Inez McCormack (1943-2013) was a Irish trade union leader and human rights activist. Born Inez Murphy into an Ulster Protestant family in Cultra, County Down, she once recalled; “recalled: “I was a puzzled young Prod – until I was 17 I hadn’t knowingly met a Catholic. I was a young Protestant girl who didn’t understand that there were grave issues of inequality, injustice and division in our society.”
Category: north of ireland
The DUP are unfit for coalition Government.
On Thursday British voters go to the polls to elect their new government. It looks like it is going to be very tight, probably resulting in a hung parliament, with no single party getting an overall majority. Consequently, the right of center British Conservatives
(Tories), are looking around for potential partners to help them form a government. One party they are 
considering is the right wing DUP from northern Ireland. But there is a big problem, the DUP have a dubious past and are intolerant right wing evangelicals who are unfit for government in a pluralist democracy.
It is well known that since it’s inception the DUP, and their supporters in the Orange Order, have been hostile toward the Catholic community in northern Ireland. The DUP founder, Ian Paisley, was once evicted from the European Parliament after staging an embarrassing protest during which he claimed the Pope was the anti-Christ. And Peter
Robinson, the DUP’s current leader, was convicted in an Irish court for participating in a paramilitary incident where pro-British thugs invaded a small Irish village. He was also a member of the infamous Ulster paramilitary group the Third Force, pictured here in paramilitary attire with convicted terrorist Noel Little who traded British missile secrets in return for support and weapons from the apartheid South Africa regime.
In recent years the DUP has also begun flexing it’s muscle against the LGBT community in northern Ireland. Examples include the DUP attempting to ban blood donations from gay men, while also opposing gay marriage. The DUP minister for Health at the time, Edwin Poots, wasted considerable amounts of tax payers money pursuing a legal battle over the gay blood ban, a battle he could never win. Some in the DUP ranks recently even expressed a desire to imprison members of the LGBT community; they actually want to criminalize homosexuality. That’s just Dickensian, an approach more suited to Putin’s Russia than a pluralist British democracy. But Peter Robinson has not moved against any in his party that hold such intolerant views. To the contrary, during his tenure, he has elevated “flat earthers” like Edwin Poots and the even more disgraced Jim Wells to cabinet positions. But DUP arrogance does not end there, we cannot overlook the DUP’s treatment of those in northern Ireland who enjoy the Irish language, a practice which is often perceived as a Catholic tradition in the divided streets of Ulster. They are “disrespectful and discourteous” to the parents and children learning the language, and block any act of legislation that would help protect the Irish language in in the North. Yet still no sanction from Peter Robinson against party members such as Gregory Campbell who engage in this prejudiced and embarrassing behavior. Last year the mask slipped and we learned what Peter Robinson and his Pastor McConnell think of Muslims. But recently, through Peter Robinson’s comments on the Abortion bill, we see the rights of women now being trampled on too. Is Peter Robinson’s idea of female equality to let women do his shopping? Does he trust Catholic women and Muslim women to do his shopping?
In proposing “guidelines” as a way forward on the Abortion issue Robinson is either kicking important legislation regarding women’s rights into the ditch, or he is displaying a colossal ignorance about women’s rights issues and how to best address them. But then when you think about it, issues involving marriage and women have not gone well for Peter in the past. He is as useful on these matters as a Catholic priest. It’s a woman’s body, and she should be in charge of it. Not the DUP or the priests. The people of East Belfast should do us all a favor and vote for Niaomi Long. Ms Long is the incumbent MP in the area and is standing against the DUP candidate in the crucial East Belfast constituency. But the DUP in Belfast have been gunning for her for some time. This is the only constituency where electoral defeat may cause the DUP to think again. The people of East Belfast can save us all from the DUP’s fundamentalist hogwash. They make NI look backward in the eyes of the world. The British Conservatives or Labour should not touch the DUP, and their fellow travelers in the Orange Order, with a 30 foot barge pole. If they do they are wide open to accusations of homophobia, anti-Catholic sectarianism, anti-immigrant sentiment etc. The DUP have more in common with the BNP, they are simply not fit for purpose. Many of the DUP leadership are members of the Orange Order, an organization that bans it’s members from marrying Catholics and bans it’s members from even attending a Catholic church. This includes but is not limited to Nelson McCausland, Nigel Dodds, and Gregory Campbell.
