is the way forward. And I feel proud to have been invited here this evening and grateful to be invited back in these circumstances and I feel as well as that a great sense, as I said, of optimism and of confidence that things are going in the right direction.
Tribute to Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern: “I want to finally pay tribute to Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern. These two men have been faced with difficult history, difficult circumstances, difficult politicians – it has to be said – and difficult sequences of events, and they have, together with the President for the time being of the United States, whether it be Bill Clinton or George Bush, they have put enormous effort into bringing about the full implementation of the Good Friday Agreement. People such as George Mitchell and many other people who have come to this island to assist in the process, haven’t been doing it out of a sense of self interest. Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern are not acting on the basis of what the next opinion poll will bring or what the political advantage to them today, tomorrow, or the next day actually is. They feel the hand of history on their shoulder and they feel that the time is right now for the people of this island to look forward to a much brighter future. And I believe myself that the best way to achieve that is on the basis of honesty not cant, truth not falsehood, history not propaganda, and a sense of hope, not a sense of pessimism. And in the last analysis a sense that the people of Ireland have more uniting them than dividing them and that some day a generation of young Irish people will be able to live in a society that fully reflects that reality. Thank you very much.”
Chair (Michael Reade): “Thank you very much, Minister. Now, as I said, you are welcome to ask questions. Let it be known, if you would, by raising your hand if there is a question that you would like to put to the Minister. Before you do that you might want to consider that we are recording this evening for broadcast purposes and you will be able to hear substantial excerpts from this evening as well during the week on my own programme, which is ‘Loosetalk’ on LMFM, the local radio station.
Marching season fears: “So, while I am looking for the first questioner, Minister, perhaps I could ask you an immediate question, an immediate pressing matter according to Fr Aidan Troy. I was talking to him today and he is extremely concerned about reconciliation between the Orange and the Green, as you outlined earlier on, going into the marching season. He’s fearful about a loss of life. He’s calling on both governments to intervene. Will that intervention happen?
Minister McDowell: “Well, you may take it for an absolute certainty, Michael, that the two governments are most concerned about the potential for violence involved in the marching season this year. And expressions of pessimism from both sides of the divide in Northern Ireland on this issue shouldn’t be allowed to mask the deep duty of everybody involved in the process in Northern Ireland to ensure that violence of that kind doesn’t happen. I got a report from the Department of Justice’s representative in Belfast in relation to what happened the other day in the Ardoyne, and I have to say – and I am going to be blunt about it – that the marchers were complying with their legal obligations and they were the subject of a violent outburst which was not justifiable. I regret to tell you that there was contact made with Dublin in the aftermath to ask what the Dublin government was going to do to defend the nationalist people in Ardoyne. So we have to be very very wary of people who will exploit all of this for propaganda reasons and create a sense of dependency in the communities based on fear of sectarian violence. And that’s the big problem now, that there are some people whose interest it is to create a sense of fear, especially among those who feel threatened by sectarian violence in the marching season, a dependency designed to justify taking steps or doing things which are not in accordance with the law.”
Chair (Michael Reade): “So there won’t be direct government intervention?”
Minister McDowell: “Well there is a Parades Commission and there is constant government political activity to ensure that everyone engages with that Commission, that everybody obeys the law and that the marching season in Northern Ireland is not turned into a tinder box of sectarianism.”
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS SESSION
Chair (Michael Reade): “We’ll go to the first question from the floor…. One question per person at a time, but also if you would identify yourself as you ask the question as well.”
Q.1. Re murder of Cllr. Eddie Fullerton:
“Hello Minister, I would like to ask you at what level of importance do you put the murder of my brother, Eddie Fullerton, who was an elected member of Donegal County Council and a politician of this State? And what are you going to do about it? And how long have we to wait for justice after 14 years? Thank you.”
Chair (Michael Reade): “Minister, will there be an independent inquiry as has been called for?”
Minister McDowell: “Well the first thing I want to say is, in relation to what level of importance do I put on it, I put the killing of any person – any person from whatever background or whatever community – at the highest level of importance. And I condemn absolutely and totally the use of violence, and more particularly lethal violence, for any political end. And I have no doubt in saying that murder is murder, no matter by whom it is committed. And Eddie Fullerton should be alive today and those who were responsible for his cowardly murder have a huge moral blame attaching to them. I would say to you that I am considering whether there is a basis for an inquiry into whether there was police collusion north or south of the border into the death of Eddie Fullerton.
“And if I found that there was a credible basis for the suggestion, for instance, that members of An Garda Siochána – as has been claimed – had anything to do with it, I would be the first to have an inquiry into that issue. And, as you know, in relation to collusion matters, the Irish Government at Weston Park committed itself to inquiring into a number of acts of collusion. Judge Peter Cory requested us to do it and I have established in recent times one public tribunal of inquiry into that matter.
No hierarchy among those who were murdered: “Can I just add to that that the killing of Eddie Fullerton was murder, and the killing of Jean McConville was murder, and there is no qualification of that in my mind, none whatsoever, and I deprecate any politician who would say that Eddie Fullerton was murdered and Jean McConville was not murdered. You can’t dine a la carte at the table of human rights. And there is no distinction to be drawn between those who are disappeared and buried here in Meath and other places, and Eddie Fullerton either. All of them are human beings. And Pat Finucane’s murder was murder, Eddie Fullerton’s murder was murder, in my mind. Jean McConville’s murder was murder, in my mind, and so were all the killings of the Disappeared. And, unlike other politicians, I don’t create any hierarchy among those who were murdered.
Chair (Michael Reade): “Minister, would the role of the Gardaí in Donegal and the findings of the Morris Tribunal make that statement any different?”
Minister McDowell: “No. I mean the events into which Judge Morris is inquiring are located in Donegal but they are quite different from the murder of Eddie Fullerton and I don’t see that they are part of a sequence of events. But, as I say, if a credible basis is put forward by anyone for believing first of all that Eddie Fullerton’s murder was in any way contributed to by a member of An Garda Siochána, and that an inquiry is capable of establishing the truth of such a proposition, I wouldn’t shy away from it for one minute.”
Chair (Michael Reade): “And the Gardaí in Donegal obviously, in your view, deserve a presumption of innocence?”
Minister McDowell: “Sorry, in relation to the Eddie Fullerton matter, I have not seen credible evidence that suggested that they are involved and I don’t believe that the great majority of Irish people believe that there is at the moment any great credible evidence of that proposition.”
Q.2. Cllr. Tomás Sharkey (Sinn Féin):
(i) Re murder of Eddie Fullerton: “Good evening, Minister, my name is Tomás Sharkey, Sinn Féin Co Councillor in County Louth. Just before I deal with my main question, on the issue of Cllr. Eddie Fullerton, who was murdered 14 years ago last week, I do believe that it’s incredible that we can sit here tonight and hear you making announcements about the guilt of the IRA in robberies, and to stand over your statements that you know what you know, without anything having been proven in a court of law and yet when a documentary aired by TG4 clearly gives new evidence and new eyewitness accounts of suspected collusion in the murder of a county councillor and an elected councillor for Donegal County Council, I find that hard to take. Last week Donegal County Council unanimously called for a public independent inquiry by an individual of international repute to look into the murder of Eddie Fullerton, and I think that should be acted upon because that motion will be put before Louth County Council shortly as well.
(ii) Re immigration law: “Why I did want to ask a question is: I was very interested in your talk, and I thought it was very informative. In the first couple of minutes you mentioned how you wanted to see a society in Ireland that is pluralist and tolerant and equal. As an elected public representative in County Louth, I meet many people, but the case that most struck me was a family of asylum seekers in Dundalk. The mother of that family described how her teenage daughter had been dragged from her home and was mutilated and bled to death, and how she fled with her youngest daughter to Ireland, and was going through the trauma and indignity of having to appeal to you and your good office for permission to stay in this State. And the most telling thing about that meeting was when the family left my office, the Sinn Féin office in Dundalk, the young child turned around and said: ‘slan go fóil, agus go raibh míle mhaith agat’ [goodbye and thanks].
“But then, later on that week, I saw you on television talking about ‘cock and bull’ stories that you allege are being made up by families. And I wonder where’s the pluralism and where’s the tolerance? And when you declare that inequality can be a good thing, I wonder what are your credentials and what is your vision for equality, tolerance and pluralism in this State?”
Minister McDowell:
(i) Re murder of Eddie Fullerton: “Well first of all … you’re an elected member of Sinn Féin, and what I am astonished by is that senior members of your party – and I don’t know if you are one of them but you can tell us if you are not – are willing to say that killing Jean McConville wasn’t murder but killing Eddie Fullerton was…. and maybe you can explain how one was justified and the other wasn’t and how one fits into one category and the other doesn’t.”
(ii) Re immigration law and asylum-seekers: “In relation to the question of immigration law, I have a difficult job as Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, in that I have to run the State’s asylum-seeking law, its visas and immigration law, in large measure. And I have always told the Irish people the truth about these matters. There is a huge amount of asylum-seeking in Ireland which is basically motivated by economic interests. There’s a lot of misinformation as well. Right across Europe, the success rate of first instance of Nigerian asylum-seekers is less than 2% which means that 98 out of every 100 asylum seekers, in every country in Europe where they make applications, are rejected at first instance.
“Now, you don’t see all the reasons that they give for coming to Ireland but I do. And I have to say to you that if I was at liberty to publish everybody’s file you would be satisfied, in the great majority of cases, that the consideration of whether they are entitled to protection by the Irish State and the appeal process is very fair. Let me just tell you a couple of things about our system. If you come to Ireland claiming to be an asylum seeker, you have a hearing in the office of the Refugee Applications Commission. For that hearing you are given legal assistance, translators, officials hear the case, take a case history from you and decide whether your case does or does not merit protection under the 1951 Geneva Convention. If you lose that case you are then given the right of appeal to an independent Refugee Appeals Tribunal. It reconsiders the case, again you are fully legally aided, you can make all the points you want to make and you get a hearing before that body. If you are turned down a second time you are given a notice that, notwithstanding the fact that it has been adjudicated that you are not entitled to refugee status, that you can apply to remain in Ireland on the basis of humanitarian need to remain, and that that will be considered by the Department of Justice and in the last analysis, the decision taken by the Minister.
“Anybody who is deported from Ireland has gone through all of those processes and has also been offered the right to go home, voluntary repatriation with assistance arranged at the International Organisation on Migration. And nobody is deported unless they have gone through all of those stages and have decided not to go home voluntarily but to remain on in Ireland. Now these are facts which the Irish people just simply aren’t told about. They are told about dawn raids and swoops, they are not told about the huge files that grow as each stage of that process is gone through.
Ireland’s asylum law: “And Ireland has a system of asylum law which is totally open to UN inspection and which is very highly spoken of by the United Nations High Commission for Refugees. But in the last analysis we have to have a system whereby if your case is rejected on credibility grounds, or on legal grounds, and it has gone through all of those arrangements, that in the last analysis you must be liable to be deported. If we didn’t have that, our system would fall into disrepute. And the consequences of it falling into disrepute would not be favourable at all, it would play straight into the hands of those in Irish society who would use racism and xenophobia and fear of immigration to exploit that for political ends. We don’t have to look far across Europe to see that even in societies which the Irish would regard as progressive liberal societies, such as Holland, Denmark, Austria and other places, that in those societies the fear of migration, fear of asylum seeking, has been ruthlessly exploited by opportunistic politicians to attempt to grab for themselves 10 or 20% of the vote and a place in Parliament.
Constitutional referendum on citizenship (2004): “Now I have stood up for a fair system of migration law into Ireland. I changed the citizenship law in order to prevent it being abused by people who came to Ireland under the guise of asylum, had a child in Ireland and then said that because they have an Irish child they wanted to remain in Ireland or to go elsewhere in Europe. When I say I changed it, I proposed an amendment to the Irish people and it was passed by 80% of them. Your party, Mr Sharkey, told me I was a racist and that it was a racist referendum. 80% of the Irish people – and you are a republican – voted for it because they knew it was necessary to bring sanity to Irish law.
“And secondly, in relation to that issue, I said at the time that I would – once that referendum was passed – deal with the Irish-born children issue in a fair, humane and commonsense way. And I want you to know that I published a scheme earlier this year and all the parents of Irish-born children who remained with their children in Ireland were free to avail of that scheme and, if they were of good character and they were genuine people, they are entitled to remain here for two years and then a further period of three years, and then after that period they will be entitled to remain in Ireland indefinitely. 18,500 people have applied to remain in Ireland under that scheme. I believe I have been more than reasonable, more than fair, and I have lived up to my word. And secondly I want to say that those 18, 500 people give the lie to the media suggestions at the time that I was raising an issue over a handful of people and that there was no significant issue, and that I was manufacturing figures to suggest there was a problem. 18, 500 people are staying in Ireland on foot of the scheme that I put through.
“And I reject, I have to say, the Sinn Féin line that the referendum was racist or that the decision of the Irish people was racist. And what’s more I’ll tell you, that when your canvassers went door to door with leaflets saying that, they gave up very soon and concentrated on the other issues in the local election because they realised they were getting doors closed in their face on that basis. So I would ask you not to be opportunistic on that subject.”
Chair (Michael Reade): “Minister, if I could come back, I just want briefly – because
we really should be talking about Northern politics – but just to expand briefly if you
wouldn’t mind, Minister, do you believe that the system for processing applications is
too slow and cumbersome to ask some people to wait as long as 4 years because by
that stage they have integrated into society, and that whilst the deportations may be
justified, the system for administering justice is somewhat cold?”
Minister McDowell: “I do agree that there was a huge volume of backlogged applications at the beginning, and that was because Ireland was a country of net emigration which suddenly became a country of immigration, it wasn’t prepared for the asylum-seeking phenomenon on the scale that we experienced it. But I do make the point that 90% of the applications for asylum in Ireland were not justified and no amount of spinning one way or the other can change that state of affairs. Likewise, the cost of asylum-seeking in Ireland is very significant. 370 million euro per annum is the estimated cost across all government agencies of dealing with the asylum issue. It’s not an inconsiderable issue, and when 90% of it is not warranted, it does require that someone in my position is straight about the issue and deals with it effectively.
Huge change: “But again what the media have not been reflecting, in my view, adequately, and tonight’s a good opportunity to begin to correct that, is that there has been huge change. We’ve now reached the point in relation to the prioritised country that applications are being dealt with from beginning to end through all the stages that I mentioned earlier in a number of weeks. You mentioned families who have been here for some time. And yes there have been families who have been here for some time and asked to go home. Each of those families has gone through the process that I have mentioned and Ireland has been – not like Australia, we haven’t put people into detention centres or segregated them from the population. Our approach to asylum-seeking has been very open. The children of asylum seekers go to the same schools as our own children in Ireland. We have operated on the basis that while they are here they are welcome guests in our community. But they aren’t entitled to, say for instance, a status which is better or superior to a visiting worker who is working in Ireland and who at the end of his or her visa has to go home and bring their children with them.
“And whether it is an American executive coming to Intel, who stays here for 3 years and for whatever reason is required to go home, he has to bring his children with him even though that involves breaking their friendships at school, and all the disappointments that that entails. The same applies to someone who comes to Ireland, seeks the protection of the Irish State, goes through due process and must go home at the end of it. ….[tape break]…..
Q. 3. Nuala McGuinness (Nobber). Re federal/confederal state.
“My name is Nuala McGuinness, originally from Co. Down [now living in Meath]:
“Minister, I would like your opinion on having a federal or confederal state in this
country. Thank you.”
Minister McDowell: “Nuala, I do believe that Irish unity is inevitable. I believe it is inevitable for a number of reasons. I think the people of these islands want Irish unity, the great majority of the people of the island of Britain want Irish unity whenever their opinions are asked in opinion polls or whatever. So I think it is going to happen some day and then the question is is it going to happen in some kind of click of the fingers, suddenly everybody wakes up in an all Ireland single unitary state or is it going to be something which will be accommodated in stages or accommodated in a confederal or federal arrangement. My own view is that it is more likely that at some stage the economic and cultural integration of both parts of this island will lead to a situation where even with NI remaining part of the UK for a while it will for instance develop much enhanced connections with the South of Ireland. One thing that I have often thought is that if the Irish state was really interested in unity we should have permanently on offer to the people of NI the right to share our membership of the European Union and to share the way in which we exercise that membership without prejudice as to whether you are a unionist or a nationalist.
Real political progress comes in stages: “I think it is unlikely that there will be a big bang revolutionary change one morning, some kind of political ‘Tet’ offensive where everyone will wake up, suddenly there will be a single unitary Irish state. I think it is more likely that it will go in stages, looking at our history from the Treaty to de Valera’s 1937 Constitution, to Costello’s declaration of the Republic, to the Good Friday Agreement via Sunningdale. If you look at all of that I think that real political progress is done in stages, not in revolutionary big bank political upheavals. So I do actually believe that, if the Good Friday Agreement beds down and if there is power-sharing in Northern Ireland between both communities, and if equality and mutual respect and respect for each other’s positions beds down and the politics of polarisation being practised by the DUP and Sinn Féin are eclipsed or at least moderated to the point where normality was centre ground emerges, that the institutions in NI will gain a life of their own of some kind, and that there will be some federal or confederal arrangement. And even Sinn Féin in times past looked to a confederal or federal Ireland as a way forward. And even if you look at de Valera’s Constitution of 1937, he talked about legislatures other than Dail Eireann operating in parts of the country. So my function this evening is not to map out what happens over the next 25 or 30 years but I do believe that if you ask me to say whether those kind of models are more likely than not to be part of the process of establishing political and cultural and economic unity on this island, I would say the answer is yes.”
Q. 4. Brendan Markey, re Disappeared:
“Minister my name is Brendan Markey and I live in Wilkinstown, 6 miles north of Navan, Co. Meath. I happen to own a few acres of land in Wilkinstown called Coghalstown Bog, and – peace and reconciliation – two young men were murdered by Sinn Féin/IRA in the early 70s. One of those young men was a month short of his 17th birthday. Their family meets me regularly and they walk the bog. We’ve been able in this community of Wilkinstown to think of those two young men. I would love to call on you Minister to assist, because local knowledge, as you said one time ‘I know what I know’. The people who carried out this butchery murdering antics in north Meath back in the early 70s, the mother of the young 17 year old has been in mentally handicapped hospitals for the last 23 years. I would like to examine can we look for those bodies and return them to the families and put together the past and unite the families? Thank You.
Minister McDowell: “Thanks. The answer to that by the way is, first of all, of the 9 people whose bodies were not accounted for arising out of the murder campaign of the Provisionals, 5 of them are still missing, and it is believed that for 3 of them their bodies are buried in Co. Meath. And the Commission which was established under the chairmanship of the former Tanaiste John Wilson has made every effort in the past to try to locate those remains and to reunite them with their loved ones.
