BRIDGING THE BORDER – RECONNECTING COMMUNITIES.

The news was about the weather. Blizzards and icy winds. Up to 20 inches of snow expected. Roads covered in black ice and the mercury dipping ever further.

But still they came. The main hall in the Westenra Hotel in Monaghan Town was packed. Standing room only. As Jackie Crowe the Mayor of Monaghan said ‘this issue of uniting Ireland is too important for us to allow a little bit of snow and cold to deter us.’

‘Bridging the Border-Reconnecting Communities’ is aimed at highlighting the problems pressing down on border communities. Many of these communities are separated and isolated from their natural hinterlands as a result of partition. This leads to economic and social hardships along that corridor.

The Bridging The Border project will collate views from a wide spectrum of public and community opinion. These engagements with business and voluntary and community bodies, with rural communities and statutory agencies, will be led by our Mayors/Chairs within each council area.

Sinn Féin Councillors currently hold a whole range of positions along the border corridor. Jackie Crowe (Mayor of Monaghan Council); Michaela Boyle (Chairperson Strabane District Council); Stephen Huggett (Chairperson Fermanagh District Council); Declan McAleer (Chairperson Omagh District Council); Padraig MacLochlainn (Mayor of Buncrana District Council); Mary Doyle (Vice Chairperson Armagh District Council); Michelle O’Neill (Mayor of Dungannon District Council); Cora Harvey (Mayor of Donegal County Council); John McNamee (Chair of Cookstown District Council); and Mick Murphy (Chair of Newry and Mourne).

They are all well placed to compile a major report which will bring forward concrete proposals to tackle the bad effects of partition. This is an excellent project. It is positive republican activism at work.

This blog commends all those involved in this initative, including Uniting Ireland Co-Ordinator Lucilita Bhreatnach. The Monaghan conference was originally scheduled to be held in Donegal but following Pearse’s success in the High Court and then the setting of a date for the Donegal South West by-election, the organizers very quickly moved the conference to Monaghan.



Their success was evident in the packed hall.

There was of course a major focus by all the speakers on the current economic mess, setting it in the context of partition and the two conservative states that were created after the passing of the Government of Ireland Act 90 years ago this year.
Independent economist Michael Burke made a very useful and interesting contribution. He tackled the often used argument that the north cannot survive without the British subvention and that the south cannot afford reunification.

Michael explained that the British are very guarded in producing detailed figures on how it manages its ‘regional’ economy. Notwithstanding this Michael revealed that the gap between the money raised in the north and the subvention is significantly less than the £14 billion often quoted. It’s around £3 billion he said. Crucially he added the north also creates significant levels of wealth each year. Around £29 billion. But almost half of this flows out of Ireland to Britain and elsewhere. A new political and economic dispensation could ensure that more of this is available for the local economy.

Michael also pointed out that an end to partition would see the north become part of an economy which would have the fiscal powers currently denied it. Instead of being at the backend of a British economy which is skewed against it, this and an ability to trade with the rest of the world, would see the north’s economy quickly grow.
There were also very good contributions made by other speakers, including Caoimhghín ó Caoláin TD and Cavan’s Katherine Reilly.

The agreement at the weekend between the Irish government and the EU and IMF on the bailout drew much criticism.

For four years the Irish Government’s desire to look after the interests of a small wealthy elite has seen it pursue an austerity strategy that has stripped over €14 billion of the economy.

The economy has deflated, unemployment has reached new heights, emigration is on the increase and families are losing their homes. Now the government has taken out a huge loan from the IMF and EU, has stripped the National Pension Reserve Fund to pay the bankers and plans to take €15 billion out of the economy over the next four years.

It is handing more and more power over our economic future to the IMF, the EU and the European Central Bank.

The Government’s economic and banking strategy is not credible.

This blogs made it clear that Sinn Féin will not be bound by the Fianna Fáil/Green Party economic plan and that we will seek a mandate in the next election to renegotiate what has been agreed.

It was a very good night.

And then this morning your man is trekking us through the snow to Dublin to meet with Pearse Doherty as he arrives in from Donegal South west for his first day as a TD.

As we travel news is breaking that Dermot Ahern has announced his decision not to stand again in Louth. He was widely criticized after his recent gaff when he claimed that the involvement of the IMF was ‘a fiction.’ Ahern was seen to be part of a government strategy to confuse and mislead the public.

Whoever stands for Fianna Fáil the fact remains that it and the Green Party are primarily responsible for the current economic mess. Its policies are driving the state and ordinary families into further and further debt.

The government should go. Citizens should decide on how we are to be governed. There would not have been a bi-election in Donegal if Pearse and Sinn Féin had not gone to the High Court. Our aim now is to bring about a general election as soon as possible.