A look at their voting patterns should give the British people a further insight into the workings of the DUP. For example, on the gay marriage vote in the northern Irish assembly, not one DUP MLA voted in favor of gay marriage, NOT ONE. The DUP had even lined up a petition of concern should the vote go against them. This is a unique assembly mechanism that means the DUP would have successfully blocked the bill even if it had been passed by a democratic vote. They are fighting gay marriage by any means necessary. The supposedly more moderate UUP entered into an electoral pact with the DUP for this Westminster election, and indeed only one of UUP MLA voted in favour of the bill. In fact, of the 51 DUP / UUP MLA’s, fully 98% voted against the gay marriage bill.
All the while the DUP have been working to bring forward their own anti LGBT conscience clause legislation, which will allow religious fundamentalists to discriminate against the LGBT community. And i’m sure it won’t be long before such legislation could be used liberally against other minorities.
On the other side of the fence, Sinn Fein proposed the gay marriage bill and have long been at the forefront of support for the LGBT community throughout Ireland. The SDLP also supported it, so we can hardly blame the SDLP or Sinn Fein for it’s defeat. Nearly 80% of Alliance MLA’s also supported the bill, two did not. One independent unionist, and two NI21 MLA’s (Basil McCrea + John McAllister) also voted in favour of the bill. Despite this the northern Ireland gay marriage bill was narrowly defeated by the fundamentalist and evangelical DUP.
No pact should be countenanced between British main stream political parties and the DUP. British democracy does not need any political party or associated organization that is anti-women’s rights, anti-gay rights, anti-Catholic or anti-immigrant.
Our DUP friends would do well to remember the old Belfast adage, “Jesus Saves, but Georgie Best scored the rebound.”
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Northern Ireland Talks – Failure is Real Prospect
So here we go again. We had the Good Friday talks, the St Andrews Talks,the Hillsborough talks, talks on Policing and Justice, the Haass talks, then in July Unionists walked out of the talks that followed the failure of the Haass talks. And of course there were talks about talks. It’s never ending. Now we have more “all party talks” and bi-lateral talks, and North-South talks. The British, Irish and US governments are all sending representatives, like school teachers managing an unruly class of miscreant kids. At least half of the class seem to be slow learners.
Failure a Real Prospect:
This time, on top of the Haass agenda of Flags, Parading and the Past, are added the issues of Welfare Cuts, Budget issues and
even the Re-structuring of the Government Institutions themselves. No one should harbor raised expectations of major progress. Especially with the DUP now attempting to frame the discussions as “front loaded” with issues they want to talk about. Issues such as Welfare Cuts, the Budget and Institutional reform. The DUP now seem to be serious about radically restructuring governance at the Assembly with Peter Robinson recently describing the mandatory coalition arrangement as “not fit for purpose”.
But Sinn Fein, are very unlikely to move on Welfare cuts as their core constituency is set against such a move. Also, the success of the talented socialist Paul Murphy and the Anti Austerity Alliance in the recent Dublin (South West) by-election will have the SF strategists diligently guarding against attacks from the left. This ensures SF will probably not move on the Welfare and Budget issues. Additionally, any push toward re-constituting the Assembly will be viewed with great suspicion by CNR (Catholic, Nationalist, Republican) community. There can be no possibility of a return to Unionist rule.
Furthermore, SF will be concerned that the DUP and Peter Robinson cannot be trusted to keep their word in negotiations. They will remember the “Letter from America”, when Robinson failed to complete a previous deal on the Maze / Long Kesh site. Then there is the recent Assembly Speaker post, where the DUP patently failed to keep it’s word on a long standing deal whereby a SF speaker would follow the retiring DUP speaker. Several observers argue by acting in this way the DUP have politicized the role of speaker and thereby damaged the democratic process.