Forensic expert: “And of recent times a proposal has been made that an expert in forensic geography who was involved in the investigations into the Moors Murders in Britain should be retained to assist in yet another effort to locate those graves and to reunite the loved ones of those people who died with their remains and a proper Christian burial for them. And the two governments have agreed that that should be done and yet another effort should be made to find them. Certainly I would urge anybody with local knowledge, or local intuition… If you know a bog, for instance, you’d know if you’d walked it as a child the bits that haven’t been disturbed, then you might be in a better position to identify it to experts coming in the bits that could be in the frame and the bits that could not be. So I would thank you very much for what I would presume is your offer that you and your neighbours would assist in any way these experts in making another search.
Physical and psychological torture: “And can I just finish by saying this in relation to the Disappeared. Each and every person who the IRA decided to kill after interrogation was put through a form of psychological terror called a court martial and many of them – and I don’t want to say this to disturb any people whose relatives have been found or have not been found – many of them underwent physical and psychological torture of the worst kind before they were killed. And many of them were terrorised into making tapes admitting that they had informed or whatever, as an inducement to save their skins, and those tapes were then sent to the relatives as proof that they were so-called ‘guilty people’.
IRA Army Council: “The rules of the IRA – and this is something that the Irish media should again bear in on – are that nobody can be, as they call it, ‘executed’, as I call it, ‘murdered’ – at the end of a court-martial unless that sentence as they call it is sanctioned by the Army Council of the IRA. It’s written into the Green Book of the IRA. And even after torturing somebody and getting whatever they wanted out of them, or even if they didn’t, they got no admission, that nobody could be shot in the head and dumped on the border or buried secretly in Meath or Louth without the sanction of the IRA Army Council.
“And I just want to say that the people who populated that Army Council during all those years, many of them are now posing on the stage as Mandela rather than Mugabe. Those people have direct responsibility for the deaths that they sanctioned in each and every case. Posturing as being concerned when you and your colleagues actually gave the direction that a bullet was to be put through the head of this person or that, is outrageous and an exercise in gross hypocrisy.
Governments restarting the process: “But angry though it is possible to feel about the hypocrisy that we have to put up with by people who were directly involved in making those decisions now posturing as being concerned about retrieving the bodies of the people whose murder they sanctioned, the two governments are absolutely committed to doing anything that is reasonable to recover the remains of those people and bring closure in so far as they can to people who have spent years in the circumstances you described of complete agony wondering whatever happened. And you know that Templetown beach [Co. Louth], nearly the whole beach was taken away and it turned out afterwards that the information that we were given was a half a mile out. The same has happened in other places but if I have any reason to believe that I can in fact with any reasonable prospect – I am not creating absolutely false hopes – repeat any search or carry out any new search that will bring closure to those people’s lives insofar as losing their loved ones is concerned, we will do it. And the Irish and British governments have recently taken steps to restart that process with the assistance of an expert to try and see what we can do and I would appeal to anybody either side of the border, I would appeal to anybody who lives anywhere near any of these places, to come forward with any hunch they have or any information they have, or any local knowledge of the topography they have, to assist with the process.
Chair (Michael Reade, LMFM): “Could you expand on the expert that you are referring to, is it a forensic expert?”
Minister McDowell: “Yes I have forgotten the gentleman’s name, it goes out of my head at the moment, he is an individual who assisted with the investigation of the Moors Murder. I spoke the other day to Peter Hain about this and we both have initiated an approach to the Victims’ Commission and to this expert, to restart the process and to re-engage with his assistance to see if that can advance the whole situation.”
Q.5. Peadar Toibín (Sinn Féin, Navan):
(i) Re allegations of criminality and due process: “My name is Peadar Toibín. I would like to thank you first of all for coming down to Navan today. There have been a lot of very interesting points made. But at the very start of the meeting I think was a very educational point. The last time you were down in Navan [30 September 2002] was very close to the fall of the Assembly and I suppose we all know why the Assembly fell: there were allegations of a Sinn Féin spying ring and a number of known republicans were arrested, and then the Assembly fell which was a travesty and a major injustice. But then we saw that when the eyes of the media were diverted, that the people whom the charges were made against, the charges were actually dropped, and recently the PSNI were asked what stage was the investigation in, and the PSNI admitted that the investigation was over. So what we have is the PSNI were either inept – they could not find enough evidence to put these people into prison – or they had actually concocted the whole story to bring about the end of the Assembly. Now many in the establishment including yourself at the time also gave out about this republican spy ring, and again no evidence came there.
Due process: “And the question I would like to ask you Minister, is: why do you expect me, in a liberal democracy, to believe you when you state you know what you know, and you can condemn groups around the country. Surely in a liberal democracy people have due process, surely they have presumption of innocence Minister, and it strikes me as something that would happen in Chile under Pinochet, where a Minister would condemn great numbers of people without people bothering to give them the right to a trial amongst their peers, a trial in front of a jury, or a trial in front of a judge. Now I know what kind of an answer you are going to give me, Minister, you’re going to give me examples again of some things republican members have done.
(ii) Re Minister’s condemnation of republicans: “”But I would just like to say one other thing, you also said that you were as equally interested in finding justice for the Fullerton family as you were for the McConville family, and I would commend you if that were true, but the whole energy of your ministerial journey so far has been attacking people who call themselves republicans. If you were to put the same energy into trying to bring about the end of loyalist murders, loyalist criminality, I would believe you Minister but you haven’t. In this whole speech tonight you’ve spent all your time condemning republicans, people who want to bring about a united Ireland.
Chair (Michael Reade): “I would just mention to you Minister that was a member of Sinn Féin and Brendan Markey who spoke earlier is a member of Fianna Fáil.”
Minister McDowell: “Can I make the point to you, Peadar, that I happen to know that the Provos carried out the Northern Bank job, I happen to know that the Gardaí have fully investigated a money laundering operation involving senior members of your party who were found in possession of large sums of money. And I happen to know that an ongoing criminal investigation is at hand in relation to those issues. And I will not be browbeaten by any political party into concealing from the Irish people the truth about these matters. There’s a difference between admissible evidence in a court and intelligence. If I don’t tell the Irish people what is actually happening on the basis that there has been no court case yet, it could spell the end of Irish democracy.
Dublin robberies: “For instance, I earlier spoke about the series of robberies in Dublin which were conducted by the IRA under the aegis of the adjutant in Belfast. None of those have resulted in prosecutions and the reason they haven’t – I’ll tell you now the reason they haven’t. First of all, in relation to the last of those robberies, the consignment of stolen goods was traced to a warehouse on the west side of Dublin. And Gardaí raided that warehouse and recovered the goods. They interrogated a number of people concerned with the warehouse and established that they were not aware of the fact that the goods were stolen and that they were innocent of any part in the robbery of the goods or the storage of them on that site. But it’s very interesting to note that one of the individuals who the Gardaí arrested and interviewed in relation to this issue was subsequently visited by two leading members of your party – Provisional Sinn Féin – one of whom had been released from prison for serving a sentence of 40 years for the capital murder of an Irish garda.
“So concerned were the Gardaí about the safety of the man whom they were going to visit to find out what happened, that they intervened and arrested all three of them. Those were two members of your party, Peadar, who were arrested in the aftermath of that robbery, inquiring of that man what happened. And what’s more, so that you should know the truth, Peadar, the group of people who had done the robbery were summoned to a meeting with the adjutant of the IRA who is based in Belfast and threatened that if the events ever took place again, they would be shot dead.
Intimidation: “Now those are the facts, Peadar, you can try and escape them any way you like, but your party, and senior members of it, and the adjutant of the IRA in Belfast who is rubbing shoulders with the people who you cheer at ardfheiseanna – these are the people who perpetrated that robbery. And if you think that the Irish people shouldn’t be aware of these facts because due to intimidation – the same kind of intimidation, let me just finish, that reduced the murder charge in Jerry McCabe’s case to a manslaughter conviction – if you think that the Irish people will be kept away from the truth by Provo intimidation of this kind, and that I won’t tell the Irish people what’s gong on because the Provos can – by threatening people – prevent the truth emerging in criminal courts and prevent admissible evidence, proof beyond reasonable doubt, from being made available to the Director of Public Prosecutions, you are very very wrong.
Determination to put facts before the people: “I am determined, and I will make a habit of it as long as it is necessary to do so, Peadar, to put the facts before the Irish people so that people who masquerade as being interested in human rights while at the same time organising major criminality and threatening people with execution don’t support that movement with funds which they steal from ordinary citizens in Ireland.”
Peadar Toibín: “If I could, Mr McDowell, I would like you to answer the question I asked you – why should anybody expect, why should you expect me to believe your point of view or your opinion on these things? In a liberal democracy we have a right to due process where the Northern Bank issue, all these other issues, people will get a chance, a day in court. It strikes me as undemocratic for a Minister for Justice to use his position, without giving evidence to the population of their peers, to use his position to condemn groups of people or individuals. I ask you why do you expect me to believe you without you putting it in court?
Minister McDowell: “I’ll tell you exactly why I expect them to believe me, because I have a record of telling the truth, unlike Gerry Adams who has a record of telling lies, saying he was never in the IRA and pretending he was never in the IRA, I don’t deny my past –[interruptions]… your friends over there are getting active, Peadar, but the fact is I tell the truth and I have a record and a reputation for telling the truth, that’s why you should believe me.
Re killing of Jean McConville: “And a second point, and I’ll ask you now Peadar, since you’ve talked about liberal democracy, would you stand up there again and take the microphone in your hand and tell me: was the killing of Jean McConville a murder?”
Chair: “It would be unusual I think for somebody in this locality outside of Arthur Morgan to answer that question.”
Peadar Toibín: “First of all, again you did say – [interruptions from members of the audience saying repeatedly ‘answer the question!’] – I asked the question, you said because you should believe me, Peadar, on this. For anybody to say – [interruptions from audience] – in the case of Jean McConville, I actually think that the killing personally was a murder, so I have no problem in saying that at all.”
Minister McDowell: “Why can’t Gerry Adams …?
Peadar Toibín: “He will answer his own questions, Mr McDowell. But I want you to put the same efforts as you have put in in the case of Mrs McConville, to put the same effort into the case of the Fullerton family here. It’s not a one-way street, Mr McDowell. There are other people in this room who have suffered from the Troubles. All I am saying is try to represent both sides fairly and stop putting your energy trying to demonise people like me and other republicans around the country.”
Minister McDowell: “Can I put this to you Peadar? Any killing, any murder, was wrong, and I am glad that you had the moral courage to distance yourself from the prevarication and the hypocrisy of Gerry Adams who pretended that the killing of Jean McConville was not a murder, and likewise Mitchel McLaughlin and Mary Lou McDonald who couldn’t admit these propositions.
Inquiring into past murders: “But can I make the other point to you? That if we are going down the road of uncovering the perpetrators of every murder, do you expect me to show the same zeal now to try to find out who were the team of IRA gunmen who took the 10 Protestants off the bus at Kingsmill and drew them aside machine-gunned them? Do you think that I should pursue that with the same zeal? Do you think that we should spend the last 20 years working out who did set off the bomb at Birmingham, who did let off the bomb at the Le Mons restaurant, who did let off the bomb at Enniskillen – [interruption from audience] … and who let off the Monaghan bombs, I am doing something about that, and I’ve spent many years as Attorney General and as Minister for Justice progressing the Dublin-Monaghan bombing and pressing for a full revelation of the truth in relation to that.
Liberal democracy requires that everyone obeys the rule of law: “But I ask you – rather than engage in this propaganda in which you are engaging of saying that I am in some sense being cavalier with the rights of the Provisional movement by pointing out when they are engaging in crime when they are – to concentrate on this issue, that a liberal democracy requires that everyone upholds the rule of law and there isn’t a la carte dining at the table of human rights, or at the table of the protection of the law, that every punishment beating is wrong.
Jean McConville killing: “And if you are a member of Sinn Féin, Peadar, you are in a much closer position to stand up at your Ard Fheis and say that the murder of Jean McConville was murder, but I don’t recall ever hearing you ever doing that, and I’d be interested if you go and repeat that at the next Ard Fheis, I’d be interested to see what kind of reception you get from your fellow delegates.
Q. 6. Sean Collins (Drogheda Cross-Border Focus Group):
“You’re welcome to Navan, Minister. I am a stranger here myself so I feel welcome. I have heard you called a lot of things over the years but Pinochet, that’s the best yet. You couldn’t possibly be using your campaign, or your position as Minister for Justice to condemn the IRA because you have been doing it for years, long before you were ever Minister for Justice, so fair is fair.
(i) Re Ardoyne disturbances (17 June): “I sat on Friday night with a group of women from staunchly nationalist Short Strand working with a group of women from staunchly loyalist inner east Belfast, and they all recoiled in horror at what they saw on TV, the pictures that were transmitted of the golf balls flying across the land rovers at the bandsmen marching. It reminded me of over 30 years ago now, I suppose, it’s nearly an eternity away – Burntollet Bridge – when the TV cameras opened the eyes of the world to what was happening in Northern Ireland with the proud B Specials beating up the people campaigning for civil rights. It reminded me a lot of that because I think Friday night’s events opened the eyes of a lot of people North and South.
(ii) Have Sinn Féin lost it? “The thing that strikes me, and I’m curious to ask at your level – if it is possible to ask – I’ve admired Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness for a number of years for bringing the IRA or Sinn Féin, or whatever they are, together, into the Good Friday Agreement, and I’ve admired them for that because I believe that was a very hard job, but in the light of the Northern Bank robbery and a number of other events and to see Gerry Kelly helplessly trying to control the events on Friday night, has Sinn Féin – are they losing it or have they lost it? Or they not leading so-called nationalist Northern Ireland any more?
Minister McDowell: “Well Sean, they are not losing it. Everything they do is very carefully planned. It’s not a question of losing it at all. You say what those women who are trying to do what I was talking in earlier – engage in the vocation of reconciliation across the peace line in Belfast – you say what their reaction was to those scenes on TV but I know that a senior member of Sinn Féin, on the following day, contacted the Dublin Government arising out of that incident and asked what the Dublin Government is going to do to protect the nationalist people of Ardoyne. I know that that’s what the reaction was, the following day.
Personal courage doesn’t mean your cause is right: “So I mean we have to be very very careful here, that we don’t allow people to pervert truth for their own purposes, and you know, I’ll give you this, I give the Sinn Féin people here, the minority of this audience which is Sinn Féin, I give them this: that many people in the Provisional movement displayed personal courage over the years, but many people in the Japanese Army in the Second World War displayed personal courage, and indeed in the German Army in the Second World War displayed personal courage, but the fact that people display courage doesn’t mean that their cause is right, or what they were doing was justifiable. And we have to distinguish between propaganda – for instance, I believe that Bobby Sands was sentenced to imprisonment for serious crimes and I also believe that many people in Northern Ireland salute his courage in making the sacrifice of his own life … but the fact that people show courage doesn’t mean that their cause is right, no more than the suicide bombers in Iraq today are justified in what they are doing even though it obviously takes huge courage to blow yourself to pieces in order to make some kind of point or whatever, it doesn’t make killing other people right.
Real challenge for republicanism: “And this is why the Irish people have to move to a new plane, and we can’t all the time dwell in the past, we can’t spend our lives marching up and down in lines at memorials all around Ireland to Volunteers, the rest of us have got over all of that and have moved on to the real challenge for republicanism which is reconciling the people of this island, North and South.
Bodenstown commemorations: “And you know I was very interested, just looking at today’s papers, at the picture of Bodenstown, and you have to hand it to the Provos, instead of the usual colour party with berets, black glasses and polo necks, there are fellows in golf club type blazers now leading off the parade.
Provisional movement is moving: “So they are moving, and it’s all very carefully orchestrated, and somebody sat down and ordered those blazers yesterday and somebody …[tape break]… they are moving, and the only thing that will force them to move, and the only thing that has been effective in the past in forcing them to move, is that the rest of us stand up against them and say: we don’t accept the propaganda, level with us, deal with us in ordinary democratic language, and accept the ballot box as the only measure of moral entitlement to engage in political activity, don’t ask us to say that you have a mandate from history which excuses you from obeying the criminal law and which allows you to kill people or allows you to rob, or whatever.
Honest speaking: “I mean, I am very very confident that Irish society has moved ahead of the Provisional movement and that they are now catching up and that they will make all the necessary steps to catch up, but will only have to happen if we reject the cant, if we say to Gerry Adams we don’t believe you when you say you weren’t in the IRA, we know you were. If we say to Adams and McGuinness we know you were on the Army Council when all these things were done, don’t give us this guff that you weren’t. If we’re honest with them, they will be forced to address us in honest terms, if we constantly appease them by using their kind of Provo speak – parallel universe stuff – that they are the legitimate government of Ireland and that’s what there in Dublin is some compromise rump of Uncle Tom, if we appease them in all of that language they will take liberties with us, but when we say no, enough, they actually respond much better than the fudge and wink type of politics.”
Q. 7. Hazlett Lynch (West Tyrone Voice):
“Hazlett Lynch, director of West Tyrone Voice victims’ group, west of the Bann in Northern Ireland. Mr McDowell, this has been a tremendous experience for me, and I know for the people who are with me, to be here tonight and to hear some straight talking. We have appreciated over the years, since you became Justice Minister here in the Republic, the things that you have said, the clear thinking that you have been able to articulate and the passion with which you have held your views. And it has encouraged us enormously, in Northern Ireland, to hear somebody in the Republic speaking the way you do. I would to God we had people in Northern Ireland and in the UK Government who would speak the way that you speak.”
Recent elections – demise of PUP: “There is a mantra that seems to be repeated time and time again by the media and politicians both in your country and in our country that gives the impression that the opposite party or political ideology to Sinn Féin/IRA is the DUP. That, sir, is manifestly untrue.
“The opposite of Sinn Féin/IRA is the PUP, David Ervine’s crowd. And what happened in the last election was this: unionist voters decided significantly to rob the PUP of half of its members in the Assembly, reducing them to one. That was a tremendous encouragement to the unionist people in Northern Ireland, to see that they were prepared to put their mark on the ballot paper to try and marginalize as far as they could any political grouping that was associated with armed terrorism.
Nationalist community: “The disappointing thing is that within the nationalist community the reverse was recorded – that there was an increase in support for IRA psychopathic murderers and killers, people who as terrorists are masquerading as politics. I am delighted to hear you using terms similar to that.
Amnesty for on-the-runs: “But one of the things that really does cause us concern in Northern Ireland is that these people, these self-same people, who you describe so accurately and on terms that I can identify with very very well, these same people have been asking for, and being granted by both governments, a de facto amnesty for on-the-run terrorists who are living in your country. Now victims of terrorism find it very very difficult in their daily lives to have to walk past and to see the people who murdered their loved ones and who put their lives under threat. This amnesty is to be activated this summer. I would ask you, sir, I don’t know if it is possible, but I know that you are concerned for law and order, I know that you are committed to promoting decency in your country and in our country, can I ask you, as a victim whose brother was murdered by the thugs who have their fellow workers, fellow-travellers with us tonight, can I ask you to do all in your power to stop the granting of political forgiveness or amnesty to psychopathic killers who will return to Northern Ireland again and harass and intimidate and torture those who were responsible for putting them behind bars in the first place?”