ANIOS AR THEACHT AN tSAMRAIDH.

This blog comes from the count centre at Stranorlar in County Donegal. Senator Pearse Doherty is about to be declared the new Teachta Dála for Donegal South West.

Everybody here knows that.

But before it becomes a reality the votes have to be counted. The place is buzzing. Over a hundred members of the media – some say as many as 153 – including many international media, are in attendance.

This day has been a long time coming for some of the old timers. For decades they have been tramping up and down the highways and byways of this constituency arguing for republican politics and a united Ireland.

Last time round in 2007 Pearse hit the cross bar. So too did Padraig McLaughlin in the adjoining Donegal constituency. The two of them narrowly missed out winning seats.

But a by-election is a different creature. It’s even harder to win.
This blog never doubted that we would be successful. There’s a great team here. There wouldn’t be a by-election at all if Pearse and Sinn Féin hadn’t gone to the High Court.

Pearse is a wonderful candidate. But arguably all of the candidates are fine representatives for their parties. So the people didn’t have to vote for Pearse. They had a choice and they chose wisely.

They voted in their thousands for Pearse Doherty and Sinn Féin.

The count centre is loud with the northern lilt of Donegal Irish. Local people slip easily from béarla to gaeilge. Martin McGuinness is here. Later he heads off to London for a Sinn Féin fundraiser. So was Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin . And Mary Lou MacDonald. The Sinn Féin Mayor of Donegal Councillor Cora Harvey and Gráinne Mhic Géidigh, the Sinn Féin representative on Údarás na Gaeltachta is here also. And other Donegal councillors, including Councillor Marie Therese Gallagher. There was also Gerry McIvor and his formidable team of Sinn Féin election workers scattered across the county. And Padraig McLaughlin and Pat Doherty the MP for west Tyrone. And me. And your man.

The counting proceeds slowly. Rumours of an announcement whirl around like leaves in the wind. The Tánaiste Mary Coughlan TD concedes defeat on behalf of the government in mid afternoon. But we all hang in waiting for the formal and official result.

The message from the election is clear. It’s time for the government to go. Its time also for the those who consider themselves to be the next government to review their position, particularly Labour which has tied itself to Fine Gael. A disastrous position for a party which professes to care for disadvantaged people and those who will be most cruelly affected by Fine Gael’s economic policy.

Some are dismissing Pearse’s as a protest vote. It is not that. It is against the government. It is against the Fianna Fáil and Green Party four year plan and against those parties like Fine Gael and Labour who have bought into this timeframe.

But it’s also a vote for genuine republican values. For Sinn Fein’s sensible proposals to stimulate the economy by creating jobs not ending them. It’s a vote for a republic in which people are sovereign and have their rights and entitlements upheld by society and the state.

Pearse’s wife Roísín is here. Their three boys come in for a wee while Padraig and Colm give cheerful thumbs up and chant ‘Pearse Doherty uimhir a h’aon’. Ronan is too young to understand what is happening. Or maybe not. He lies comfortably in his mammy’s arms.

Pearse’s parents Miceál and Grainne are here also. They are as proud as punch. And for very good reason.

To while away the time your man starts singing ‘Óró, Sé do Bheatha 'Bhaile’. Before he gets beyond the chorus a hundred and fifty republican voices raise the roof with ‘Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh’.

And then Pearse is announced as the TD for Donegal South West and the place erupts with cheering and clapping and loud whistles.

Padraig McLaughlin tries to hoist Pearse on his shoulders – Padraig’s not Pearse’s.

Roísín is crying. So is your man. ‘He ain’t heavy’ Padraig whispers to me, ‘he’s my brother’.

And so he is. He’s also the peoples TD.

Mighty work!

Sinn Féin Abú!

Well Done agus Comhghairdeas Conway Mill

Almost 30 years ago the late Tom Cahill came to me with an idea for a unique and innovative project for west Belfast.

Tom proposed that Conway Mill, which was then lying derelict, should be leased and turned into a community enterprise project providing education, self-help and local employment opportunities. Tom deserves great credit for his vision and foresight. A small businessman himself he could legitimately have developed the Mill in his own interests. I don’t think that even entered his head. Toms interest was in this community and its citizens.

A management committee was organised which included many well known local republican and community activists, including Frank Cahill, Fr. Des Wilson, Liam Burke, Alfie Hannaway, Jimmy Drumm, Jean McStravick, Sean O’ Neill, Tom Cahill & Colm Bradley.

The objective was to promote small indigenous economic enterprises. The committee was also keen to encourage adult education and establish an education programme that would supplement the work being done in Springhill House to catch those young people who were either being expelled from school or were dropping out.