Consequently, it is unlikely SF will trust the DUP enough to agree to anything in the front end of the talks, unless and until everything is agreed, including the Past, Parading and Flags. This is all too much to achieve, and we have traveled this road to no effect several times before.
Throw into this mix internal divisions within the DUP, with the hard liners probably restricting Peter Robinson’s ability to move and you begin to get a sense of the task at hand. Robinson referred to the opening of the latest round of Northern Ireland Talks as a “circus” and refused to attend on the opening morning. The DUP offered the attendance of the Irish Government as the excuse. A move no doubt prompted hard line elements in the DUP. With the DUP strategists guarding against any attacks from the TUV, the party is being pulled further to the right, far from the center ground where the only prospect of accommodation lies.
On the up side, some progress could be made on “flags”, with an agreement on “no flags on arterial routes” seemingly the easiest fix. But no guarantees there either. Dealing with the Past, Parading (Ardoyne), the Budget, Welfare cuts and restructuring of the institutions are simply not going to get resolved by these two parties at this time.
The Newsletter is a leading Belfast newspaper with a predominately PUL (Protestant, Unionist, Loyalist) readership. Today they ran an online poll on the current round of Northern Ireland talks, the poll has garnered over 2,000 responses so far. While online polls are a weak barometer, it is interesting to note 55% of the respondents feel the Northern Ireland talks will end in failure. A further 25% said they do not care. That means a huge 80% of respondents feel the talks will fail or they don’t care if they fail. That certainly points to a failure, not of the peace process, but the political process.
With failure a real prospect, the question will quickly become, what are the consequences of political failure at the Northern Ireland talks? The answer is simple, by name it will be known as Direct Rule, but in reality it will be de-facto Joint Authority. In other words, the British and Irish governments will meet regularly and jointly administer the territory. It’s an intriguing prospect, one in which Unionists will no longer be able to block initiatives such as the Irish Language Act. But we will have to talk about that another day.
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Irish language classes in East Belfast
I came across this little piece on the BBC website. It is great that people from the Protestant, Unionist, Loyalist (PUL) community are taking time to explore the Irish language. As the article states, the language belongs to everyone and hopefully these classes are an early sign that the anti-Irish extremism of people like Nelson McCausland is fading off into the political wilderness where he and his ilk belong.
More from the BBC here.
Martin McGuinness meets Queen of England
Notice that Mr. McGuinness does not bow his head, yet Queenie looks quite happy when they greet each other.
(WASHINGTON) Congressman Richard E. Neal, the senior Democrat on the Friends of Ireland Caucus in the United States Congress, released the following statement in anticipation of Sinn Fein’s Martin McGuinness meeting Queen Elizabeth in Belfast today. For more than three decades, Neal has been a leader in the effort to bring peace and reconciliation to the island of Ireland. Mr McGuinness has been making serious effotrs to reach out the hand of peace to his Unionist neighbors for some time.
Congressman Robert E. Neal (D)
“As the leading Democrat on the Friends of Ireland Caucus in the United States Congress, I welcome in the strongest possible terms the announcement that deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness will meet and shake hands with Queen Elizabeth for the first time at an event in Belfast sponsored by the cross border charity Co-operation Ireland. I applaud this expression of civility and respect, and believe it is another significant milestone in the peace process. It is also another powerful reminder that we are living in an unprecedented period in Irish history where the impossible routinely becomes possible.
For supporters of the peace process, a meeting between Martin McGuinness and Queen Elizabeth would have been unimaginable just a few short years ago. But times have changed, and we are now witnessing a new era of partnership where former adversaries now work together building a shared and more inclusive future. The Irish peace process has become a model for successful conflict resolution around the world, and tomorrow’s meeting will be another sign of genuine reconciliation and healing.”