Minister McDowell: “thank you for your kind remarks at the beginning. What the Good Friday Agreement was about in part was a decision to draw a line across history and to say we have to have a new beginning. And, for many people, the widows of the policemen who were shot both North and South of the border, it was a bitter day to see the people who shot their husbands go free under the Good Friday Agreement. And for many people, I agree with you, that the prospect of closing the files on many of those cases are bitter fruits indeed, because they hoped against hope that the system of justice would at least establish the truth even if it wasn’t going to exact punishment. My own judgment about these matters – and you may find this slightly disappointing but it’s true in my view – there has to come a time when, on both sides of the divide in this country, we say that we are going to look forward to the future together rather than continue to require a determination of past wrongs.
Unbalanced approach to inquiries into past events: “But what I would like is that the Sinn Féin people in this audience to dwell and reflect for a moment on the intensity of the words you just used, because what I have noticed is that there was an absolute determination by the Provisionals that the on-the-runs should be excused and that the prisoners should be released, but at the same time, an absolutely unquenchable demand that every wrong done on the other side should be the subject of intense inquiry and scrutiny. And that I find difficult to take.
“If the name of the game is drawing a line across the page of history, people will have to realise that the pain you feel, obviously, and the loss of your brother, and the notion that the likes of his killers will be able to return even without facing a criminal trial, that that pain is real and substantial as you just announced it there, and that those who keep demanding, incessantly and insatiably, further and further inquiries – which suit their political purpose – into events 10, 15 and 20 years ago should realise how unbalanced that approach is. That what’s reasonable to ask you to accept, in their mind, which is that your brother’s killers should walk past you in the street, free or unconvicted as the case might be, is equally full of the implication for them that they cannot constantly recreate history and pretend that all of the injustices done to their side of the equation should be the subject of tribunal after tribunal, inquiry after inquiry, and the like. And that the Police Service of Northern Ireland at some stage – like the Gardaí here – should be free to police that society and to protect today’s youth from having their legs broken by thugs, rather than trying to work out at a distance of 20 years ago what happened in the murky days of a dirty war.
“So, you may find what I am saying slightly disappointing, because I do believe that, just as it makes sense to say to the men of violence on either side you may go free from prison, and have your punishment set aside, it may make in certain cases sense to say that those who have not yet been accused but are suspected should go uninvestigated and unconvicted and that may be part of the price of bringing normality.
Sense of injustice felt by victims: “But I want to say this, and finish on this note again, that the pent-up anger and sense of injustice that you have articulated here today should be listened to, particularly by the Provisionals, because when they demand, in retrospect, that all of their selective grievances should be fully investigated and pursued to the nth degree, they seem to be ignoring the pain and suffering that you have and what has already been accorded to them, at your psychological and emotional and sense of justice expense.
On-the-runs: “You asked me to oppose a policy of non-prosecution of the on-the-runs. I have to take a pragmatic view of that. It may be that it would be justified to bring an end to all the violence but the quid pro quo is that we don’t get the nonsense, the propaganda and the cant, that only people who in the new official Provo history of Ireland suffered injustice are the members of the Provisional movement or their supporters. That it was the mainly decent people on either side of the community who suffered most at their hands, and that most of that is going to go uninvestigated, unconvicted and unpunished. And I think that’s where the balance of history, where the pendulum will end up, it may not be satisfactory to you but I think it would be remiss of me to imply that you can let people out after serving a small fraction of a mandatory 40-year jail sentence for shooting a member of An Garda Siochana dead, as happened here, and you can’t see it as equally pragmatic in some circumstances to say to people who are suspected of similar offences in Northern Ireland that the process of criminal justice should be stayed in the interest of a brighter future for everyone.
“And those may be harsh words to you, but you praised me for straight talking, and you’re getting a bit of it now.”
Chair (Michael Reade): Re Sinn Féin leadership and IRA Army Council: “And Minister, do you believe that the Sinn Féin leadership, McGuinness, Adams and Ferris, remain on the IRA Army Council or has that changed in recent times?”
Minister McDowell: “I think they are now in the process, Michael, of actually trying to get out of it. But it’s purely cosmetic, they are in total charge of the Provisional movement, and as long as the IRA was a lethal force which was the backbone of the Provisional movement they remained centrally involved and in charge of it, and I regard it as a good thing that they are now trying to get out of it because it suggests that it is not going to be the centre of their political struggle in the future.”
Q. 8. William Smith.
“My name is Smith, William Smith. I am not a political supporter of the Minister but every time he speaks his mind to condemn the Provisional IRA, and … the IRA, and every time he condemns torturers and murderers and robbers, I am 100% behind him, as every decent Irishman should be, as every decent Irishman is…… And I am more than four score years and It’s time for me to shut up I suppose, I keep making myself unpopular and what I am going to say will make me more unpopular.
“I remember 73 years ago, 73 years now in January, going with my parents to the local polling booth where they were going to vote for Eamon Duggan. And for those people here who never heard of Eamon Duggan, he was one of the signatories of the Treaty, the Anglo-Irish Treaty, and that was the treaty which was the basis of the formation of this State which was led by W.T. Cosgrave and was opposed all those years – over 80 years now – by Republican Sinn Féin [tape unclear] ….and it is my understanding, I remember in the 1930s Thomas MacCurtain turned around in Patrick Street in Cork and shot a policeman in the stomach, and I will say this for de Valera who was not one of my favourite people, but he did during the early years of the 1940s stand up to them and when they tried to blackmail him by having a hunger striker in Portlaoise…… he stood his ground and let the man die which happened much later in Northern Ireland with all sorts of condemnations. But fair play to de Valera he wasn’t afraid to shoot people …..
Will Gerry Adams bring in the extremists? “To get to my question, does the Minister believe that when Gerry Adams eventually gets old enough and tired enough, and less ambitious, and adopts the road of democracy, is he equally going to bring all his followers with him? People who live in the sewers, those kind of people who still continue to believe in murder, torture and robbery as a means to achieving their political future… Does he believe that they will not become – I don’t want to use the word Omerta – but .. what happened in the United States and in Sicily, people who will be self-propagating and self-fulfilling, mé féiners, and does he believe that …?
Chair (Michael Reade): “Minister, before you respond that there are more questions than we have time left, and I am sorry to those of you in advance, but the question very simply is: will there be an old boys’ club, will that be acceptable?”
Minister McDowell: “William, can I say this? I can see where your politics are, from what you say there, can I say this too that my three sons, as I said earlier at the beginning, will number among their ancestors people who died for the Republic in the Civil War, people who put their lives on the line for the Free State in the Civil War, people who were on hunger strike for the Republic in the Civil War and people who later became Fianna Fail T.D.s. They number all of that, my sons will number all of that among their ancestry. And I believe that if you look back across the history of independent Ireland – from the Treaty onwards to de Valera taking power in 1932, to the 1937 Constitution and the like – that where things were wrong was when people pushed their ideology before their republican democratic values, and when things went well it was because republicans accepted that the will of the people was superior to their own theory of history.
Pernicious doctrine – IRA legitimacy: “And I believe that the greatest and most pernicious doctrine that the Provos at top level still believe is that the handful of survivors of the Second Dail in 1938, December 1938, handed over to the IRA the legitimate powers of the Irish State which they said was founded by the people in the 1918 and the next election, and the IRA declared itself to be the legitimate government of Ireland thereafter. That’s a very pernicious doctrine and totally anti-republican in view of the fact that the great majority of people who were in 1916, people who put their lives on the line to create an independent Irish State, brave people like Collins and De Valera, those people knew that the way to be a genuine republican and democrat was to work with what you had to transform it, to build a republican society on this island. And I look back across my own family history and across Irish history and I am willing to salute on both sides of the Civil War divide, and in subsequent political struggles and bitter disputes that there were, the genuine patriotism of those who went before the people, Duggan and others as you mentioned, and sought a democratic mandate and abided by it, and thought that there was no higher mandate than the vote of the people who supported them, and didn’t have an each-way bet on the armalite and the ballot box.
Provisional movement in democratic politics: ““You asked me the question, if Adams and McGuinness bring the Provisional movement to a totally political level and they just participate in democratic politics on the same way as the rest of us, will they bring their extremists with them? And my answer to that is, probably there will be a few hangers-on who will then revert to violence. I mean we have had indications the last number of months of people who have done precisely that, people who were in the past associated with the Provisional movement now they are simply using violence for their own personal gain. And we still have the dissidents and the CIRA and the RIRA there on the edges, but if you ask me do I believe that Adams and McGuinness will bring the Provisional movement with them largely speaking intact into democratic politics, if that is their choice, my answer is yes, they are in total control, they are in total control of that movement. They are not facing an internal mutiny, they are not facing an internal challenge, they are not facing a group of people who, for instance, will say well if you go down that road we’re hanging on to all the arms and the bunkers and all the rest of it, and the Semtex. I believe there will be decommissioning. I believe that they will bring the Provisional movement across the threshold – if they choose to do it – into democratic politics.
Need to stand firmly with conviction: “What I equally believe is that as long as people like you and me offer them the opportunity to have one foot on one side of the threshold of paramilitarism and democratic politics, and one foot on the other, as long as we were willing to tolerate that they were willing to exploit that witness on our part.
“And it is only when we say that the door to democracy is open and remains open but you must cross that threshold and stand with two feet on the democratic side of that line, it is only when you say that with absolute conviction and totally unwavering commitment to that proposition that they will actually make the shift. And the reason I am here tonight and I am making the points I am this evening and in other places is to articulate what I believe is the determination of what you describe as all decent Irish people – that this must be an unequivocal, irrevocable and non-negotiable movement from one position to another, and if the Provo leadership understands that that is the only show in town, I am confident that they will make that decision.
Appeasement: “If they are appeased, and there are appeasers, there are people in the media who criticise me for naming them and the members of the IRA Army Council. There are people in the media – and they know who they are, I am not going to dignify them by mentioning them because frankly they are not even worth a mention – who attacked me last year for standing up against the Provos when I knew what I knew. I am saying that if we go down the road of appeasement it will be exploited to create ambiguity and to allow them have this each-way bet of undemocratic activities… and it is only if we are absolutely rock-solid unshakeable that there is no way forward other than an exclusively peaceful and democratic political commitment from the Provisional movement, to operate within the rules of the laws on both parts of this island from now on, it’s only if we show that degree of determination and moral courage that they will make the inevitable break from the past and come in, like many others did before them, into democratic politics.”
Q. 9. Cllr. Michael Gallagher (Meath Sinn Féin):
Re Bobby Sands:“You’re very welcome to Meath, Minister. A few questions I would like to ask you. You’re very proud of your ancestors, and rightly so. How do you relate your grandfather to Bobby Sands? Do you class your grandfather as republican and Bobby Sands as a criminal? And the Provos that had to go out and defend our houses and properties in the ‘70s, and they were let down by this State, and you seem to have an awful lot of information on the Provos, it took 14 years to find out the criminality that was in the Guards in Donegal. Go raibh mhaith agat.”
Minister McDowell: “I don’t really see the question there.”
Michael Gallagher: “What is the difference between your grandfather as a republican freedom fighter, and Bobby Sands whom you classed as a criminal?”
Minister McDowell. “Bobby Sands, as you well know, was sent to jail for firearms offences as part of the Provisionals’ campaign in Northern Ireland. And just so that there should be no misunderstanding, from 1976 onwards use of violence in Northern Ireland – murder, explosives, firearms – was an offence against the Southern State’s laws as well, under the Criminal Law Jurisdiction Act [1976]. It was a breach of our law, it was a breach of the law of Northern Ireland. And I’m not in the business of condemning Bobby Sands for his hunger strike, and I’m not in the business of taking away the courage that that must have entailed, but I do say that people like John Hume, who took the peaceful path and were derided by the Provos and Sinn Féin for their stance, those people deserve a lot more hero-status in Ireland, than the people who engaged in the campaign of violence in Northern Ireland.
“And I also make this point: that you and I both aspire to be republicans, but what the Provisional movement did – in relation to setting back the process of reconciliation between Orange and Green in Northern Ireland – will take people like me many many decades to reverse. “
Member of audience: “Why did you oppose the Hume-Adams talks?”
Chair (Michael Reade): “Ok, I am just taking two more questions…”
Minister McDowell: “Because I will tell you why. At the time I believed that the Provisionals were going to try and have it both ways, and when you see the Northern Bank robbery you know that I wasn’t all wrong.”
Chair (Michael Reade): “I’ll take a few more questions, and I ask you to be brief, just ask the question.”
Q. 10. Ronnie Owens (Slane). Re rights and responsibilities: “Ronnie Owens, farmer and community worker, living close to where Brendan was referring to, where bodies were buried and I know about them since that time. Just in relation to today’s culture, if you like, bringing this whole issue of attempting to put solutions to problems, we talk nowadays about knowledge-based economy, most of us know about the ill effects of rampant consumerism, globalisation and commercialism. Would you agree that as an instrument to kind of inform people – Christianity was good at saying that people are duty bound to inform their conscience – one of the things that I see in many of the Bills of Rights that are put up nowadays in political form, they do not put down in equal standing, or equally articulated, they do not put down the responsibilities.
“I would have liked to have seen alongside the rights, the duties in equal form. I think looking at a lot of kids today, and a lot of demonstrations, people are very quick to engage in marches and protestations about their rights but there are very few marches about people’s responsibilities. In other words, as an instrument to maybe give people more courage, citizens – you talked earlier on about the foundations of republicanism, being republicanism of equality and fraternity in relation to all the citizens being equal to get the benefits, but I think they must equally inform themselves of their responsibilities.
“And in that sense people would be more courageous about refusing to be intimidated because I know locally people are intimidated, they know stuff and they are afraid to speak up about a lot of things, not just Sinn Féin/IRA stuff, but all kinds of other needs in society. So would you agree that maybe when Bills of Rights are being drawn up they should equally refer to responsibilities and it would be much more informative In people’s minds about the balance that should take place?
Minister McDowell: “the answer to that is I radically and profoundly agree with you, in relation to that. When I was a student of law in UCD, the late John Kelly was the man who lectured us in legal philosophy, and he constantly said what you are saying, a right without a corresponding duty is nothing …[tape break]… and it is certainly the case that in this day of huge concentration on human rights and rights-speak as a language, that everybody is articulating their grievances or their demands as denial of rights whereas nobody is stepping up to the plate and saying that other people must owe a duty for every one of these rights, and that we collectively, if we live in a society of rights, must live in a society of duties. That is undoubtedly the case and there is a huge moral vacuum in political discourse in Ireland based on that exact thing – that everybody is now articulating their views as an issue of rights. And in particular in relation to things which are political arguments, there’s a huge tendency now to put what you believe are your demands in the language of rights being denied to you rather than just simply say this is a political demand or a political policy which I am willing to advance. Everything is put in this business of if you don’t have X, somebody’s rights are being denied. Now I think that is a poison in the coinage of our political language, that we have forgotten the whole area of moral responsibility and moral duty, and personal individual responsibility, just as much as personal rights.
“Because it must be the case, it must be the case, that if we live in a society which accords everyone their personal fundamental human rights, that they must acknowledge that they have personal fundamental human duties to society, institutionally, and to their fellow citizens. And I find I have to say that that kind of language and that kind of debate has evaporated largely in recent circumstances. And in the whole area of rights and duties, if we go down the road of concentrating exclusively on a culture of rights and rights-speak, we then forget all of the duty-based reality on which civilised society relies.
Irish Constitution and political duties of citizens: “I’ll give you an example: the phrase ‘duty’ in the Irish Constitution, I think it appears in two contexts: the rights and duties of parents, and it also appears curiously in Article 9 of the Constitution which says that fidelity to the nation and loyalty to the State are fundamental political duties of all citizens. And the right to sit in Dail Éireann, for instance, is restricted to citizens of Ireland. You can’t sit in Dail Éireann if you are not a citizen of the Irish State. And the right to seek election to Dail Éireann is restricted to citizens, and it is restricted, therefore, to people who owe this fundamental duty of fidelity to the nation and loyalty to the State established by the 1937 Constitution.
“So that means that anybody – whether they come from Sinn Féin or the Progressive Democrats, or an independent candidate – who seeks election to Dail Éireann, undertakes a duty to all the people that vote for them to show loyalty to the State that the Irish people created by their Constitution in 1937.
“And you can’t sit in Dail Éireann and claim that the State is illegitimate, and you can’t sit in Dail Éireann and say that the State’s laws don’t apply to you, or that you can rob or you can kill because you have a higher authority. That’s not loyalty to the Irish State. And you can’t participate in Dail Éireann’s politics under the Irish constitutional scheme of things unless you acknowledge that you are exercising your citizenship under the 1937 Constitution and that you are undertaking that duty of loyalty to the Irish State. So I totally agree with you, Ronnie, I totally agree with you, but some people seem to talk an awful lot about rights, and I never ever hear them make a single speech about duty. And they are not so far away from you there.”
Q. 11. Eithne Casey:
“Michael, it seems extraordinary I feel I have to say, after what you have said about fundamental duties, that it is a fundamental duty not to pull a trigger on another human being. And I remember sitting at my grandfather’s knee who fought in Bolands Mills [1916] and who was then taken up the docks and interned in England, and I remember him saying as a child ‘oh, we stopped fighting because the people of Dublin were getting killed.’ And he said ‘and then the women of Dublin spat at us as we were going to the docks because of what we did in Dublin.’ So, for everybody who does anything, they do it for different reasons, and so many different views.
(i) Fear of not being able to speak out: “But in my early twenties I worked in the murder triangle in Northern Ireland which was west of the Bann and east of [?] and one thing I do remember, as I got used to living in the community there, working in the community, I could no longer bear it, after about a year and a half, or nearly two years, because you got to know the fears of people who were living there, the fear of not being able to speak out and not being able to speak their minds.
(ii) Polarisation: “And I noticed that in many times, and one time in particular, the second Ulster loyalist strike, you saw the immediate polarisation among educated middle class people. And what’s wonderful about tonight is that we are hearing the views so bluntly expressed, because at that time you would never have heard talk like this in Northern Ireland.
(iii) Dr Paisley: “And also what is extraordinary, and I am just changing the emphasis a little bit here, and would just love a comment on – I never would have thought that I would see Dr Ian Paisley come down to Dublin and walk into Government Buildings, and that itself is also a tremendous achievement because once there is contact, and it’s human contact, a cup of tea, I have friends coming down from Northern Ireland who have never come before, and then we cannot have – in most cases – we cannot have the same old views, the same old ideas, about the other side.
(iv) Reclaiming republicanism: “And when you use the word, two words I think, ‘republicanism’ – we have to reclaim that word for everybody here who wants to use it. We don’t live under royalty so we are republicans and there is nothing to be ashamed about that.”
(v) Reconciliation through direct human contact: “And then the other thing is reconciliation, and the only way reconciliation can come about is by direct human contact, sitting in the same room. And it is extraordinarily difficult, and you can see it today, because people are so highly motivated on the Sinn Féin side, how difficult it is to face the fact that you cannot take a human life for your beliefs, and then those who have had their lives or their families taken away from them, to come in the same room is a great movement. And I just hope that the government encourages more politicians to come down all the time, and likewise vice versa, and of course people at every level should have exchanges north and south of the border. And then you can’t have devils, and you can’t project all the evil onto one side, and all the grievances on to yourself. You know we are human beings, and we have a terrible shadow – we have this capacity to kill and we must confront it and stop it.”