All of this required a huge amount of work. Conway Mill was in a very bad state of disrepair. Making it habitable and usable took a great deal of effort.

To facilitate the provision of education one floor of one of the two main buildings was given over to education. It was run under the auspices of Springhill Community House. The floor was cleared, classrooms constructed, toilets installed and a theatre and stage built. Halla na Saoirse (Freedom Hall) was frequently used the staging of plays written by local people. It was also used for debates, conferences, and occasionally for press conferences by Sinn Féin. Some of the most important press conferences during the early days of the peace process were held there.

A crèche was established and staffed by ACE (Action for Community Employment) workers and teachers and tutors were provided by the Workers Educational Association (W.E.A.) and the Ulster Peoples College.

Local businesses and artists took space on other floors and although the facilities were at times very Spartan there was a great sense of community and camaraderie among those who lived and worked there.

Regrettably Conway Mill also became a target for the British state. Under British Secretary of State Douglas Hurd a policy of political vetting against community groups which it alleged were republican was introduced. This policy was supported by the SDLP.

After Conway Mill hosted a community led public enquiry into the killing of a young man, Sean Downes, by a plastic bullet fired by the RUC in August 1984 the Mill was targeted for vetting and the crèche lost its funding. The attack on the crèche caused outrage. To its shame the SDLP supported the British position and supported the political vetting of Conway Mill.

The impact of the vetting ban had a knock on effect in making it more difficult to source funding from Europe and charities.

Businesses and community organisations were told that they would be refused funding if they moved into the Mill.

However the management refused to be coerced or intimidated and continued to fundraise and to develop the Mill. In this they were enormously helped by friends in the USA.

Some years ago the management committee produced an ambitious plan for refurbishment for the Mill.

Following Sinn Féin’s success in securing the creation of the West Belfast and Greater Shankill Task Force the Mill became one of a number of priority projects for west Belfast and it began to receive substantial funding. Years of hard work by the management committee, supported by Sinn Féin, succeeded in securing sufficient funding for the refurbishment work to go ahead. The final piece of the jigsaw was funding from the Office of the First and Deputy First Minister.

The official opening of the refurbished Conway Mill is a victory for the determination and vision and courage of that first Management Committee in the difficult years of the 1980’s and all of those who have taken up that task since then.

Conway Mill is evidence of the great sense of community and solidarity that exists in west Belfast. I wish this innovative and citizen centred project well for the future.

DONEGAL PENS

This blog’s big achievement is to use the laptop in the back of the car while your man just about manages to keep us between the ditches as we wind our way through the highways and byways of Donegal South West in pursuit of a Dáil seat and the only candidate capable of taking it off the government, Senator Pearse Doherty.

Today it is raining. In a way that only the rain in Donegal can rain. Yesterday was beautiful. In a way that only Donegal rain can be beautiful. It’s the light your man says and I can but agree. Even the rain has its own beauty. This is my kind of landscape. Hills and glens and mountains and rivers and lakes and deserted lonely beaches and magical sea scapes and big skies.

And my kind of people. There is great spirit here. Especially in the Gaeltacht. That’s the good thing about elections. This blog gets to meet all kinds of inspiring people in the course of my work. But during an election and the compressed days of hyper activity that this involves, good and wonderful people seem to pop up at every turn of the road.

Quiet people and sometimes not so quiet people, working away within their communities giving leadership and setting an example to the rest of us. It’s the same all over Ireland. And everywhere else in the world. Citizens always rise to the challenges created by bad systems, bad governments and bad leaders. And that is why the people will win out. Because the human spirit always aspires to greater things.

That is true here in the Donegal Gaeltacht as well as everywhere else. And it is not always a matter of big speeches or high flying rhetoric. That has its part. But within communities and particularly rural communities the indomitability of the human spirit is manifest in small ways.

In the hospitality of the people who invite us into their homes. In the communal spirit and the wisdom in these communities. In their democratic traditions and culture. In the commitment of small business people who provide jobs and services for their neighbours even in the midst of economic madness. In the spirit and energy of our young people.



Conor and Rónán McGarvey are young lads from Loch an Iúir here in the Gaeltacht. They are school boys. And they are also craftsmen and business partners. In a wooden shed behind the family home they are making wooden ink pens. Each pen is unique. They are created from many types of wood, including Yew, Ash, Elm, Walnut, Beech and Oak.

They presented me with one. A very fine pen indeed. Made from Bog Oak. And as informed readers may know Bog Oak is thousands of years old. They gave one to your man as well when we visited them in their workshop. The two of us are well pleased. Go raibh maith agaibh Conor s Rónán.

So if you are looking for a very unique Christmas present. If you want to support two young Gaels. Or if you just want a very good pen handcrafted in the north west of Ireland contact their on line shop at www.donegalpens.com or email info@donegalpens.com.
You won’t regret it.

THE RISING OF THE MOON.

This blog comes to you from Donegal South West. I came here by way of Kerry which is a long way to travel even by Sinn Féin standards, but Steve MacDonogh my friend and publisher’s funeral was in Dingle. So I went there on Saturday.

On the long way up the West afterwards someone told me that Sunday was the anniversary of the original Bloody Sunday when the Black and Tans gunned down 14 civilians in Croke Park.


Luke Kelly

Then I read that last Wednesday had been the late Luke Kelly’s birthday. He would have been seventy. Luke was a wonderful balladeer. His version of Dirty Old Town, Scorn Not His Simplicity, ASong For Ireland, and Raglan Road are unsurpassed. He also wrote Why Died The Sons of Roísín , a prophetic poem given the events this week in Ireland. This is my version of it gender proofed but otherwise unchanged.

For What Died the Daughters and Sons of Róisín, was it fame
For What Died the Daughters and Sons of Róisín, was it fame
For what flowed Irelands blood in rivers,
That began when Brian chased the Dane,
And did not cease nor has not ceased,
With the brave men and women of ´16,
For what died the daughters and sons of Róisín, was it fame
For What Died the Sons and daughters of Róisín, was it greed
Was it greed that drove Wolfe Tone to a paupers death in a cell of cold wet stone?
Will German, French or Dutch inscribe the epitaph of Emmet?
When we have sold enough of Ireland to be but strangers in it.
For What Died the Daughters and Sons of Róisín, was it greed
To whom do we owe our allegiance today
To whom do we owe our allegiance today
To those brave men and women who fought and died that Róisín live again with pride?
Her children at home to work and sing,
Her youth to dance and make her valleys ring,
Or the faceless men who for Mark and Dollar,
Betray her to the highest bidder,
To whom do we owe our allegiance today
For what suffer our patriots today
For what suffer our patriots today
They have a language problem, so they say,
How to write "No Trespass" must grieve their heart full sore,
We got rid of one strange language now we are faced with many, many more,
For what suffer our patriots today

Never was there a more appropriate verse. And never was it echoed more angrily than at this time decades after it was written

Ireland is at a crossroads. The southern state is led by a government that has misled, and confused and lied to the Irish people for at least three years. There is a deep economic and social crisis. This Government is probably the most unpopular in the history of the state. It is now implementing bad, deeply damaging policies.

The government got it wrong on the bank guarantee scheme.

It got it wrong in implementing successive austerity budgets that drove down productivity while driving up unemployment and poverty.

And it got it spectacularly wrong with a banking strategy that has bankrupted the state.

The Irish government has no mandate whatsoever to do this. It has handed authority for the state over to outsiders in order to give a dig out to the Banks which the Irish people will pay for years to come.That means that every man,woman and child in the state will be saddled with €40,000 of debt.

When Brian Cowan and Brian Lenihan made their announcement on Sunday to ask for a bailout from the International Monetary Fund and the EU and European Central Bank I was canvassing in Donegal South West with Pearse Doherty. This is a by-election that the Fianna Fáil/Green Party coalition did not want.

The Irish government’s objective was to deny citizens the opportunity of an election in which they could pass judgement on the four years of bad government financial policies.

Last week it repeatedly said that there would be no bailout. Their candidate in Donegal South West was filmed telling one constituent that there was no possibility of the IMF coming in. He was doing this at the same time as the government was talking to that body and inviting them to take over the running of the state.

On Monday night the Taoiseach said he would bring in a budget and call an election early next year. He should cancel the budget and call the election now. The government should resign and give citizens a say in a general election.

The people of Ireland face enormous challenges at this time. But we are no mean people and I am confident that with clear headed leadership and sound economic policies we can rebuild the economy and return prosperity.



The Donegal south west by-election will give a clear sign of where the people are. For me it is very reminiscent of Bobby Sands entry in his diary on the 17th day of day of his hunger strike.

Bobby wrote:
“If they aren’t able to destroy the desire for freedom, they won’t break you. They won’t break me because the desire for freedom, and the freedom of the Irish people, is in my heart. The day will dawn when all the people of Ireland will have the desire for freedom to show.
It is then we’ll see the rising of the moon.”

Writing women back into Irish history

Alice Milligan



While on hunger strike in 1981 Bobby Sands asked if we could get him some of the poems of Alice Milligan. Bobby was in the prison hospital. It was very difficult to fulfil Bobby’s request but due to the diligence of our friend Tom Hartley, that great magpie of our struggle, a small hardback book of her poems was liberated and sent into the H Blocks. Bobby was delighted. I’m sure Alice Milligan would have been delighted also.