Chair: “Minister, I’ll take that as a statement…”
Minister McDowell: “One of the comments that I would like to make if I can, Michael, and that is that I am afraid of leaving here this evening without saying the following things: that Northern Ireland was a place in which there was huge injustice, that the Catholics took more than their fair share of injustice over many years, that many many Catholics were killed because they were Catholics.
Loyalist criminality: “That loyalism is as pernicious, and in fact more pernicious in some respects than Provo-ism because many of its chief people are just simply lining their own pockets and engaging in every form of monstrous activity, drug distribution, racist attacks on minorities in Northern Ireland, and control over rackets and blackmailing and all the rest. I just want to put that on the record, just in case anyone thinks I am selective in my views on these matters. I am not, but I have to address the issues as they are now, and as was said here earlier the loyalist thugs have little enough purchase on Northern Ireland politics and the voters in Northern Ireland, whereas thuggery is present in the Provisional movement and has to end.
Hopeful signs: “And to reply just briefly to what Eithne said, I know it was more a statement and I agree with her statement. I just want to say she’s right, the very fact we can have these conversations here tonight, and there is vehement disagreement here and a lot of masked opposition to each other’s position, but the very fact that we are sitting in relatively civilised circumstances discussing these issues, and the very fact that I could meet Ian Paisley in the Irish Embassy in London and that he has come to Dublin to discuss economics with businessmen, these are immensely hopeful signs.
Duty of Provisionals and DUP to make society work: “And it doesn’t mean that the DUP is not a party which is free from its sectarian past, it isn’t and I don’t pretend it is, but likewise we have to look to the positives because having demolished the centre ground, the Provisional movement and the Democratic Unionist Party have now – to go back to the point that Ronnie was making – the duty to make their society work, and they will only do it if the rest of us make unequivocal demand, in unequivocal straight-talking terms, that they do face up to their responsibilities and duties as people who got seats and got votes, and take them into democratic [action?].”
Chair (Michael Reade): “My apologies to anybody I didn’t come to this evening, we’ll just take a final question from Julitta Clancy and then I am going to ask the Minister if he will give another couple of minutes of his time to talk a little bit about the future conclusion, and my apologies to anybody – because there are a lot of people who have had to travel long distances – if we have held you up. ….”
Q. 12. Julitta Clancy “I preface my question by thanking you Minister for spending so long with us, and thanking all those who got up and spoke here, and people who came – regardless of difference – to share their views. And we very much are grateful for people coming. It was difficult.
(i) Reclaiming the spirit of the Agreement: “Somebody mentioned ‘balance’, and I think Eithne referred to ‘reclaiming republicanism’…. I think we should also be trying to reclaim the spirit of the Agreement that so many of us, particularly in the South, put all our hopes in despite all its flaws, and with the knowledge that possibly a bare 50% of unionists voted for that Agreement, and in the years in between – because of the way it was being implemented and brought in – unfortunately that number went down and down. And therefore the pain of the victims increased, and it increased on all sides. And we spent a very pleasant day in Fermanagh on Saturday, a few of us, as guests of the Dooneen Community Education Centre, the Guild of Uriel and members of the Ulster Unionist Party, Sinn Féin, the SDLP and others, and it was to me such a huge difference from the days when we went up monitoring disputed parades in Fermanagh.
(ii) Interface tensions and marching season: “But I want to turn your attention to
the interface areas of Belfast particularly, because those are areas that some of us
have had the privilege of being invited into in recent years, both in republican and
loyalist areas, and we have seen the pain on both sides, the difficulties on both sides
and the great efforts being done by many good people on the ground there to diffuse
tensions and to get away from the situation it was in a few years ago.
“But there is also the fact that those people cannot yet talk to each other like we are
doing because of difficulties, and if there is any way that that can be helped, in any
way, because the dangers of what now looks like could happen in the marching
season, if it goes back to that a lot of good steps will be reversed. And it is the
suffering of those people, who have suffered so much, on both sides there, I would
appeal to.
(iii) Have we done enough in this State? “And my last point is, Minister, do you think that we in the South have done enough to embrace and to live up to the spirit of that Agreement and should there not be more groups like us engaging – not as we did in the beginning with peace rallies and all of that – but engaging in this type of dialogue across the divide? Thank you.”
Minister McDowell. “Michael, can I complete my two minutes that you were going to say to finish up with my answer to Julitta?
Good Friday Agreement – a deal is a deal: “Firstly, I do agree with you that we are in danger of forgetting the spirit of the Agreement which was there in the first place. And I do believe that the period of time that has elapsed since then has allowed a lot of people to get sceptical, cynical and to forget the moral force of that Agreement. And, if I may say – though there aren’t many here – to people of the unionist persuasion, and particularly to the Democratic Unionist Party I would say this: a deal is a deal, the people of Ireland and Britain through their governments did a deal.
“The people of both parts of this island did a deal. The Irish State has transformed its relationship with Northern Ireland and the United Kingdom into one of which, instead of the claim made in Articles 2 and 3 as they then were, there’s an acknowledgment that a majority in Northern Ireland will determine its constitutional status on terms of a deal. And the deal is that it is a society based on mutual respect, that it is a society in which Irish nationality is not simply tolerated but respected, and that those who feel themselves to be Irish nationalists and republicans in Northern Ireland are free to give their loyalty and fidelity to the Irish State as its citizens as I mentioned earlier.
DUP rhetoric: “And therefore some of the Democratic Unionist Party rhetoric that Dublin should be seen as a foreign state is inconsistent with the terms of that Agreement. We are not just a foreign state, we are not just to Northern Ireland what Norway is for Iceland. We are a state that did a deal with a sovereign state, the United Kingdom, registered with the United Nations and it’s a deal that gives the North-South dimension and the sense of Irishness and all of those institutions real substantial legal status. And I think that we have to recreate in our own minds an understanding of that deal that we did and say to Ian Paisley and Nigel Dodds and Peter Robinson: you’ve done a deal and a deal has been done with us by a sovereign government and the people of the United Kingdom, as a sovereign entity in which you believe, have made a compact with us for a new dispensation in Northern Ireland, and have indicated that they will back a united Ireland and implement it when it becomes the choice of a majority of the people in Northern Ireland.
“That’s the deal, and we are not going to allow anybody walk away from that deal, and by making the institutions unworkable it will only redouble the determination of Dublin that that deal will be adhered to and delivered on.
Marching season: “And the second point you make about the marching season, I really do fear that in the vacuum that now exists that people – instead of facing up to the responsibility of their mandate from the ballot box – will instead look to sectarian conflict arising out of the marching season as a justification of some kind for reneging on their democratic responsibilities. And that applies on both sides of the issue. Those who have obstructed the Parades Commission, denigrated it, torn down its efforts to produce fair and reasonable solutions on both sides, and those who will use violence, or threaten violence, in order to avail of the marching season as an opportunity just simply to reassert atavistic polarised politics, and to justify their own position as defenders of their community.
Have we done enough in this State? “And the last question you asked is: have we done enough in this State to deliver on our side of the Good Friday Agreement? That’s a question on which the jury is out. But I am certain of this, that – above the hurly burly of politics and arguments about ASBOs, and pubs and all the rest of it, airports and all the rest of it, -I am certain of this that we should have a generation of politicians who aspire at least in this one area to be remembered as statesmen and stateswomen, and that is that they articulated a sense of Irishness which was based on the views of Tone, the Sheares brothers, Emmet and Davis, an inclusive sense of Irishness, a thing totally bereft of sectarianism and of polarisation. And I really do believe, if you ask have we done enough, that we haven’t done enough on that. That we still, in this part of the country, have a view of Irishness which is not as open to Protestants and unionists as it might be, which is alien to them in some respects despite our best efforts to make substantial reforms in our political culture. And that there are many many things that we could all do to emulate what this group has done to extend the hand of friendship, to build bridges, and to build links between the two parts of this island. How sad it is, that 20 years ago in days of privilege, the unionists in Northern Ireland sent their children to be students in Dublin, how sad it is that that has trickled to practically nothing and they are to be found in Sterling and other places in Scotland rather than even in their own universities in Belfast.
Identity: “And have we actually engaged on a North-South basis, on a generous basis, to re-involve those people in Northern Ireland with our society – to acknowledge what I was saying earlier about the wealth of the Anglo-Irish part of our culture, to acknowledge that we are all mongrels in one respect or another, we are all born of Normans and Scots, and Scots Irish and English, and now that we have a new wave of immigration into Ireland, rather than pure descendants of a Gaelic society which is not the patrimony of most Protestant unionists on this island. And that we have a sense of our identity which is capable of embracing all of those views rather than being seen as sinister or hostile to people who aren’t of the main stream of Catholic nationalist Ireland.
Lack of genuinely inclusive vision: “I genuinely believe, Julitta, to answer your question, that we are not doing enough on those fronts and that we are not doing as much as we could, and that just as you have garden centre unionists in Northern Ireland who have fled the scene and abandoned it to the DUP and Sinn Féin, the centre ground people, so also in the South there’ll be your garden centre nationalists and garden centre Irish in that we do not have a genuinely inclusive vision and any sense of political vocation to really engage with the unionist community on the logic of the tricolour.
Challenge before us to create a new dynamic of Irishness: “That’s my strong view, and I will share with you, first of all compliment you and all your colleagues for what you are doing, going up to the interfaces and working with people there, but you asked me that hard question – are we doing all we can? And the answer is most certainly not, and it’s a challenge to everybody in this room, from Sinn Féin to unionists to Fine Gael, to Fianna Fail, to PDs, to Labour, to whatever persuasion you are, there is a challenge there now to rise up towards the real goal which is to create a new dynamic of Irishness on this society. And its not for the faint-hearted, it’s not for the politically lazy, it’s not for the opportunists or the night watchmen of history, it’s for the statesmen and the stateswomen of Ireland, for the new generation of Irish politicians to bring about a radically different approach which is based on reconciliation and based on generosity. Thank you.”
Chair (Michael Reade): “Just finally, one final question, do you expect to live long enough to see a united Ireland?”
Minister McDowell: “Well, yes.”
Chair (Michael Reade). “Before you go home, transcripts will be available later from the Meath Peace Group, significant segments of this evening’s talk will be broadcast on LMFM over the course of the next week. Congratulations to Julitta and the group. There’s a cup of tea at the end of the room, thanks to everybody for coming, as it was mentioned this evening this evening was progress in itself and part of that was having such an important and distinguished guest speaker. Ladies and gentlemen, the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Michael McDowell.”
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Meath Peace Group report ©Meath Peace Group 2005
Talk recorded by Judith Hamill (audio) and Jim Kealy (video). Transcribed and edited by Julitta Clancy
APPENDIX A: Biographical notes: Michael McDowell, T.D., S.C. was educated at Pembroke School and Gonzaga College, Dublin. He is a graduate in Economics and Politics from UCD. He qualified as a barrister in 1974 and was made a member of the Council of King’s Inns in 1978. In March 1987 he was called to the Inner Bar. He is a founder member of the Progressive Democrats and was first elected to the Dáil for the Dublin South-East constituency in 1987. He was re-elected in 1992. Having lost his seat in the 1997 election he was successful in the 2002 General Election, when he was once again returned for the Dublin South-East Constituency. He was Chairman of the Progressive Democrats from 1989 to 1992 and was appointed President in February 2002. Between 1992 – 1997, he held spokesmanships successively in Foreign Affairs, Northern Ireland, Trade and Tourism and Finance. He was appointed by the Tánaiste to chair the Working Group on Company Law Enforcement and Compliance. In 1999, he was appointed by the Government to chair the Implementation Advisory Group on the Establishment of the Single Regulatory Authority for the Financial Services Industry. In July 1999 he was appointed Attorney General of Ireland and served in that post until June 2002, when – on the formation of the new Government – he was appointed Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform.
APPENDIX B: Meath Peace Group update June 2005
Navan school bus tragedy: We offer our deepest sympathies and condolences to the families, friends, communities, teachers and fellow-students of the five young students from St Michael’s Loreto (Navan) and Beaufort College (Navan) – Lisa Callan, Claire McCluskey, Amy McCabe, Deirdre Scanlon and Sinead Ledwidge – who died tragically in a school bus accident on Monday May 23rd. We remember also the students who were injured, including students from St Joseph’s (Navan). Our thoughts and prayers are with them and their families, friends and communities.
School programme: Our annual TY peace studies programme at St Joseph’s Secondary School, Navan, concluded with a Fair Trade seminar on 9th May addressed by the Lord Mayor of Birmingham, Michael Nangle, Fergal O’Byrne of the Green Party and representatives of Oxfam. Local TDs Damien English and Shane McEntee attended, as well as students of St Michael’s Loreto, staff, students and parents from St Joseph’s and members of the Navan business community. Our 2004-05 programme focused on experiences of interface communities in North Belfast and guest speakers included Chris O’Halloran of the Belfast Interface Project, Conor Maskey of Intercomm Ltd and Sean Ó Baoill of Mediation NI. The Spring 2005 term included a visit to Belfast on 11 April, taking in the Conflict exhibition at the Ulster Museum, and visiting the New Lodge Area as guests of Intercomm Ltd. Other topics studied were World Trade, Fair Trade, Immigration, Poverty and Debt Reduction, and mental health. Workshops were conducted by Michael O’Sullivan, Michael Murray and members of the Samaritans and West Papua groups. The overall programme was organised and conducted by Julitta Clancy and Judith Hamill with the assistance of teachers Mary Maguire and Julie O’Dwyer.
Recent public talks:
No. 56 “Bombings and their Aftermath” was held on 9th May and was addressed by Lord Mayor of Birmingham, Michael Nangle, Jacinta de Paor of Glencree and Gareth Porter of the H.U.R.T. group. The talk was chaired by Michael Reade. Prior to the talk, the chair of Meath County Council, Cllr. Tommy Reilly, made a presentation to the Lord Mayor on behalf of the Council.
No. 54: “The Good Friday Agreement – The Future” held on 25 February 2005, and addressed by the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Dermot Ahern, TD, John O’Dowd, MLA (Sinn Féin) and Dominick Bradley, MLA (SDLP).
No. 55: “Where do we go from here?” held on 7 March 2005, and addressed by Professor Paul Bew (QUB), Sean Farren, MLA (SDLP) and Jim Wells, MLA (DUP).
Acknowledgments: Grateful thanks are due to all who have helped with the planning, publicity and organisation of the public talks, and all who have supported the work of the group, over the past 12 years. We thank all those who have come to participate in our talks, members of the audience as well as speakers and guest chairs. We thank the Department of Foreign Affairs Reconciliation Fund for much-needed assistance towards the running costs of the public talks and Transition Year programmes.
Meath Peace Group Committee 2005: Julitta and John Clancy, Batterstown, Co. Meath; Michael Kane, An Tobar, Ardbraccan; Anne Nolan, Gernonstown; Canon John Clarke, Boyne Road, Navan; Philomena Boylan-Stewart, Longwood; Olive Kelly, Lismullen; Leona Rennicks, Ardbraccan; Catriona Fitzgerald, Warrenstown; Judith Hamill, Ross, Dunsany
No. 54 – “The Good Friday Agreement: the Future?”
Friday, 25th February, 2005
St Columban’s College, Dalgan Park, Navan
Speakers:
Dermot Ahern, T.D. (FF) (Minister for Foreign Affairs)
Dominic Bradley, MLA (SDLP, Newry and Armagh)
John O’Dowd, MLA (Sinn Fein, Upper Bann)
Chaired by Michael Reade (Presenter of “Loosetalk”, LMFM Radio)
Contents:
Introduction: Julitta Clancy and Michael Reade
Speakers’ addresses
Questions and comments (summary)
Closing words
Appendix: written speech of Minister Dermot Ahern, TD
INTRODUCTION
Julitta Clancy: “…. On behalf of the Meath Peace Group I would like to thank you all for coming tonight at such short notice as this talk was organised very quickly…. It is a time of great concern. When we met here last November at the talk we had on “Policing, Justice and the Bill of Rights”, there was great expectation then that a deal was going to be done and that we would see within a few months a power-sharing government back up in Belfast. But that wasn’t to be, and a number of events have happened since then. A few days ago the Taoiseach said that the peace process itself looks like it could be unravelling. Let’s see tonight where we are at. We are here because this peace process belongs to us, it belongs to the people. It doesn’t belong to the politicians or the paramilitaries, or the governments. It belongs to us and we need to be there watching it and being vigilant. This Agreement was ours. Most of us ratified it, some reluctantly, for many it was a huge compromise. Some who had suffered greatly signed up and said ‘yes’ to that Agreement. We are wondering why after almost 7 years we still have not got what we voted for in the institutions, but in many other areas, the Good Friday Agreement has brought very important developments…..On behalf of the Meath Peace Group I would like to thank the speakers who have come here tonight and I will hand over now to our guest chair, Michael Reade, presenter of the morning “Loosetalk” programme on LMFM radio, a very worthwhile programme to listen to … We thank him very much for agreeing to chair the proceedings here tonight.”
Chair (Michael Reade): “Thank you. It really is a pleasure for me to be here. Even though this talk was arranged very much at the last minute, I’m not overly surprised to see such a good attendance because of the level of interest that there is on both sides of the border in the current impasse. I wouldn’t say too much by way of commentary, especially with the eminent politicians that we have here, I wouldn’t feel it appropriate. As a journalist, what I like to do is to listen and hopefully we will be able to hear what you have to say, and what questions you have to ask and to listen to what the politicians have to say here this evening.
“… As a journalist working on radio in the south of Ireland, I can’t remember ever seeing such a … level of interest in the impasse and related events. As Julitta said, I believe there is a lot of concern, I think there are people right across this island keeping their fingers crossed that there is some way forward. On the subject of listening to people I suppose the only relatively scientific thing we have to go on is the Millward Browne IMS poll that was published in the Irish Independent today which showed two significant things. There was a lot of opinion obviously on what happened with the Northern Bank raid but in terms of how it has affected the political situation, it’s very interesting to see that the President of Sinn Fein has plummeted in his popularity, he’s down by 20%, now the least popular leader … and perhaps it’s an indication that all politics is local but Sinn Fein has held onto it’s core vote, or maybe it has not transferred yet. I am sure all of our speakers will have a lot to say on the impasse, but the topic tonight is the future, what is the future? To us it’s unknown, but these are the people I suppose who can shape that future…. I now ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Dermot Ahern, TD, to begin.
1. Dermot Ahern, T.D. (FF), Minister for Foreign Affairs
[Editor’s note: text of written speech of the Minister is reproduced in the Appendix below]
“First of all, ladies and gentlemen, could I just thank Julitta for the invitation to me to say a few words. She said this was organised very quickly, and it’s true to say that, given the fact that there is a by-election on in this constituency, when I got the request in I said I’d better do this or else Mike Reade will never let me forget it on his programme! I’m not altogether sure about the description of Mike when he says that he just listens, I have to say that, having been on the other side of the phone and the microphone from him he does tend to intervene quite a lot, something that I think most politicians don’t often want! But indeed I have to say that he does conduct a very good show. I want to thank him for participating and to thank my two colleagues also.
Border deputy and constitutional republican: “For those of you who may not know where I come from or what sort of background I come from, I’m a border deputy, I was born and bred and am still living in the Dundalk area. I literally look out every morning on the Mourne Mountains. I regard myself, I have to say, more as a Northerner than as a Southerner, in that most of what would have driven me politically, over my political life, and indeed before my political life given that my own particular area was very badly affected from my memory as a youngster. And I often wonder if the border had been on a different line, perhaps a little bit further south during the start of the Troubles, where would I have ended up?
“But I do say that most of what drives me and has driven me over my political life, which stretches back to 1979, is my view as what I would regard as being a constitutional republican, as John Hume time and time again has said: the need to unite the people on this island in peace and harmony.
Good Friday Agreement: “One of the tenets of the political and armed struggle conflict was, and an excuse for it – I don’t say that I believe that this is the excuse for it – was that 1918 was the last time that the Irish people, in a single act of self-determination on the island, voted as they saw fit. That was transposed by the Good Friday Agreement in 1998. The Good Friday Agreement was the first time since 1918 that the Irish people had, in a single act on the entire island of Ireland, self-determined what they believe was to be the position in the future.
Key principles: “Built into that were a number of key principles. One of the principles was that whatever happened would be on an inclusive basis, and with the consent of the people of Northern Ireland, but also that there would be a legitimate expectation on behalf of the people who voted that all those parties and individuals who were associated with paramilitarism would end that and that the future would be looked at in a totally democratic way, that all political parties who wanted to promote their ideals that they would do so in an exclusively democratic way.
Peace process – 1988 talks: “I have to say that, as Julitta has said, seven years on from the Good Friday Agreement I think it is a source of some dissatisfaction that we are where we are today, that we aren’t further down the road in that goal. The Hume-Adams talks started seventeen years ago. I was asked by the then Taoiseach, Charlie Haughey – he had been asked by Fr. Alec Reid, who was the instigator of the Hume-Adams talks, if Fianna Fail in the Republic would mirror the talks that were taking place at that time between Hume and Adams. It was agreed very secretly – this only came out maybe ten years later – that I, Martin Mansergh and one of your own in this constituency, Richie Healy, on behalf of my party would meet with Gerry Adams, Pat Doherty and Mitchel McLaughlin. In 1988 I was only a young deputy of a year, if it had got out that I as an elected representative, a TD, was meeting these people I think I wouldn’t be standing here today, at least politically. I would have lost my position, very clearly. In fact when I asked Charlie Haughey, he told me these talks were in effect secret, he didn’t know whether word would get out. I said to him that I would participate. I indicated to him that I didn’t believe what he’d said to me that if word of these talks had got out, that in effect I would be on my own. But in any event those talks took place, and the whole tenet of those talks which I participated in was on the basis of the historical comparison between the moving of my party from conflict into constitutional politics. Most of the discussion at that time was the comparison, the similarities. And most of what we were trying to say to the Sinn Féin representatives was in very very tough times, because during those meetings there were some absolutely horrific events taking place across the border which made us, particularly myself and Richie Healy, have great trepidation in the continuation of those talks. I say all that because that was nearly eighteen years ago.
Crossroads: “I fully accept that the situation is far better since then, I fully accept it and I think we all have to give everyone credit on all sides of the political process for the tremendous changes that have taken place on our island. But I believe, as I have said quite frequently in recent times, that we have reached the stage where we are at a crossroads, and particularly I think the Provisional leadership have to accept the will of the people as expressed by the people in vast numbers in the Good Friday Agreement just seven years ago.
Provisional criminality: “I believe that Provisional criminality is the impediment to the implementation of the Good Friday Agreement. We met with Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness immediately after the Northern Bank raid took place. We said to them on that occasion that we on this side of the table were prepared – and they knew this – to do some very unpalatable things in the context of an overall settlement, a comprehensive agreement whereby there would be a total end to paramilitarism and criminality. We were prepared to do that, the British Government were prepared to do that. In fact as a result of the discussions that we had in 10 Downing Street – between the Taoiseach, Tony Blair, myself, Paul Murphy, Michael McDowell and indeed the PSNI chief, Hugh Orde and Noel Conroy [Garda Commissioner] – this was before the publication of the documents, there was discussion as to what the British Government had to do in relation to issues like demilitarisation etc. As a result of our meeting it was suggested that Hugh Orde might invite Gerry Adams over in the succeeding days in order to discuss the issue of demilitarisation.
That meeting took place, it was very successful, it was a significant meeting, the first time someone from Sinn Féin met with the leader of the Police Service in Northern Ireland.
Governments prepared to do unpalatable things: “So we were moving in effect to the final hurdle, and this was something that we said after the Northern Bank raid, that we – the British Government and ourselves – had carried out and were prepared to carry out all of the issues that were on the table that we had to do. Some very unpalatable things that would cause severe difficulty to us politically in the Republic and indeed to a certain extent to the British Government.
Acts of completion: two remaining issues: “We told Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness that while we had fallen at the last hurdle in relation to the comprehensive agreement – we published the documents – that there were still 2 key remaining issues:
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Full decommissioning, and
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An end to paramilitarism and criminality
1) Full decommissioning: “We accept and still accept that there was in words, and also from what our security sources told us, that there was a solid movement in order to provide full decommissioning. We fully accept that that was on the table, that that was possible. Obviously we had to accept people at their word, but the strong suggestion from our security sources was that that was available to us, and we have to come back to that.
2) End to paramilitarism and criminality. “One of the other issues that we said at our meeting after the Northern Bank raid was the issue of the end to paramilitarism and criminality. Tony Blair and the Taoiseach previously, in the Joint Declaration, particularly Article 13 of the Joint Declaration, said that they had to have “acts of completion”, that everything had to be dealt with in a comprehensive agreement. And one of the key issues was the issue of an end to paramilitarism.
IRA statement, December 2004 : “As you may remember in the run up to the publication of those documents in December, it was delayed for about a week, people were wondering why it was delayed. It was delayed purely and simply because – obviously everyone knew about the photographs issue, the transparency issue – but equally so one of the key issues was in relation to the words that would be used in a statement by the IRA. It was indicated to us very late, particularly after the unfortunate words expressed in Ballymena about “sackcloths and ashes” and “humiliation”, that the issue of transparency and photographs was completely off the agenda. It was indicated to us that, while some people within the Provisional movement had no difficulty with the issue of putting in words into the statement in relation to the safety of individuals, that others had. The governments decided, in or around the 6th of December, to proceed with the publication on the 8th December with what we saw was our best estimate of a possible compromise both in relation to the photograph and also in relation to the issue of the words used in the statement about an end to paramilitarism and criminality. Subsequently the IRA issued a statement which omitted the words that we required in the statement. You may say they were only words, but the omission of those words raised a very serious question mark on our behalf, and on the British Government’s behalf, as to why they were not prepared to say these words. What they were prepared to say was that the IRA would go into a new mode, that they were prepared to ensure that their volunteers would do nothing which would endanger the Agreement. What they were not prepared to do was to follow on with additional words and say that they would not do anything that would endanger the safety and lives of public individuals. The omission of those words and the fact that they were not prepared to say those words raised a serious question in our minds.
“I say all that because our impasse at the moment is unfortunate, it’s there, whether we come back to these issues tomorrow, in a year’s time after the election, or whenever, there will still be those two remaining issues: the issue of full decommissioning and the issue of an end to paramilitarism and criminality. We said quite clearly in our meeting that [while] we were prepared to do – and still prepared to do – all the unpalatable issues, we could not solve the issue of decommissioning or paramilitarism. It was only they, on the other side of the table, who could do that.
Commitment to inclusivity: “We make it clear to this day, that despite all that, we’re still in favour of inclusivity. Given the fact that the vast majority of the people on this island, both North and South, voted for a blueprint for the future of this island, we believe they did so on the basis of including both communities. So we believe, despite all the difficulties, that we still have a duty – given the fact that we brought the process so far to the eleventh hour, to the last hurdle – that we still have a duty to investigate and to try and bring it further, and to help those who have these two key issues to deliver.
Responsibility of Provisional movement: “As the Taoiseach said in the Dail this week, in response to the statement by Caoimhín Ó Caolain, we are listening to what you are saying but really, and this is our position, it is up to you. It is up to you to convince not only the governments but also the wider community that, despite all the difficulties of bank raids and previous robberies that have taken place – and we’re quite clear were carried out by the Provisional movement – and indeed by the punishment beatings and shootings that took place as if a tap had been turned on. We got an indication on the 6th of December that it was not possible to produce a photograph, that it was not possible to put in the words in the statement, in relation to not endangering the personal safety and lives of individuals. We published the documents two days later.
Punishment beatings and shootings: “On the 7th December, for the first time in months, the first punishment shooting occurred in Belfast, again clearly indicated not by the PSNI, but by our own sources – and we have officials in Belfast resident all the time. They indicated to us clearly that it was on behalf of the Provisional IRA. After that, from then on, quite a number – about four or five – punishment beatings took place. Before the 7th December, virtually none had taken place during all the discussions that we had.
Finality: “It raises the question: while there is a peace process, there has to be finality in relation to it. And we have to ask: do people want finality to the peace process, or do they want a never-ending peace process, a peace process that is always in crisis, that rumbles from crisis to crisis? This constant crisis, it really diverts attention, in our view, from the real politics that go on in relation to economic and social policies, and the real investigation and the questioning by people like yourselves, both North and South, about the type of policies that political parties have. And I think that’s even more so in the case of Sinn Fein. To a certain extent, everyone thinks that the only issue on the agenda is the peace process, and going from one crisis to the other. But there are other issues, and to a certain extent the constant never-ending peace process does divert Mike Reade’s attention, and all the other media people’s attention, and indeed ordinary individuals, from the type of policies that are being espoused by a party like Sinn Féin.
Why are we questioning? “The very fact that we are questioning – we as a government and I as a member of a constitutional republican party who have the same ideals of Irish unity, who are prepared to work for Irish unity, but not on the basis of violence putting it further and further back, not on the basis of 30 years of what in our view was detrimental to the unification of this country – the very fact that we are questioning the authenticity and the type of trust and confidence that we thought we had with the people we were dealing with is extremely significant, and I think it has to be, I suppose, put up in lights there. But someone like Bertie Ahern particularly, who has invested 10 years of his life in this process, a huge amount of work behind the scenes, a huge amount of work that he could be doing on other issues in relation to the running of this State. People have to ask the question: why are we questioning at this juncture? Because we believe that all the other acts of completion that Tony Blair referred to in that speech to do with the Joint Declaration, that all of the acts of completion are there on the table, the two governments are prepared to do their bit, the two final acts of completion are significant ones, they are the ones that are the key because they are the ones that the people on this island voted to finalise.
North-South bodies and all-island economy: “It is unfortunate that we have a peace process that is stop-start, stop-start. It means that all the structures, particularly the North-South structures, have been hamstrung. I as a constitutional republican, my party, our supporters and I think the vast majority of the people in the Republic and indeed in the North, had great difficulty in regard to the issue of Articles 2 and 3 in the Constitution and the deleting of those, but we did that and we sold that on the basis that the North-South dimension of the Good Friday Agreement was the way forward where we could in effect deal on an equal basis with bodies in the North to the mutual benefit of all of us on this island.
“So the quid pro quo for Articles 2 and 3 were the North-South bodies and the mushrooming of those bodies. Unfortunately they have been hamstrung by the constant stop-start of the peace process which is not good from our point of view or from indeed all of our citizens’ point of view. I say this as someone born and bred in the border area… I don’t want to be over-critical of parties, but for years and years we have heard about all-island and all-Ireland institutions. I well remember, and I say this as somebody who was a minister in the area of energy and telecommunications, we have parties now espousing all-island policies in relation to electricity: literally week in, week out, the electricity interconnector in my constituency was blown up. Again in relation to transport: we have policies coming out now about all-island transport policies: literally every week the rail line was bombed and people were injured. Thankfully we’ve moved away from that.
Practical benefits of all-island economy: “The benefits of an all-island economy are there for everyone to see. For the first time in my life my own area is blossoming, the way it should have done for decades but didn’t because of the conflict on the island, because we weren’t allowed because of the conflict. Who would come to our area, either as a tourist, or as an industrialist to look at our area because of the violence? What better place to site something, halfway between Dublin and Belfast, slap bang between the two centres of population, but it’s only now that the benefits of the peace process are being seen in that area. I say those things because that’s what we are losing, and the potential, if we don’t continue at it.
Gas pipeline: “I was part of a government who dedicated 12.7 million euro towards a gas pipeline in the North. The Department of Finance told the government quite clearly – as they normally would anyway – that there was absolutely no economic rationale for the southern Irish taxpayer giving money across the border for a gas pipeline. The government decided we would do it anyway, we decided that in the interests of cross-community and cross-border cooperation we would do it.
Electricity interconnector: “I was Minister for Energy in relation to electricity particularly. As a result of discussions that have gone on between the Northern minister and myself we now will have a better and bigger electricity interconnector which we badly need in order to transfer electricity particularly from North to South. …These are all practical things that will benefit if the politicians are allowed to get on with the issue of the peace process.
Sometime back, as you know the economy is burgeoning here, there was a difficulty in relation to the capacity of electricity. As a result of a ten-year contract between the ESB and Ballylumford in the North, hundreds of jobs – not nationalist jobs, most of them would be unionist jobs – were saved…..That plant in Ballylumford was actually going to close. That’s a practical manifestation of the benefits.
Again the issue of road and rail interconnection, the issue of tourism which is now dealt with on an all-island basis, mainly for the benefit more particularly of the North rather than the South. We need to get on with these acts, these practical aspects. We can’t do it at the moment because we are hamstrung. We would far rather do it on the basis of dealing with people from the North as ministers, from both traditions, working in harmony because they know and we know that this island can be better and better.
Responsibility on all to promote the peace process: “I agree with Julitta when she said the peace process was not just for the politicians. I’ve said it constantly time and time again that we can only put on paper what we believe are the parameters that the people live to and work with. It is up to trade unions, the employers, the voluntary community sector, the farmers and all aspects of Irish life North and South to promote this peace process more and more. I do say, not in a critical way, that we have to adopt this attitude given that the two remaining key issues are something not in our part… but the sooner that the impasse is over, the work on the Good Friday Agreement in relation to north, south, east and west, will accelerate.
IRA have to go away: “I would just finally say at this gathering, I would appeal to the Provisional movement to listen to the will of the Irish people. It is the epitome of republicanism that those people who espouse republicanism would listen to the will of the people. And the people’s will was expressed, whether they like it or not, in 1998 under the Good Friday Agreement. I’ll end by saying that Gerry Adams said ‘they haven’t gone away you know’, but I say they have to go away.”
Chair (Michael Reade): “Minister, before we go on to the next speaker, just on a point of clarification: you mentioned about the photograph which is to some degree a secondary issue but obviously a very significant issue if a deal is to be reached. You said that you were told in December that it wouldn’t be possible to produce a photograph. Was there an indication as far as you were concerned that that was around the corner last December?
Dermot Ahern, TD: “There was clearly an indication, and there was discussion about a photograph. Constantly as always in these discussions it would be said to us ‘that’s a matter for the IRA’ and ‘we have to go to the IRA’. Now again I would remind people of our solid view based on solid Garda Siochana intelligence that there is no dividing line between the Sinn Fein leadership and the IRA leadership, so, as far as we were concerned, when we were discussing the issue of a photograph, it was clearly on the table, but I have to say that whatever possibility there was for a photograph was blown out of the water, I think we accept that, after Dr Paisley’s speech in Ballymena.”
Chair: Our next speaker is Dominic Bradley, MLA for Newry and Armagh, SDLP candidate in the forthcoming Westminster elections and the party’s spokesperson on Education and the Irish language…..
2. Dominic Bradley, MLA (SDLP)
“…Tá an-athas orm beith anseo I gContae na Mí leis an Grúpa Síochána anseo….. I would like to thank the Meath Peace Group for inviting me here today to speak on where now for the Good Friday Agreement. I was in the College here previously, I came as a schoolboy playing in a basketball tournament, and stayed for the weekend and really enjoyed my time here. It is nice to be back in Dalgan Park again.
“As Michael said, I am the MLA for the SDLP in Newry and Armagh. I come from South Armagh. I was brought up in a small linen village called Bessbrook which is a mixed community. I was brought up side by side with people of a unionist outlook and I am glad to say that the village is still mixed and that community relations there are excellent to this day. My mother used to say to me: “son, wherever you go don’t tell them you’re from Bessbrook.” I was a bit baffled by that so I said to her one day: “ma, why shouldn’t I tell them I’m from Bessbrook?” And she said, “they’d only be jealous of you!” So I’m proud to be from Bessbrook, from County Armagh and from South Armagh.”
Referendum on Good Friday Agreement (1998): “Just to focus in on our topic for discussion here this evening… I think it is useful to look back on where we have come from. To start with I would like to go back to the day that the Good Friday Agreement was approved by the people of Ireland, because, as a party of true republicanism, what the Irish people have willed is what the SDLP is determined to uphold. That day in May 1998 was one of great optimism for the people of Ireland, both North and South, a day when all the people of Ireland were able to vote together for the first time. Their first act of self-determination since 1918. And on that day by clear majorities North and South, the Irish people voted for partnership. They voted for progress and they voted for peace.
Situation today: “Yet now we find ourselves in the position that our institutions have been frozen by suspension. We find progress halted by the dead hand of direct rule and we find our peace threatened by criminality.
What has gone wrong? “Well we might ask ourselves at this point in time: what has gone wrong? Where has the hope and the heady optimism of 1998 gone? Some people argue that the Good Friday Agreement has let us down. But it is my absolute conviction that the Agreement has not failed us. Rather, parties and paramilitaries have failed the Agreement. First of all, we had David Trimble who tried to breach the Agreement by demanding prior decommissioning. Then we had the DUP. They tried to overthrow the Agreement by demanding renegotiation. Now we see the Provisional movement undermining the Agreement through criminality. None of this is what the people of Ireland voted for in May of 1998. None of this is what they want. All of this is a perversion of the will of the people of Ireland. There are some people who don’t take seriously what the people of Ireland voted for. Some people who believe that you can change whatever you like and fall short whenever you need to. I disagree with that. When the people of Ireland express their will, it is the duty I believe of all true democrats to follow.
Duty of Provisional movement: “That is why it is the duty of the Provisional movement now to wind up, as the Minister has said, their criminality, to scrap their guns and to work with the rest of us to secure the rule of law in every part of Ireland.
Loyalist paramilitaries: “The same applies to loyalist paramilitaries who terrorise the nationalist community and who poison their own communities with drugs. They don’t have much of a democratic mandate, but they have a democratic obligation to comply with what the people of Ireland, North and South, voted for.