Many moons later Dr. Catherine Morris, who is now the Cultural Co-ordinator for National Library Ireland and Trinity College Dublin, wrote an article on Alice Milligan. She was researching a book. This blog wrote to her and told her this story.

On Wednesday I was invited by Catherine to go to the National Library for a preview of an exhibition on Alice Milligan. It’s entitled ‘Alice Milligan and the Irish Cultural Revival’.

Her exhibition is an impressive, informative and hugely fascinating account of a remarkable woman whose significant contribution to Irish culture, the arts and politics in the late 19th and early 20th century is largely unrecognised.

Dr. Morris has done a great service to Ireland and to Irish women. She has rewritten Alice Milligan back into our history. Dr. Morris is also to publish her book on this wonderful visionary activist and patriot.



Who was Alice Milligan? She was born in Gortmore outside Omagh in west Tyrone on the 4th September 1866. She was the third of 13 children. A few later the family moved to Belfast. It was a unionist household and Alice was educated at Methodist College and at Kings College in London. She trained to be a teacher and for a time taught Latin in Belfast and Derry. She herself said that suring this time she ‘learned nothing of Ireland.’

In her 20’s Alice, along with her father, were part of the Belfast Naturalist Field Club and the Ulster Archaeological Society. It was here that she became a keen photographer and learned how to transfer images on to glass slides for use in public presentations and theatre productions – an early power point presentation.

Her conversion from unionist to radical nationalist occurred when she was 24 and living in Dublin. She records in her diary in May 1891 – which she kept for three years from 1891 to 1893 – ‘While in the tram going up O’ Connell Street I turned into a Parnellite’.

His death later that year reinforced her conviction and she threw herself into the emerging Irish language and Cultural revival that was then taking place.

She was very mindful of the inequalities in Irish society, particularly for women. In the great debate around the constitutional future of Ireland women were excluded and ‘were not called upon to have any opinion whatsoever.’

Alice returned to her family in Belfast. She was determined to pursue her new opinions, including learning Irish. Undaunted by the anti-Home Rule sentiment around her Alice and her friends declared their determination to ‘lighten the darkness which prevails to such an extent in this province about Irish literature, history and music.’

She was described as the ‘red headed nationalist’ and a ‘black mark’ on her family’s name.

Alice Milligan was a prime mover in the centenary celebrations in Belfast to mark the 100th anniversary of the 1798 Rising. She was part of the ‘Ardrigh group’ which was a loose affiliation of republicans and nationalists who came together at Francis Joseph Bigger’s home, ‘Ardrigh’, on the Antrim Road to discuss politics and agree ways to promote the Irish language and culture. Milligan was at the centre of all of this, including writing ‘A Life of Wolfe Tone’.

She was also involved in the establishment of a wide range of other groups, among them the Henry Joy McCracken Literary Society, the Women’s Centenary Union and branches of the Irish Women’s Association. She was a prolific writer in local journals and newspapers.



The Shan Van Vocht

In 1895 Milligan and Anna Johnson founded the Northern Patriot and then the Shan Van Vocht – taken from the Irish An tSean Bhean Bhocht; the poor old woman – a representation of Ireland.

Both were hugely influential publications. The two women wrote much of the content, including poems, songs, and political essays and encouraged new writers and thinkers. James Connolly received his first commission to write in an Irish publication from the An Shan Van Vocht.

Milligan and her friends understood the threat that existed to the Irish language and culture. British policy was to destroy both in order to destroy the Irish identity and sense of national pride. They encouraged festivals and language classes and promoted drama and the Gaelic League.

Her pioneering work in the theatre helped forge the connection between drama, the theatre and the Irish language. She wrote drama and produced plays and toured widely throughout the country with these dramas.



Thomas MacDonagh, who was one of the signatories of the Proclamation and was executed in 1916, recognised the immense contribution of Alice Milligan. In the Irish review of September 1914 he wrote: ‘I will begin with the best. ..It is meet (appropriate) that this Irish National poet should be a woman. It is meet that she, like so many of the Irish Volunteers, should be of North East Ulster. Alice Milligan, Ulster Protestant, Gaelic Leaguer, Fenian, friend of all Ireland, lover of Gaelic Catholics as of her own kith …Alice Milligan is the most Irish of living poets and therefore the best.’

She was a friend of most of the leaders of republican and nationalist politics and the Irish language movement. She campaigned tirelessly on behalf of Roger Casement and attended his trial every day. After his execution she spent time visiting Irish political prisoners being held in English jails.

She also increasingly took on the role of carer for members of her family. She moved back to the north and settled outside of Omagh. She continued to write and campaign and in the late 1920s helped establish the Anti-Partition Union. She died in 1953.

Alice Milligan was a passionate, gifted and articulate advocate for Ireland. She loved Ireland and the Irish people and her contribution to all aspects of Irish society was immense.

It is fitting that each Easter members of the Milligan-Harte Sinn Féin Cumann in west Tyrone lay a wreath at her graveside in memory of a great Irish woman.

Death of Publisher Steve MacDonogh

Steve MacDonogh

This blog is deeply saddened and shocked by the death of my friend and publisher Steve MacDonogh.

My thoughts are with his family, particularly Meryem and their baby Lilya, his mother Barbara, sister Deirdre, and brother Terry, and the extended MacDonogh family. Condolences also to Máire and all who work at Brandon.

Steve was a well loved and very decent Irish man. He ran a hugely
successful, pioneering and progressive publishing business, Brandon from
Daingean, Co. Kerry.

Steve was deeply committed to free speech and against censorship, he
campaigned in support of Salman Rushdie on the one hand and against the
secrecy of the British state on the other.

He breached the repressive ethic on this island at the time when he first
published my writing in the early 1980’s.



This blog learned a lot from him in the years since then and he has published
twelve of my books.Brandon authors include Alice Taylor, whose “To School
Through the Fields” sold more than any other book in Ireland.Steve also
published Neil Jordan, Ken Breun, and many other authors who went on to win international recognition.

He relaunched Walter Mackin, Patrick McGill and JB Keane.

He was a fine writer himself and a very good poet. He had just finished a
book on U.S. President Barack Obama’s Irish roots.

Like President Obama, Steve’s roots were in the south east and the Church
of Ireland and his latest book is a well researched examination of the
Protestant exodus to, and influence in, the USA.

Steve was a lover of Irish music and culture, a keen photographer and a
champion of the unique community and culture of the Dingle peninsula. He
was an enthusiastic mummer. Steve cared deeply for the west of Ireland and
made a link between that community and west Belfast. He was a friend of
Féile an Phobail. He was a friend of the people of Morocco, particularly
the Berber people and was returning from there when he became ill.

His contribution to Ireland, the Arts, and to the world of publishing and
free speech was immense and he will be sadly missed. I hope it is some
comfort to his family that their grief and loss is being shared by many
throughout Ireland and globally.

Go ndéanfaidh Dia trócaire ar a anan dílis.” Crioch

NOT GOING AWAY, YOU KNOW.

‘You’re mad!’ your man said.
‘What do you mean I’m mad?’
‘Going to Louth – abandoning the people of west Belfast. It’ll all end in tears.’
‘Well’ I said, ‘When you talk the talk you also have to walk the walk. The country’s in a mess. People are crying out for leadership and a way to regain our sense of ourselves’.
‘And you think you can do something about that? Who’s going to represent west Belfast?’
‘The people will sort that out. And I’m not leaving west Belfast. I’m standing down from my public responsibilities here. But this is where I live. It’s where Colette and our family live. It’s my community. It’s where my church is, my GAA club, my county.’
‘So, you think you’re going to get elected in Louth?’
‘Well, that’s the intention. There’s no guarantees. Wee Arthur is a hard act to follow. And it is a challenge. Luk, Sinn Féin is the only all-island party. There are two different sets of policy position, currencies, political establishments because of partition. But the problems are the same. I’m two or three days in the south every week as you know. And sometimes two or three days in the Assembly. So, its hard to do both to the extent that is required.
‘and what about the peace process?’ he asked.’
‘Martin and I work very closely together and we don’t take the peace process for granted. I’ll continue to work on that. But you have seen people coming up to me in distress at what the government in Dublin is doing.
And Fine Gael and Labour have bought into that agenda. We are the only ones proposing a better way forward.
I’m one of the people calling on citizens to make a stand. So I’ve decided to make a stand myself.
And by the way all the work I do on suicide prevention, on justice issues like the Ballymurphy and Springhill Massacres, I’ll be able to bring them to a different platform.’
‘If you get elected!’
Your man was really in a tizzy.
‘I know this idea has been kicked about for 9 or 10 years now’ he exclaimed, ‘but why now? What about the regeneration projects in west Belfast?’
‘We’re going to push ahead with those. Look, I know this is a big thing. I had to decide personally whether I was up for it. Whether I wanted to put my family through another roller coaster ride. Whether I could wrench myself away from the work that I do here in the west of the City.
And when I did eventually come round to the conclusion that I personally would be prepared to take this initiative, apart from Colette, the first people I spoke to was the Belfast and west Belfast leaderships. And then our leadership in County Louth.