Nationalists did not vote for criminality: “And just because Sinn Fein does have a democratic mandate, it does not mean that they can cite it to excuse, diminish or deny IRA crime. Because no nationalist voted for Robert McCartney’s throat to be cut. No nationalist voted for Sinn Fein to try to cover up the truth about his murder. No nationalist voted for families to be held hostage and threatened with death. When Sinn Fein hide criminality behind their mandate, they fall short of the democratic standards of the Irish people. And they insult the decent standards of their own voters. Nationalists did not protest for civil rights only to have the right to life of families threatened. Generations did not campaign for justice only to find their elected politicians covering up murder.
Criminality is wrecking the Agreement: “The SDLP respects Sinn Fein’s mandate. We have opposed silly sanctions and exclusion. It is time that Sinn Fein showed the same respect for their mandate and, instead of covering up criminality, worked to end it. Because criminality is ruining the peace process. It is wrecking the Agreement. And it is playing right into the DUP’s destructive agenda, just indeed as Sinn Fein in the negotiations played right into their agenda, they gave the DUP sweeping new vetoes. They accepted not a single extra North-South body or area of cooperation. They even colluded with the DUP to create a new form of automatic exclusion to be used against democratic parties. Why? Because Sinn Fein were not negotiating for national interest. They were protecting the Provisional movement’s self-interest. Getting a blind eye turned to their criminality. Getting an amnesty for the on-the-runs. Ensuring no sight of their decommissioned guns. And what in the end of the day was their “deal breaker”? Release of the killers of Garda McCabe. So much for an Ireland of equals.
SDLP alternative: “The SDLP offers an alternative. The SDLP offers a better way to a better Ireland. We stand strong against paramilitarism and we stand strong for the Agreement. We stand for both a lawful society and an inclusive democracy. We are convinced that this crisis can be overcome and the battle for peace and inclusive democracy won.
Message to the Governments: “Our message to the Governments is clear. Press ahead with the Agreement. Implement it in full. If you want people to know the Agreement is the only agenda, you must show them that it is the only agenda. The announcement of the closure of Girdwood and Oldpark barracks was an important step in the right direction. Now deliver more to ensure a normal, equal, shared society that the Agreement promised. Above all, get politics working again. Just because we cannot get an inclusive Executive right now, there is no reason why things should be left in stalemate. The SDLP have proposals for getting the Agreement moving. They get us out of the rut of suspension without taking us down the dead end of exclusion. They deserve to be implemented. Under our plans, we would end suspension right now. We would restore the Assembly and the North/South institutions straight away. The Assembly would then have six weeks to appoint a new inclusive Executive. If they do, well and good. But if, as may be likely, they don’t we should not just accept suspension of all the institutions just because we cannot get the Executive working right now. Instead, the two Governments should nominate people to run the departments and all of the rest of the Agreement can work on.
Message to the paramilitaries: “Our message to the paramilitaries is firm. Your day is done. We want all paramilitaries – loyalist and republican – off our backs so that our communities can get off their knees.
Message to the political parties: “Our message to the parties of Ireland is strong. Now is the time to reconvene the Forum for Peace and Reconciliation. Now is the time for all parties to set the standards for democracy on the island of Ireland for the 21st century.
We can stand together against paramilitarism, be it republican or loyalist. We can stand together for the Good Friday Agreement. We can remind the DUP, and indeed Sinn Fein, that while they have a mandate, it is not greater than the mandate that the people of Ireland gave the Agreement.
Message to the people: “Above all, our message to the people is sound. The SDLP will work for a stronger mandate to protect the Agreement. Our approach at Leeds Castle in the face of DUP wreckers could not have been better and our mandate will be stronger. If people support parties that have let the Agreement down, they will only keep letting the Agreement down. If they back people who deliver less, they will never deliver more. Above all, what gets rewarded gets repeated. The best way to force the pace on unionists and to force peace from paramilitaries is for people now to show stronger support for the approach of the SDLP. Go raibh mile maith agaibh.”
Chair (Michael Reade): “Just briefly, have the more recent talks been inclusive enough to your satisfaction?
Dominic Bradley: “I think we were probably disappointed that the approach taken by the two governments was to concentrate on the two largest parties, the DUP and Sinn Fein, and to some extent ourselves and other parties were left out in the wings. This has not been helpful. That approach has not delivered comprehensive agreement. The SDLP policy has always been inclusivity, and I’m glad to hear the Minister echoing that here tonight. It was an inclusive approach which led to the Good Friday Agreement in the first place and I think it is an inclusive approach which will lead to the implementation of the Good Friday Agreement in the future.”
Chairperson: “Thank you very much, Dominic… Our third and final speaker is Sinn Fein’s John O’Dowd, MLA for Upper Bann. He is the party’s spokesperson on health in the Assembly and also Sinn Fein’s group leader in the Assembly.
3. John O’Dowd, MLA (Sinn Fein)
“First of all I would like to thank the organisers for their invitation tonight. I used to holiday around here in my early teens, my uncle lives across the back fields here and I used to swim in the outdoor pool in this area as well, as a young child. I have very fond memories of around here, and indeed a local priest who attended to my father when he was very ill was a Columban who is buried here……so I’m back on familiar ground. I listened attentively to the Minister’s speech tonight. I was pleased that we are having a diplomatic but firm and structured conversation. Megaphone diplomacy is not going to solve this problem. Insulting each other is not going to solve this problem. I was disheartened by Dominic’s approach but during the question and answer session we can deal with all of those bits that people have on their minds tonight.
Sinn Fein will not tolerate criminality: “As a republican representative I have responsibilities, as has my party. I will answer and live up to those responsibilities as will my party. We do not underestimate the seriousness of the situation. People across Ireland are concerned that the peace process appears to be in free fall and that ten years of good work and progress is being cast aside. But let me state this again, as a republican representative, as a SF elected representative and as leader of the Assembly group in the Assembly: no republican worthy of the name, whether they be a republican in the Fianna Fail party, or a republican in the SDLP, can be a criminal. They have no room in the ranks of Sinn Féin or any other political party. We in Sinn Fein will not tolerate such behaviour. Our opponents know that, but some can barely disguise their glee at the recent turn of events. There has been trial by media. This night last week, every security journalist on this island was popping up in front of the cameras telling us the rank of each of those people who had been arrested, what rank they were in the IRA down in Cork, how long they had served in the IRA, how many years, what their rank was, what they were doing. Each and everyone of those people has been released, except for one who has been charged with membership of a dissident organisation. And that person has the same right to a fair and open trial as everyone else.
“The only Sinn Fein member arrested on that night has been released without charge, no papers sent to the DPP, nothing. And remember, in this State you can be sentenced for IRA membership on the word of a senior Garda, so if there was even an inkling of guilt there a senior Guard could have stood up in a court of law and said “I believe that person to be a member of the IRA”, and the judge could sentence him to five years. None of that happened. So I say to people here: do not listen to the Jim Cusacks of this world. Listen, and let the Garda investigations continue, and let the truth come out as to what happened.
Criticism of Sinn Fein not new: “Sinn Fein will weather the storm. We’ve been through all this before. Yes this is an intense time of criticism of Sinn Fein. I joined Sinn Fein when I was 18, nineteen years ago. I cannot remember this time when we were great pals with all the other political parties. Journalists will now tell you that Sinn Fein is going through a very bad time, they are isolated from the other parties. I never remember a time when we weren’t, I never remember a time when Sinn Fein was treated like any other political party. Yes certainly Bertie Ahern, Albert Reynolds, all have done massive work for the peace process. We have moved this country on, beyond anyone’s belief even ten years ago, but don’t try and kid me that all those political parties were doing Sinn Féin a favour. Some of the people involved in the whole peace process and across the board were genuine, so they were. I have no doubt that Bertie Ahern, Albert Reynolds and indeed the Foreign Affairs Minister are genuine in what they are doing, but they are not doing it to drag Sinn Fein in from the cold. Sinn Féin elected representatives were brought into this process by their mandate.
Irish unity: “Moving on to Mr Ahern’s comments in relation to all-Ireland work. I am delighted at the work he outlined here tonight. I am delighted that the Minister recognises the need for all-Ireland work, and I hope it continues. This morning I was in Dublin where Sinn Fein launched its campaign for a Green Paper on Irish unity. In 1992 Sinn Fein published a document Towards a Lasting Peace in Ireland, which set out our party’s present peace policy. That document set out the development and evolution of the peace process. This morning we set out our road map for Irish unity, to urge the Irish Government to bring forward a Green Paper and to begin effective planning for Irish unity now. Caoimhin O Caolain said, and I say now, that no party, including my own, has a monopoly on unification. The struggle for Irish independence is not something that is owned by a political party, or a brand useful for electoral purposes.
South Korea: “I acknowledge the Minister has said that his party is committed to unification. I acknowledge Dominic’s party a number of weekends ago in Derry published a document outlining their road map to reunification, and I welcome and congratulate that initiative. But it’s not enough. Let me use a rather different country as an example. In the mid 1950s the South Korean government set up a Ministry of Unification. The sole role of this body is to work for the reunification of Korea. For decades this body has been building links… working on economic initiatives, bringing divided communities together across the most militarised border left in the world. And driving it all is the certainty and hope of the Korean people to be united. It is a certainty I am sure my colleagues on this platform share about the future of the Irish people, whatever community they belong to. But the difference is the South Koreans are planning for it, preparing for it, facing the challenges that will come about with the merger of the two health systems, two economic systems, two education systems.
Government’s responsibility: “We’re conscious that Sinn Fein don’t know all the answers, but we want the debate to start. We want the search for the answers to begin, and the onus of responsibility for this must lie foremost on the Irish Government who need to transform the aspiration for Irish unity into a real goal and to work towards that goal. We are urging the Taoiseach to commission a Green Paper on Irish Unity as the key starting point. All strands of opinion represented in the Oireachtas should be participants in this, and that is why we want to see an all-party Oireachtas Committee on Irish Unity established. We are proposing that a Minister of State should be appointed by the Irish Government with specific responsibility of driving forward the developing policies, actions and strategies to advance the outcome of the Green Paper and to direct and coordinate the government’s all-Ireland politics. Participation by people resident in the North in the democratic life of the nation should be facilitated immediately: bring in Northern representation in the Houses of the Oireachtas and voting rights at Presidential elections. That was one matter in the deal that came apart that Fianna Fail could now move on with. Are they telling us that because Sinn Fein and the DUP can’t agree that Northern elected representatives shouldn’t have speaking rights in the Dail? That doesn’t make sense to me.
“The Irish Government in consultation with the social partners and the community sector, and the non-governmental organisations should begin a process of economic planning on an all-Ireland basis. I emphasise this is not just about the achievement of Irish unity at some time in the future. It is about making a real difference to people’s lives in the here and now. We need to see …coordination of public services, like health, education and transport, maximising the benefits for everyone who shares this island
“I want to invite ordinary members and supporters of Fianna Fail in particular to engage in this debate, and to begin very seriously to assess how the stated aim of their party can be achieved. I would like to invite anyone with an interest to borrow from our ideas and to bring forward their own. Sinn Fein has no copyright on the road map to Irish unity, but most importantly this is an opportunity for the people the length and breadth of this island to play their part in the great project of reuniting our country and our people.
Unionist and loyalist community: “We acknowledge our obligation to reach out to the people on the island who presently do not see a role for themselves in a future Irish Republic, who see themselves as British or unionist. An Irish Republic that is not inclusive of these people as it must be inclusive of new arrivals to our shore from Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe, is not the republic I want to build. We need especially to reach out to the unionist and loyalist working classes who find themselves economically marginalised and abandoned by unionist leaderships.
Sinn Fein support: “Some might ask if the republican cart is before the horse in terms of coming forward with these ideas in the current political climate… The accusations of criminality against Sinn Fein are without foundation. People looking at the Independent poll in this morning’s newspaper will no doubt be asking themselves why in a period of most sustained political and media onslaught on our political party since the historic ceasefire in ’94, our party’s support has remained static. Indeed, Pat Kenny wondered this morning on RTE radio what their continued support for the party said about these people. Pat should understand that these people are ordinary everyday Irish citizens. Sinn Fein voters do not have horns on their heads, their eyes are not closer together, they are ordinary people from every section on this island, 342,000 of them come out in a secret ballot of their own choice, go into the polling station and vote for Sinn Fein. The reality is that the people of this country, and the growing republican vote repudiate… attacks on our party, the baseless accusations made without any evidence, they compare this to their personal experience of Sinn Fein. They compare their experience of Joe Reilly, delivering for the people of Meath, as an innovative campaigner in his local community, as a tireless fighter to vindicate the rights of his constituents. They compare the slurs on the character of Aonghus Ó Snodaigh, T.D., with the picture they have of the man motivated in politics not by greed or careerism, but from a desire to better his community. In short they see through the nonsense, they see through the lies, and more and more they ask themselves: what is the agenda behind this?
“…I spent part of the day in the main shopping centre in Navan, canvassing along with Joe [Reilly] and a few other colleagues. Only one person asked me about the Northern bank robbery, everyone else wanted to know about road infrastructure, schools, hospitals, jobs, etc. That is the debate that is going on out there, not about the Northern Bank robbery. Let me tell you that Sinn Féin will continue to build political support and adopt dynamic policies. The importance of this cannot be over-stressed. It’s worth remembering that in the North we are the largest pro-Agreement party and on the island itself we are the third largest party.
DUP walked away from the deal: “So what of the IRA? No doubt the question will arise tonight, it’s already been mentioned by the Minister and by Dominic… The work of republicans – imagine a republican saying this ten or twenty or thirty years ago – the work of republicans is to create a situation where the IRA no longer exists…. Can you imagine that being said 20 or 20 or 30 years ago? I see Roy Garland in the audience. Through Roy’s experience that has to be an unbelievable statement. What the IRA offered in the December talks, and indeed in October 2003, if it had been offered in any other field of conflict across the globe, it would have been snapped up.
“The DUP decided to walk away from it. I’m glad that the Minister recognised tonight that the statement made in Ballymena by Mr Paisley – the “sackcloth and ashes” – destroyed that. It wasn’t an unfortunate statement. It was a planned statement. It was written by his son, Ian Paisley Óg, who is opposed to any agreement on any grounds, not only with republicans but with nationalists. On the platform that night with Ian Paisley and Ian Paisley’s son was Alan Murray, former head of the RUC Special Branch. Alan Murray led the raid by the PSNI into Stormont buildings 27 months ago which brought down the Stormont Executive. 27 months on from then, not one of the five people who were charged have been brought to trial, in fact two have been released without further charge, no evidence, and the serious charges brought against those people, of spying on the NIO, have been dropped. Now, people ask us to join up to that police force, people ask us to have faith in that police force! Alan Murray was the sidekick of Ian Paisley the night Ian Paisley destroyed the chance of an agreement. “
British Army presence: “Sinn Fein’s role is to remove all guns from Irish politics. When the Minister looks out his window in the morning and looks across the Mourne Mountains and across the North, I wonder does he see the British Army spy posts that ring South Armagh, does he see the British Army helicopters, does he see the British Army foot patrols as do people in my constituency? The British Army still control my constituency, after 7 years of the Good Friday Agreement.
IRA not the only difficulty: “The IRA have a responsibility to deal with the issues that the IRA have. The republican goal is to remove the IRA from the field, but they are not the only difficulty facing the Northern peace process. Dominic referred to the DUP as the wreckers. We haven’t heard that since December. When the deal fell apart, young Alan McBride, who lost his wife and his daughter in the Shankill bombing by the IRA, and who has every right to hate, despise and mistrust republicans, turned round in a media interview and challenged Ian Paisley as to why he walked away from that deal. I think that was the fear more than anything, that ordinary workingclass Protestants were beginning to question their own political leadership and that is why we are in the crisis we are in today. Thank you.”
Chair (Michael Reade): “Thank you… Very briefly, I get the impression that you implied there was some sort of slur campaign against Joe Reilly in this [by-election] campaign, did I hear that right? Has Joe Reilly been in some way targeted in this by-election campaign because of the impasse?
John O’Dowd: “No I don’t believe so.”
Chair (Michael Reade): “I didn’t understand you correctly. Now I’m going to take questions and I hope people will be as brief as possible….”
QUESTIONS AND COMMENTS (Summary)
Q1. Henry Mountcharles: “I have two questions for the Minister, and two questions for John O’Dowd.
(i) Release of McCabe killers: “First of all, Minister, you referred to ‘unpalatable things’. I wanted to know whether you were specifically including in this the release of the killers of Garda McCabe?
(ii) Sinn Fein’s economic policy: “Secondly, in my view quite rightly, you made reference to this constant crisis in the peace process and that this distracted political parties from real politics. In that context I wanted to know whether you agree with your colleague, Dr. James McDaid, who described Sinn Féin as being economically illiterate?
(iii) & (iv) Murder of Robert McCartney: “John O’Dowd, in your remarks you said, with reference to criminality, “Sinn Féin will not tolerate such behaviour” In that respect I would like to ask you a few questions: do you know the identity of the person or persons who were responsible for the murder of Robert McCartney, and would you recommend anyone who does know the identity of the person or persons who killed Robert McCartney to go to the PSNI?
Dermot Ahern, TD: (i) “In relation to the unpalatable things, yes, the release of Garda Jerry McCabe’s killers was one of the unpalatable things which was put on the agenda as one of the key issues that had to be addressed in a comprehensive agreement. It was put on the agenda by Sinn Féin and they made it quite clear that it had to be one of the issues dealt with in the acts of completion, the comprehensive settlement. It was indicated in the context of an overall settlement, that if all of the issues including full decommissioning and an end to paramiltarism etc… that the Government would look at that issue.
(ii) Sinn Fein’s economic policy: “In relation to the constant crisis, while I wouldn’t particularly agree perhaps with the hyperbole of “economically illiterate”, I do make the point very strongly that this constant crisis in the peace process does divert all our attentions, particularly in the Republic, from the economic policies of Sinn Féin. I made a statement in Hillsborough which was misconstrued. I said that I do look forward to the day when Sinn Féin are in government. I didn’t say that I wanted them in government with Fianna Fail. In fact, they would be the least likely party as far as I would be concerned with whom I would want to coalesce, particularly in relation to the issue of economic policy.
“Because I don’t think there is anybody in this room who actually knows what the policy is in relation to dramatic increases in taxation which they put into their policy document no later than the last local election. Nobody questioned them in the media. The only organ that I actually saw doing a forensic examination of Sinn Féin’s economic policies, and their desire for a 32-county socialist republic, the only organ in my view was an excellent article, or series of articles, in the Irish Examiner where they went through line by line the implications of the economic policies of Sinn Féin which was, in effect, I would say, all things to all men and women. So, while I wouldn’t describe them as economically illiterate – I do think that we have to pay respect to political parties and the policy documents that they bring out – but I do say that our attention, the public’s attention, to their other policies has been clouded and diverted by the constant crisis in the peace process.
Chair: “Thank you. John O’Dowd, if I could ask you to restrict your answer to the two specific questions asked of you…
John O’Dowd, MLA: (iii) & (iv) “…I personally do not know the name of the person who killed Robert McCartney. But I repeat what was said the day after that murder happened: anyone who feels comfortable going to the PSNI with information should do so. Anyone who does not feel comfortable going to the PSNI should contact a solicitor or a respected member of the community. Now, while that stance of Sinn Féin has been criticised, especially by the SDLP, it is worth noting that after the investigation by the Police Ombudsman into the murder of Sean Browne, a senior GAA official in south Derry … and the Ombudsman’s office found that the police investigation was a shambles, when the PSNI went to reinvestigate that murder, they published leaflets and posters stating “anyone who does not want to contact us, go to their solicitor, or local priest”…And Mr Adams turned around today and said – reflecting the views of Mr Ahern – that it “is the patriotic duty of anyone with information on the murder of Robert McCartney to bring that forward so that the families can receive justice…”
Questioner: “I think I am right in saying that unless statements are given directly to the PSNI, they are hearsay and not admissible in court. I’m sure the Minister as a former solicitor could confirm that?”
John O’Dowd, MLA: “Perhaps you could ask the PSNI as to why they issued those leaflets in south Derry when they reopened their investigation into the murder of Sean Browne?”
Dermot Ahern, TD: “While people could give statements to solicitors, the key issue is whether they would go into court and publicly give evidence. I didn’t refer to the McCartney issue, I don’t want to be accused of playing politics, but I will say this: the family clearly stated to me that they knew the people involved and that literally everyone in the community knew the people involved, that there were at least 50 people who were clear witnesses to the incident and none of them have come forward. And many of them were leading members of Sinn Féin, who worked for Sinn Féin, in the area, and are well-known as workers for Sinn Féin. So, it’s quite clear, and I am just making the point that was made to me, I am not making it in a political way, that they said to me while statements of Gerry Adams publicly exhorting people to go to the appropriate authorities, whatever they were in his mind, that the action on the ground has not been followed on by those people. And they were people saying that who quite clearly and specifically said that they voted for Sinn Féin over the years.”
Chair: “Just one point, is it acceptable to Sinn Féin if the end result in this McCartney murder is that senior members of the IRA, or IRA members of any description, are arrested by the PSNI and then taken to court?
John O’Dowd, MLA: “Whoever is guilty for the murder of Robert McCartney, whether it was a republican or otherwise, we support the terms of the family in this, that they receive justice, and in the family’s terms that is through the courts”.
Q2. Cllr. Brian Fitzgerald (former Labour TD for Meath); disappointment with Sinn Féin: “….Like a lot of people I feel badly let down, because I, like others took a lot of risks over the years to try to bring Sinn Féin in from the cold. You claimed that the only reason Sinn Féin were being brought in from the cold was because of their mandate. That is not correct. They did not have a mandate when they were brought in from the cold, because they only had then started to recognise this State, they refused to recognise our courts, they refused to recognise Dail Éireann, and in fairness to people like Albert Reynolds and the Downing Street Declaration was the real commencement of bringing Sinn Féin in from the cold. And the reason I feel so disappointed is when I read on a daily basis the refusal of Sinn Féin and their colleagues to define what is a crime. There is no doubt in our minds as to what is a crime. A crime is a crime whether we are talking about Robert McCartney, or any other person, or indeed Dominic’s colleague, John Fee, who was beaten within an inch of his life. That is a crime in my eyes.
“So please don’t come here and start telling us we are all against you. We have not been against you. We’ve bent over backwards to bring you in from the cold, as Dermot has already said. We’ve done everything possible. What I would like to ask you is, if you’re not prepared to decommission, if you’re not prepared to end criminality, will you please ask the IRA to say three words: that their military war is over, and that will go a long way in restoring peace on this island.”
John O’Dowd: “Could I just ask what political party are you a member of?”
Cllr. Fitzgerald: “I’m asking you…” [interruptions]
Chair: “He’s an independent, former Labour TD…”.
John O’Dowd, MLA: “…. I’m delighted to hear more and more people are taking an interest in the peace process… but if you had been following the whole issue right up to December, and had seen what the IRA were prepared to do, the IRA were prepared to leave the field of conflict, they were prepared to put all their weapons beyond use by Christmas, and the DUP walked away, and were allowed to walk away. This issue of criminality was brought up by Mary Harney in the Dail when she got Bertie Ahern out of the room. She brought it up in the Dail when Bertie Ahern was out of the room… Now who is the lead party in the Coalition? Is it the PDs or is it Fianna Fail?
Chair: “We’ve gone a bit away from the question…”
Dermot Ahern, TD; re IRA statement in December: “I just want to make a point. That was the first time the issue was vented in public. There was constant discussion on the issue of the words used and the inability of Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness to arrange, call it what you like, that the words “not endangering the personal safety and lives of public individuals.” They were not prepared to put those into the statement, which, well before Mary Harney got up on her feet, raised the issue as to why they were not prepared to say that …I want to make that quite clear. The efforts to try and suggest that there is some tail wagging some dog in government, that is not correct. We are absolutely ad idem in relation to this.”
Chair: “I’m just getting some information that I am sure will be of interest… apparently in the last hour there was a statement issued by the IRA stating that three IRA members have been expelled in relation to the Robert McCartney murder… I’ll take the next question.”
Q3. Roy Garland (Ulster Unionist, Belfast); re Irish unity: “I was very interested in all that has been said. I’m particularly struck by the way that John O’Dowd emphasised the Irish unity thing. I want to ask you why?
“You said that in Navan the questions people were asking were about housing, social issues and so on. It begs the question… It seems to me that many working class unionists whom you talked about would find no problem with that, in fact I think you could get votes if that was all it was about, ordinary everyday issues. But the united Ireland thing, in view of the fact that the unionist community has faced 30-odd years of constant barrage, killing, shooting and maiming, obviously a complex issue, towns and villages absolutely destroyed. I grew up in the Shankill, I know Alan McBride, I knew the fish shop that was blown up, the time that Alan McBride’s relatives were killed, in fact a distant relative of mine was killed there, I went in there as a kid with my mother, I still remember it. That community was devastated by what the IRA did. If you’re promoting unity, particularly if you still have an armed wing, and in view of the hurt that has caused, is it not first of all counter productive, and why do you insist on it as being so important, I thought you were going to say it was a sacred duty, and when it is so alienating to us as unionists, why do you persist when it seems so counter-productive?”
John O’Dowd, MLA: “I’m not the only person at the table who supports a united Ireland.
In fairness, the unionist community are not the only people who suffered during the 30 years of conflict. The uncle that I mentioned at the start, the reason he had to move was because his two sons and his brother were shot dead in the house on the one night. The unionist community are not the only people who suffered….Now, in relation to Irish unity, it is the stated political goal of Sinn Féin that we believe in reunification of the island of Ireland. We believe in it because it is economically viable, and it is the right of the Irish people to live in the one nation. Now, we want the unionist community to come in on that debate. I don’t expect the unionist community to roll over …..they have a major role to play in any re-unified State. They will make up over one million of the population in a united Ireland, they are less than 2% of the United Kingdom. Where do their economic loyalties lie? I am not lecturing unionists but in my opinion, unionism will flourish better in a united Ireland than it has done under partition.”
Dominic Bradley, MLA: “Could I come in here? The SDLP also believes in Irish unity. We believe that the institutions of the Good Friday Agreement can work within a united Ireland and that the unionist population will have the same rights and protections afforded to nationalists currently under the Agreement. But I think that the way we get to Irish unity is through cooperation, working together and persuading the unionist population. And I think it is a democratic principle that political parties have the right to persuade those who are opposed to them to come round to their point of view. And indeed the SDLP has done this down through the years. Sunningdale was opposed by Sinn Féin, by the DUP and by elements of the Ulster Unionist Party. The SDLP worked at that formula, they didn’t give it up until it was encapsulated again in the Good Friday Agreement.
“If Sinn Féin seriously want to persuade unionists that they can be trusted to be partners with them in a united Ireland, well they are going to have to become a totally peaceful and political party. The Provisional movement at the moment, as the Taoiseach has pointed out, and as those of us who live in the North know, is two sides of the same coin. There is a military wing and there is a political wing, and there is an overlap in membership somewhere there. We are aware of that. If the criminality which the Minister mentioned earlier on continues – for example my own constituent Frank Kerr was murdered in a post office robbery in Newry, constituents of mine have been beaten up in punishment beatings, horrific punishment beatings where they were battered with nail-encrusted sticks within an inch of their lives to the extent that their skin was torn off their backs – if this continues, it’s not going to convince anybody that Sinn Féin can be trusted as partners in a united Ireland. Danny Morrison once espoused the policy of “the ballot box in one hand and the armalite in the other”. That policy, as far as I can see, still continues. The ballot box is still in one hand, it might be more stuffed with votes now, but the armalite is still there as a silent threat, the paramilitary wing is still there as a silent threat, and those things are used as bargaining chips in the peace process and this stop-start element in the peace process suits that type of bargaining.”
John O’Dowd, MLA: “Could I just ask Dominic, if all these things are true, why did people in Newry-Armagh, in his constituency, go into the privacy of a polling booth and outvote his party in Sinn Féin’s favour two to one?
Dominic Bradley, MLA: “I think that nationalists in the North, like people in the SDLP and in other parties, have attempted to give Sinn Féin the space to rid themselves of criminality and of the connection with a paramilitary organisation. I believe that Sinn Féin have not yet lived up to the expectations of that mandate. “
Q4. Steve McColl (Ulster Unionist, Belfast). “I have two questions…
(i) “Question for John O’Dowd, what does the principle of consent mean in the Good Friday Agreement? What does that mean to you?”
(ii) “Question for Dermot Ahern: “how long do we have to wait on Sinn Féin? You are the government of the Republic of Ireland, not the IRA army council, surely you have responsibility to be the government, not to tolerate this group of people?”
John O’Dowd, MLA: “…. In terms of consent, what I believe consent means in the Good Friday Agreement is that the Irish people have the right to make their own decision without coercion from an outside force …
[tape break]
Steve McColl: “Do we have any say in our destiny?”
John O’Dowd, MLA: “Yes.”
Steve McColl: “And if we vote against Irish unity…”
John O’Dowd: “If there’s a vote of 51% for a united Ireland are you going to respect it?…I respect the right of the Irish people to make free choices without outside coercion…”
Dermot Ahern, TD: “Could I come in here? … John Hume said that the question of uniting Ireland is more about uniting the people who live on the island. It goes to the issue of consent. And I would just pose this: if the day comes when there is a 50% + 1 majority on the island, as per the Good Friday Agreement, in favour of a united Ireland, under the Good Friday Agreement that’s to happen. But we all know, our history tells us, that unless we have…. And that gives the allegiance of the desire and the hope for us who espouse a united Ireland to work to, but I am one of those people, and I think my party is one of those parties, who believe that we have to create the conditions long before that is to happen, whereby it is absolutely accepted that instead of the nationalists in the North being a small minority, or a relatively big minority in the North, that the unionists in an all-island context – post 50% + 1 – are not a very dangerous and unhappy minority within the all-island context. I haven’t read the Sinn Féin document in relation to Irish unity, I will eventually read it. I will say this before I read it – and I have to read the document – that the blueprint for anyone who espouses republicanism or nationalism is the Good Friday Agreement, for a united Ireland. It is up to us well in advance of the day that there is a 50% + 1, if that day is ever reached, to have the conditions created where, as a businessman just last night said to me, from clearly the unionist tradition, clearly even a DUP supporter, that he understood as most ordinary unionists understood that there is an entirely legitimate reason why we should work on an all-island basis for the benefit of all our people. We can work on those things but it has to be done on the basis of mutual understanding and consent. In my view, the blueprint for any nationalist for a united Ireland is not the document of Sinn Féin, or of the SDLP, or of Fianna Fail, it is the Good Friday Agreement which has the entire mandate of the Irish people.”
Questioner: “I accept what you say but you still haven’t answered my question. How long do we have to wait for Sinn Féin?
Dermot Ahern, TD: “Sorry, I was answering the first part. How long do we have to wait? The main tenet of the Good Friday Agreement is inclusion, and, whether we like it or not, the electorate in the North have dealt the cards in the last election and that is the DUP on the one side and Sinn Féin on the other. We as governments have to deal with the situation as dealt with in the democratic decision. Even the SDLP accept that we cannot move ahead to the exclusion of Sinn Féin on the basis that the principle of the Good Friday Agreement was on the basis of inclusivity of a settlement. The SDLP have some very good proposals as to how we get out of the impasse, and Dominic referred to them earlier and my Department is looking at them. The only problem is they don’t have the possibility of cross-community agreement. Similarly the unionists have proposals for a voluntary coalition, but equally so, those proposals don’t have the element of cross-community consent. So we have to find ways to move things on. But I can assure the listeners that we will proceed with all of the elements in the Good Friday Agreement that we can operate, and that can be operated in and around the issue of unfortunately the lack of movement in regard to putting back in place the Assembly and Executive….”
Chair: “Could you be more specific in that Minister? ….Will that be in 2007?
Dermot Ahern, TD: “I can’t say that. I do think that time is not on our side in relation to all of these things. Every time there has been a vacuum, there have been difficulties. I think unfortunately for the last number of weeks there has been megaphone diplomacy, and that’s not a good thing because ultimately we have to pick up the pieces. Some things have to be said but as long as we can understand that the trust and confidence has to be built. I mean I question, what would have happened if the DUP had gone into government in March and this bank raid or the punishment beatings had taken place? What would have happened?”
Q.5. Jim Owens; re helping people in other conflicts: “Minister, your brief is local but you have a global brief as well. You and the other speakers have spoken about the long years of work … working through this particular conflict and how to cope with what you called unpalatable aspects. I’m asking you how you can use this painful learning to be tolerant of other countries, in particular in the developing world, and I have a particular interest in Sierra Leone in Africa, to support them in coping with their conflicts and to recognise the incredible amount of resources and energy and time it takes. We can learn from this local issue and help other communities …. We have to acknowledge it is a big investment. … Could you as Minister comment on that?”
Dermot Ahern, TD: “Just very briefly, a fortnight ago I spent some time in New York and I met with Kofi Annan and his senior adviser and other UN officials. We offered, on behalf of the Irish Government and the Irish people, any resources, particularly in the post-Presidency situation in which we built up quite a lot of expertise. We offered the UN our services in any of the conflicts in the world that Kofi Annan wished to delegate us to. You might have seen recently, one of the Assistant Commissioners of the Garda Siochana was nominated to head up the investigation into the murder of the former Lebanese Prime Minister. That was the first manifestation of our offer to use our experience of the discussions in relation to the peace process in order to assist in other conflicts. And indeed Julitta referred to the grant that the Meath Peace Group got from my Department, we grant-aided also a specific grant to the Glencree Centre in order to allow them to bring people in from the Palestinian-Israeli conflict to Ireland on a regular basis, over a three-year period, in order to learn from the experience here in Ireland.”
Q. 6. Marie MacSweeney. “I am not affiliated to any political party or organisation. Before I make my comment, I’d like to clarify with the Minister when he talks about ‘public individuals’. I presume you mean citizens and not just people who are as important as you?”
Dermot Ahern, TD: “Oh yes citizens.”
Marie MacSweeney; re degradation of language: “Thank you. I was one of the people who voted against the Good Friday Agreement and I did that after much thought because I considered the part that provided for the release of prisoners, people who may have committed murder yesterday or last week or last month or last year, I felt that to release people like that and to reward them for their violence was to give violence energy. I was very concerned about that so I voted against it. But it was supported by the majority of the people and I supported their decision after that and I thought it would work. I expected in the beginning that the decommissioning would start very soon and I think the Minister has said that military ways should have been abandoned early on. I checked with friends of mine when I became dismayed that this wasn’t happening. I asked them did they feel that the Agreement meant that decommissioning should start soon and all my friends and people I asked said yes.
“But in the public arena something different was happening and this is where the ‘F’ word came in, the big ‘F’ word which I think has been responsible for a lot of the disasters in the peace process, and the word is ‘fudge’… One of the early casualties of the Agreement has been language, the use of language, and it’s still with us. Caoimhín Ó Caolain in the Dail last week, later on when he became converted to pacifism, said that he was against any kind of criminality and that Sinn Féin were against any kind of criminality. I think perhaps 99.9% of English-speaking people in the world would know what that meant, but we don’t know what he meant.
“And that’s part of the problem. I would suggest that the degradation of language has been a huge problem, and if there are any further proposals and plans to be made as part of this peace process and as part of the requirement for decommissioning, that the language should be luminous, that each word should be clear and unequivocal and precise so that everybody knows what they mean and everybody knows what everybody else means and we can take it from there. Thank you.”
Chair: “Thank you, I think that was a statement rather than a question so I will take another question…”
Q.7. “I’m a voter, I voted for the Good Friday Agreement … … I want to comment on the Dublin –Monaghan bombings and the fact that nobody has been brought to justice over those terrible atrocities. Also, the McCartney killing was a terrible act, a dreadful act.
Dublin and Monaghan bombings: “…that was a crime, murder, but nobody has been brought to bear… …. why hasn’t the British Government, the Irish Government, why haven’t they brought those people to bear? …The forensic evidence was there, fingerprints, everything. … Really and truly, everything to do with collusion must be put on the table. If there is any trust to be brought to the PSNI, and indeed to our own Garda Siochana……I can’t believe that our own State and the British State – that these people can go about their business with no accountability whatever.”
Chair: “Minister?….”
Dermot Ahern, TD: “Like your comment on the last speaker, I would regard that as a comment rather than a question. …
Chair: “Well, let me put the question… perhaps you would address the refusal of the British authorities to cooperate in terms of the investigation?”
Dermot Ahern, TD: “There have been inquiries in relation to the Dublin and Monaghan bombings and in fact I was instrumental at Cabinet level recently in making sure that not only would the Dublin and Monaghan bombings be investigated but the ones in Dundalk which happened as well, where people were killed as well, and some times are forgotten about….. I mean there’s no easy answer in relation to why we don’t have finality in relation to that. Obviously proving cases in court is… you know we live in a democracy and the Guards may have views in relation to it… Similarly in relation to the Northern Bank, while the Government were able to give our opinion based on intelligence that the Garda Siochana had given us, the issue of prosecution ultimately will be for the authorities in the North as regards prosecuting people ultimately for that particular incident. So we have made, and this government particularly has made, every effort we can and every exhortation to the British Government to provide assistance and cooperation in relation to the Dublin and Monaghan bombings, as we have done in relation to the Finucane, Nelson, O’Neill and all the other incidents where it is believed that collusion has been part of it. So I can assure you that these issues are constantly on our agenda in raising this with the British Government.”
Chair: “It’s ten o’clock. We said we’d finish at ten o’clock but we’ll take a couple more questions. We have a long list of people and we’re going to have to leave some disappointed. John O’Dowd, I think you want to respond?”