We had lengthy discussions and we’re all at one on this. A struggle is about taking risks. It’s about acting in the common good. Our struggle at its essence is about Ireland and the people of Ireland. So, there you are.’ I concluded.
‘You don’t have to give me all that bullshit. Who’s going to thank you for this?’
‘I’m not looking thanks.’
‘You’re looking your head chopped off. You’re handing it to the staters on a plate. The establishment is going to come at you – like a tornado.’
I decided to provoke him.
‘Did you ever read Robert Frost?.’ I asked.
‘I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood,
And I –
I took the one less travelled by,
And that has made all the difference.’
He looked at me with a smirk.
‘You’re full of it!’ he exclaimed.
‘And’ he said coyly with a little smile, ‘You’re leaving me.’
‘No I’m not’ I said. ‘You’re coming with me.’
‘Seriously?’
‘Yep!’
‘Well I’m up for that! The only thing is,’ he hesitated ‘I feel like Ché before he went to Bolivia.’
‘We’ll be alright’ I said.
‘I suppose so’ he said.’ Let’s do it. Up the Republic!
‘Now who is full of it? ’ I asked him.
‘Well’ he replied ‘We’re not going away you know. Just down the road a wee bit. Up Louth’.
‘Turn coat’ I said ‘Aontroim Abú!’

Enjoying Trees

This blog gets invitations to attend all sorts of events. Regrettably time and a busy schedule does not always permit me to accept. But on Friday I travelled to the Visitors Centre at Phoenix Park in Dublin to open a new exhibition by Eve Parnell.

It was a very enjoyable event. Eve and her mother and father were very welcoming.

And it was about trees. And as regular readers of this blog will know I have a great fondness for trees.



‘The Act of Enclosure’ is an exhibition of pencil drawings of trees on paper. They are remarkable and captivating images of trees which offer another view of the natural world and recognise and celebrate the beauty, strength and presence of trees.

Every autumn this blog gathers up seeds and plant them. You can pick them up everywhere. Ash and acorns and Beech and sycamore. This blog has collected seeds from the Falls Park, the Belfast Hills, as well as farther flung places like Aras an Uachtaran and Chequers, the White House and Downing Street and other great houses across these islands.

Once I brought some seeds back from outside San Francisco of giant Redwood – Sequoia – Trees but they failed to take. Rita O Hare on the other hand succeeded and now has one standing several feet tall – almost as tall as herself!

I pot scores of seeds and many of them end up as presents. Sometimes for a birthday or Christmas, occasionally for a new birth but also for a death.

The seeds I grow most are chestnuts. I planted one outside in my back garden about 20 years ago and each year it produces hundreds of seeds. However the Chestnut is not a native tree and it’s really important that we make an effort to plant native species.

At the beginning of the 20th century only 5% of land in Ireland was wooded. This is a disgracefully low figure. Much of the older woods and forests were ripped up in the 16th and 17th centuries for export to Britain where they were used to build ships.

A hundred years later that figure has only risen to 7% and much of this is confer.

Native trees only account for around 1 per cent of the total and ancient woodland which has existed for hundreds of years is even rarer. In Ireland native trees are Oak, Ash, Hazel, Birch, Scots Pine, Rowan and Willow.

This year the Tree Council of Ireland set 2010 as the ‘Bliain na Beithe’- the Year of the Birch. And last month schools across Ireland took part in a one day celebration of the Birch with guided woodland walks.

Next year 2011 has been declared as ‘Bliain na Foraoise’. The international ‘Year of the Forest’. The concentration will be on the part played by forests in shaping and sustaining our environment.

The importance of trees was recognised by the druids and was at the centre of life for them and for the people of this island. They believed that trees were a source of great wisdom. The wood of many trees was also considered magical. Among these is the Hazel from whose wood Harry Potter, other wizards and their friends get their wands!
The Oak was the most sacred tree. The druids believed it symbolized the center of the universe.

It is true that for many the Oak is the king of the forest. Did you know that a single Oak can support a huge variety of life. For example it is estimated that up to 600 species of insects live in an Oak. It also supports small mammals, fungi and birds. From its bark comes Tannin which is used for tanning leather while its wood is used for furniture and barrels. And many of the roofs of those great houses mentioned earlier are made of Oak.

The destruction of our native species means that much of our wood is now imported. Last week an RTE documentary about Latvia showed how huge amounts of wood are being exported from there to Ireland for all sorts of use, including fence posts.

Why can’t we be growing our own wood and creating employment? But then this government, like previous ones, prefers to sell off our natural resources for a pittance or fails to exploit in a managed and sustainable way those resources we have.

Take the camán – the hurley stick. Very few are made from wood grown in Ireland. And yet hurley makers produce between 10,000 and 20,000 each year from imported Ash.

But back to Eve’s exhibition and her wonderful pencil drawings of trees.

Rochelle Mass’s poem ‘Waiting for a Message’ sums it all up.