John O’Dowd, MLA: “I think it’s important to remember this. Collusion was IRA propaganda for 25 years. None of the other political parties on this island were prepared to stand up to the British Government which was acquiescing with loyalist paramilitaries on this island to kill nationalists. The Dublin and Monaghan bombings are a clear example of that there. The British Government, who are now lecturing Sinn Féin on ensuring that evidence is given in relation to the McCartney killing, is hiding evidence from the Irish Government in relation to the murder of citizens in Dublin and Monaghan. The British Government at this present time is putting legislation through the House of Commons to restrict evidence to the Pat Finucane inquiry, the Rosemary Nelson inquiry…. All that is going through, and these are the same people on the high moral ground in Westminster and every where else lecturing republicans on justice. Those are the serious questions that need to be answered. “
Q.8. John Clancy; timeframe for end to paramilitarism: “I have a question for John O’Dowd. First of all, welcome and it’s great that you have come here and we are having this discussion. The Minister has been very clear, and he said, as I understand it: an end to decommissioning is one of the prerequisites, the end to criminality and paramilitarism. Now I understand you to say that one of the parts of the peace process as far as you are concerned is creating the situation where the IRA is no longer required. …Now I’ve asked a specific question… Has that situation arrived? If it hasn’t, is it another 6 months, 1 year, 20 years, before the IRA is no longer needed?”
John O’Dowd, MLA: “No, I haven’t used the word ‘needed’…. With respect, your notes aren’t neutral. What I said was that republicans were creating a situation that the IRA would no longer be in the field of conflict….”
Questioner: “Can you answer – is it 6 months more for the IRA to be there?”
John O’Dowd, MLA: “Ask the Minister ….” [interruptions] ….Do you want me to answer the question…..?”
Chair: “Let him answer the question…”
Questioner: “I beg your pardon…”
John O’Dowd, MLA: “Exactly, show a slight bit of respect. Ask Minister Ahern. Minister Ahern is telling us that there mightn’t be talks until 2006, 2007, and indeed some political pundits in the North are telling us that there won’t be political talks until after the elections here in the 26 counties. So, I want to create the political situation where all armed groups leave the scene, including the IRA, and that’s my goal in politics…”
Dermot Ahern, TD: “Lest anyone think that I said that the talks wouldn’t take place until 2007 or after the next election here in the Republic: we are ready, willing and able to – and we accept that the public may have a different view – but we are still prepared to engage in an inclusive basis with a party like Sinn Féin, but we have to make it absolutely clear. We believe we are at a crossroads in this regard, in that 17 years on from Hume-Adams, 7 years on from the Good Friday Agreement, that it is quite clear that the move to exclusively democratic and peaceful means is now, in that the two remaining issues are decommissioning and paramilitarism.
Twin track approach: “And the fear is, and the breakdown in any trust that we as a Government had, that the British Government had, that the wider community, not least the unionist community had, is that the political project as we often hear talked about by Sinn Féin is a project, and they’re getting a mandate, there’s no doubt about that, but are they doing it on the basis that there ‘s a twin track and that they are prepared to continue the twin track approach … as long as they are able to do that and the more they can do that the better it is, that they will ultimately go exclusively political but that they will do it in their time. And in the meantime, robbery to fund very substantially their organisation, but also the threat of general going back to war, the threat that’s always unspoken and the difficulty of the soft man/hard man within the Provisional movement, this sort of thing that’s always said. We saw a bit of it in one of the tabloids this week, you know, that there are hard men in the organisation who want to go back to war and of course there are soft men who want to do all the nice things that we all want to do, and that’s to be democratic.
“Be under no illusion: there is no space between the Sinn Fein leadership and the IRA leadership in relation to this. Be under no illusion. And that raises the question with us which was confirmed by the bank robbery but also the turning on of the tap of punishment beatings and based on security advice. I mean Tony Blair did say in 10 Downing Street, that there had been creative ambiguity over the last number of years to try and bring people … we are now stating quite clearly, and we are ready, willing and able to engage in discussions again but it has to be on the clear understanding that the goal will be reached very quickly in relation to the issues of full decommissioning and paramilitarism etc.”
Chair: re IRA split: “Very briefly Minister…. on the question of a pending split in the IRA Gerry Adams said he wouldn’t be drawn, that he couldn’t speak for the IRA. What’s your opinion: are you fearful of a split in the Republican paramilitary movement?”
Dermot Ahern, TD: “I’m not going down that road because I don’t believe – particularly based on the security and intelligence advice that we get – that there’s a question of a split. There might be one or two who are unhappy and there might be one or two who go off and do their own thing but the hold that the leadership of the Provisional movement, and I include everyone, on the organisation is absolutely rock solid. I don’t think that the public should be under any illusion, and that’s why people like Bertie Ahern, who’s not particularly known for his tough stance – people often say that he’s a conciliator – he is absolutely resolute on this on the basis that he believes that the time is now for people to decide. There’s a fork in the road – is it that way towards politics, or is it that way towards a bit of politics and a bit of criminality and the threat behind it all?”
Q.9. Ann McQuillan (SDLP, Fermanagh): “…First of all, I would like to say to John [O’Dowd], I remember well the murder of your people, that was a most appalling act among many appalling acts that took place in that area at that time. I have a feeling that a few of your people were also in the SDLP?
John O’Dowd, MLA: “My father was, yes….”
Ann McQuillan: “I’m very sorry that you aren’t!”
Inclusivity and December deal: “Now, this question of inclusivity, with reference to the agreement in December, it seems to me to be very flawed. I sat on the executive of our party for 10 years at least and I have seen a lot of people, John Hume, Seamus Mallon, our present leader, a lot of people working very hard to bring peace to our country, to build and build and build what became the Good Friday Agreement.
“There’s been many disappointments, many setbacks, but we built it and those people worked for it. They didn’t just work in the last 10 years, they worked for the last 30 years, more, for that kind of inclusivity. Now when this last agreement came out I was very disappointed to see that the Agreement had been changed, that instead of the Leader and Deputy Leader being chosen as one unit, and the idea of that as I understand it was so that they would have to act as a unit. That’s now been put aside so that Sinn Fein could elect their man and the DUP could elect their man, so everybody could be in their own little corners and they could split the country as they liked into republican or DUP. Then came the matter of inclusivity. When it came to voting on those things, it was to be that the DUP voted for their man, Sinn Fein voted for their man, and if the SDLP and/or the unionists decided not to vote for them they could not become ministers. Now where is the inclusivity in that? We have heard nothing, particularly from Sinn Fein… Is the inclusivity exclusivity? Then it transpired that if Paisley resigns as leader and Peter Robinson comes in, then any other party who doesn’t vote yes is automatically excluded. Can you comment on that?” [tape break]”
Dermot Ahern, TD: “First of all, it was built into the Good Friday Agreement that there would be review after a period. … Given the political cards we were dealt with, the DUP and Sinn Fein being in effect in the driving seat in the negotiations…. but we did keep the SDLP and all the other parties fully informed on a constant basis…..there was confidentiality on some issues but the general basis was explained. I can assure you we got the Attorney General’s advice on this issue…. I know that the SDLP alleged that some of the tenets of the Good Friday Agreement were watered down. That was not the case. The Attorney General was absolutely satisfied, the principle of inclusivity was sacrosanct.
“In relation to the tactical issue of voting, again in the document it’s built in… We had to deal with the situation that people in the North didn’t really believe that Paisley would sit down with Martin McGuinness and work together as First Minister and Deputy First Minister. That had to be put up to them. We put it together in such a way that that would have happened in March of this year. We had to put it up to them, and that there would be no fall-back position.
“I can assure you that one of our overriding principles was to ensure the parties like the SDLP and Ulster Unionists were fully involved in the project…”
Dominic Bradley, MLA: “My understanding is that these changes did not come out of the review of the Good Friday Agreement, the review was never actually completed, but they came out of negotiations involving the two main parties. In the original version the joint election of First Minister and Deputy First Minister was a key part of the Good Friday Agreement, it was the flagship symbol of cooperation and we believe it was changed to suit Ian Paisley who didn’t want his name to be on the same ticket as Martin McGuinness.
“It was wrong… it sent the wrong message out. Instead of sending the message out that this whole project was about reconciliation and partnership, it sent the completely opposite message out. And you’re right when you say that parties like the SDLP who would have voted against that under the new arrangements they would have been excluded from ministerial office…..
“But on the wider issue of peace and inclusiveness, we are at the stage now where, as the Minister said, all parties must be operating on an equal footing, they must be all operating on totally democratic and peaceful means, and that means that parties which are not operating on that basis will have to ensure that they are, as the Minister said, in the very near future.”
Chair: “I’m conscious that a lot of you have long distances to travel. We’ll take one final question.”
Q.10. Pat Lynch: Re ambiguity: “This problem with the Northern Bank robbery and the attendant analysis that has taken place, up to now it’s been all politics, now it’s real, it’s about money. And the question is what republicanism means, what big ‘R’ republicanism means, and what the physical force tradition is….Up to now there has been a certain ambiguity in some of the republican parties. There now can be no ambiguity… some people have alleged that Fianna Fail started the Provisional IRA… There needs to be an unequivocal denial of any government involvement in any armed organisation…. Will something good come out of this? Will we question our values as to the physical force tradition?”
Dermot Ahern, T.D. “I don’t think that anyone other than yourself could believe that Fianna Fail started the Provisional IRA.”
Dominic Bradley, MLA: ”I believe we have come to a defining moment in the process. We talked earlier on that a certain amount of space had been given to the Provisional movement to become totally and exclusively democratic and political. That hasn’t happened but recent events have underscored the need for that to happen. People in Sinn Féin will have to start seriously addressing these problems. That is demanded by the people of Ireland and by all the parties in the country, and it’s going to have to happen sooner rather than later, and I think that good will come out.”
CLOSING WORDS
Closing the evening’s discussion, Michael Reade thanked the speakers for their contributions and he thanked the Meath Peace Group for a very interesting meeting. On behalf of the Meath Peace Group, Canon John Clarke thanked everyone for coming and paid particular thanks to the chairperson, the speakers and to St Columban’s College for facilitating the talk. He announced that the next talk, “Where do we go from here?” to be held on Monday 7th March, would be addressed by Professor Paul Bew, Sean Farren, MLA (SDLP) and Jim Wells, MLA (DUP).
Meath Peace Group report, May 2005 ©Meath Peace Group
Taped by Judith Hamill (audio tape) and Jim Kealy (videotape)
Transcribed and edited by Julitta Clancy
This is the 54th public talk since the series commenced in September 1993. Reports and/or summaries of many of the previous talks are available on request from the committee (contacts below) and are also on the website: www.meathpeacegroup.org
Meath Peace Group would like to thank the Dept of Foreign Affairs Reconciliation Fund for grant assistance towards the expenses of running the talks.
Meath Peace Group Committee 2005: Julitta and John Clancy, Parsonstown, Batterstown; Anne Nolan, Gernonstown, Slane (Treasurer); Fr. Michael Kane, An Tobar, Ardbraccan; Canon John Clarke, The Rectory, Boyne Road, Navan; Philomena Boylan-Stewart, Longwood; Leona Rennicks, Ardbraccan; Judith Hamill, Ross, Dunsany; Olive Kelly, Lismullen; Catriona Fitzgerald, Warrenstown, Kilcock
APPENDIX: Text of written speech of the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Dermot Ahern TD, to the Meath Peace Group, Dalgan Park, Navan, Friday, 25th February, 2005
Introduction
Ladies and Gentlemen, I want to speak tonight not so much as a Minister, or a public representative, but as an ordinary Irish republican. As someone reared next to the border. Who knows at first hand how it affected communities and families. Who knows no higher mandate than the will of the Irish People. Whose personal political agenda is Irish unity, peace, justice and equality. As a republican, I believe the best way to advance this agenda is through the Good Friday Agreement. And, in 1998, the Irish people – in the first act of all-Ireland self-determination since 1918 – supported that view.
Present Impasse
As I have already stated, that Agreement created the legitimate expectation that criminality and paramilitarism from all quarters would end. And almost 8 years later they have not.
That’s the major cause of this present impasse – nothing more complex. It is the clear and simple failure of the various paramilitary organisations, including the Provisional Leadership, to heed the will of the Irish people. In their failure they are impeding the implementation of the Agreement.
They are hindering North/South Co-operation and the agenda of peace, justice, equality and Irish unity. The continuation of this trust-sapping paramilitarism represents the single greatest impediment to realising the full promise and potential of the Agreement. I say that in sadness not in anger.
Ladies and Gentlemen, The primary impediments to implementation of the Good Friday Agreement are clear to all:
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Decommissioning
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Criminality and Paramilitarism
If we are to move forward – particularly if a prospective unionist partner is to be found – these issues must be dealt with and resolved. In this context the quandary for the Irish Government is clear – we can’t order the Provisional movement to deal with these issues.Only the Provisional Leadership can – and that’s exactly what we have asked them to do. After the Northern Bank Robbery we asked the Provisional leadership to reflect on how trust and confidence – which had been massively damaged – could be restored We made it clear that the major onus now lies with them. The solution does not lie with ordinary Irish nationalist and republicans – it requires the Provisional Leadership to take a major initiative that restores some sense of confidence and positivity. Regrettably, as each day passes without a positive response, trust fades further. And while we refuse to play the politics of exclusion. And while we will refuse to feed into any victim complex – It cannot now be business as usual. It’s up to the Provisional Leadership now to fully internalise and positively respond to the challenges which it faces – bringing all forms of paramilitary and criminal activity to a definitive end. As the Taoiseach said in the Dail this week we are listening carefully and we want to hear back on these crucial issues sooner rather than later.
Peace or Process
Ladies and Gentlemen, On Wednesday as I sat with Robert McCartney’s devastated family, the Provisional Leadership laughed and staged snowball fights for the cameras. And that juxtaposition really brought home to me the depths of the present crisis. For 18 years now we’ve had a Peace Process. And after Wednesday, I like many others before, was compelled to reflect on whether the Provisional Leadership wanted a final peace – a settlement – at all, or just the never-ending Process. As you may be aware, a sceptical thesis has recently suggested that while we were focussed on the Peace – others were focussed on the Process – and the Press, and Publicity and PR and which crisis after crisis has brought? The Provisional Leadership needing support to bring them fully into the peace – but never fully getting there. This dispiriting thesis suggested that a Provisional Movement- born out of conflict – needed to maintain its resonance and allure because behind the dynamics of conflict lay only another banal Party with bland policies which must compete on the same basis as everybody else in the political marketplace I have not formed a final judgement on the validity of this thesis. I want to believe that it is wrong and honestly hope that the evolution of events in the coming period will disprove it. But the fact that I, and many other people who are committed to an inclusive process, are now reflecting on its possible validity is significant.It shows the degree of corrosion caused by recent events. It indicates the challenges that Sinn Féin and the IRA must meet if they are to repair the damage caused to trust and confidence. Because, after the Bank Robbery. After the murder of Robert McCartney by IRA volunteers,, trust and confidence have practically evaporated
But we’re not going to give up. In fact, the Irish Government intends to redouble its efforts to protect the gains of the Agreement thus far – particularly in the critical area of North/South co-operation.
North/South Co-Operation
One of the most regrettable impacts of the present impasse is the negative impact it has on the full operation and development of the North/South dimension of the Good Friday Agreement.
In particular it has stalled the strengthening in specific areas – and for sound, practical, commercial reasons – of the all-island economy. As a direct result of the deficits of trust and confidence caused by continuing paramilitary and criminal activity, the stop-start operation of the Agreement in recent years has negatively impacted on the development of North/South co-operation. The North/South dimension is a fundamental part of the overall accommodation which the Agreement represents.
This Government is determined to protect the achievements of the Agreement, including in the area of North/South co-operation. Obviously we would much prefer to be in a position to do business with locally-elected Northern Ireland Ministers within the North/South Ministerial Council. Unfortunately, that is not possible at present. Nevertheless, we have a duty to take forward the mandated work programme of the NSMC to date. We are continuing to identify and follow-up on new possibilities for co-operation – where such co-operation is clearly for mutual benefit.
In practice, as the Taoiseach noted recently, North/South co-operation is not just about politicians or civil servants. The private sector, trade unions, the voluntary and community sectors and the farming community are but some of the actors involved .The business community, in particular, have long recognised the benefits of closer economic links on the island. In many ways, they have been ahead of the rest of us in seizing the opportunities arising out of the new landscape created by the Agreement.
Over the past ten years, total cross-border trade has grown by over thirty-five percent. One third of all Northern Ireland companies now export to the South. These are encouraging statistics when you consider the ignoring or the lack of awareness of business opportunities closer to home which characterised the decades before the Agreement. Organisations such as the Northern Ireland Business Alliance, IBEC-CBI, and the Chamberlink venture between Chambers of Commerce on both sides of the border have all played their part in this work.The North/South Body, InterTradeIreland, was specifically established under the Agreement to tackle the barriers to North/South trade and to help businesses to realise the full potential of an all-island market. Headquartered in Newry, InterTrade has developed a range of initiatives aimed at facilitating trade and business contacts across the island. A major focus of its work is highlighting the need for improved business competitiveness in an all-island economy. Last year’s report of the Enterprise Strategy Review Group identified the key challenges in the South which must be addressed if we are to maintain the economic performance of recent years. Its prescription included enhanced expertise in international markets and increased technological and applied research and development capability. The absence of devolved Government in Northern Ireland, and the consequent inability of the NSMC to meet, means that Ministers from North and South are not engaging on these issues; are not talking to each other about agreed strategies and actions that respond to these challenges.
The losers here are ordinary citizens on both sides of the border who rightly expect their political representatives to address these challenges and arrive at policy solutions that will improve their lives. The current impasse is not just a political stall, it is also represents a failure in economic and social terms. Despite the difficulties and constraints caused by the destabilising activities of others, the Government is nevertheless determined to protect and develop the North/South axis of the Agreement and will continue in the weeks and months ahead to advance this agenda with the British Government and with the parties. The close working partnership between the two Governments has been the fulcrum of stability in this process. Both Governments are determined that a political vacuum will not be allowed to endanger progress nor to degrade the achievements of recent years. We will proactively use the machinery of the Agreement – in particular, the British-Irish Intergovernmental Conference – to ensure that the gains of recent years are protected and developed. In that regard, the Taoiseach again signalled to the British Prime Minister on 1 February that the North/South dimension of the Agreement is a key strategic interest for this Government. It, moreover, was one of the main reasons the people in this State changed our constitution in 1998. The North/South axis of the Agreement represents a win-win agenda for everyone on this island. It threatens nobody’s interests or identity. Its maintenance and development is simply the application of good common sense in the interests of mutual practical benefit. The sooner the current impasse is resolved, the quicker we can all go fully back to business in the interests of every citizen on this island.
Conclusion
Ladies and Gentlemen. The causes of the impasse are clear. The solution is equally clear. It lies principally with the Provisional Leadership. I appeal directly to them to act on the authentic vision and ideals of Irish Republicanism – to heed the will of the Irish People, who backed the Agreement, who sought an end to paramilitarism and an end to criminality.
[Dermot Ahern, TD]
ENDS
Meath Peace Group report 2005 ©Meath Peace Group