Trees help you see slices of sky between branches,
point to things you could never reach.
Trees help you watch the growing happen,
watch blossoms burst then dry,
see shade twist to the pace of a sun,
birds tear at unwilling seeds.
Trees take the eye to where it is,
where it was,
then over to distant hills,
faraway to other places and times,
long ago.
A tree is a lens,
a viewfinder, a window.
I wait below
for a message
of what is yet to come.

Keep drawing Eve. Fair play to you and your talent.

Seeking a consensus on the Past

Dealing with the past and the issue of truth recovery arising from the conflict has become increasingly fraught. This is largely down to the failure of the British government to face up to this issue in a way that provides victims with the best opportunity to achieve truth.

Regular readers will know this blog facilitated a meeting between the Ballymurphy Massacre families and the British Secretary of State Owen Paterson at the beginning of October. The families want truth and an international independent investigation.

And like the Omagh families who met Paterson two weeks earlier, they left dissatisfied with the British government response.

A Sinn Féin delegation also did a meeting with Paterson to discuss how the issue of the past and of truth recovery can best be dealt with.

Our meeting was one of a series Paterson was doing with all of the parties as the British government prepares to set out its position on the Eames Bradley report sometime in the new year.

Regrettably the forty year record of the British government’s approach to dealing with the past and truth recovery does not bode well for a positive outcome.

For example, in May 2006 the then British Secretary of State, Paul Murphy, visited South Africa to examine how they tackled this matter after apartheid.

The Historic Enquiries Team of the PSNI was set up. Murphy’s successor Peter Hain established the Eames/Bradley process. Then the Victims’ Commissioners published a report. This recommends that a consensus is needed to deal with the issues involved.

Spokespersons for the British Government have supported this position. They point to the wide spectrum of responses to the Eames/Bradley propositions as the rationale for that.

But what sort of consensus? Is it possible to have a consensus between Colonel J, who ran the Force Reconnaissance Unit for the British state and which counts among its victims Pat Finucane, and the victims and families of collusion?

Is it possible to have a consensus between British Army, British intelligence, their allies in the unionist deaths squads and the victims and families of these groups?

Is it possible to achieve a consensus between those who blindly supported everything the RUC and UDR did and the nationalist population who suffered gravely from these activities?

Is it possible to have a consensus between the British Government and former IRA combatants or those who were victim of IRA actions?

The reality is that there was and is no prospect of achieving a consensus between all of these. This much was evident in the spectrum of responses to the Eames/Bradley propositions which came from a body set up exclusively by the major protagonist in the conflict, the British Government.

This blog is for a consensus. But no truth recovery process whose remit is set by any of the protagonists will secure the necessary consensus. So how do we move this very important and difficult issue forward.

I believe the consensus we must first achieve is one which accepts the centrality of independence.

That is, independence both in the design of a future truth recovery process and in the implementation of the detail of such a process.

Moreover the reality is that participation in such a process will only work on the basis of voluntary participation. This will be regardless of any powers conferred on a body to compel persons to give evidence or produce papers; and regardless of powers of sanction in the event of failure to comply with such a demand.

Victims, their families and the wider public will make their own judgements on responses to the issue of cooperation with a fair and inclusive truth recovery process independently designed and implemented.

In keeping with all of this it is clear that an Independent International Truth Commission is required. Independence is key because truth recovery cannot be dealt with through a British or Unionist prism or, for that matter, through an Irish republican prism.

Clearly an effective truth recovery process is dependent on full and voluntary cooperation by all relevant parties. Any body charged with this onerous task:
- should have a remit to inquire into the extent and patterns of past violations as well as their causes and consequences;
- should examine and report on institutional and collective responsibility, and
- must be independent of the state, combatant groups, political parties, and economic interests.

The Irish and British Governments should authorise a reputable body, such as the United Nations, to devise and implement all measures and processes necessary to achieve:
- the independence of the Commission;
- effective independent truth recovery methods, and
- the public reporting of its findings, conclusions and recommendations.

This should be underpinned by the two Governments in legislation.

There should be no hierarchy of victims. All processes should be victim centred and should deal with all victims of the conflict on the basis of equality and fairness.

There are vested interests who do not want truth and who will be opposed to the creation of a meaningful truth recovery process. The disgraceful wrangling over the Eames/Bradley proposals for a recognition payment and the definition of a victim are examples of this.

OUR FLIGHT FOR IRISH FREEDOM.

This blog is high in the night sky on a plane bound from Pittsburgh to New York. Your man and me left Ireland on Tuesday on a long haul that had us travelling for over twenty two hours before we arrived at our first stop in the tidy town of Meadville, Pennsylvania. Bed thankfully beckoned and we collapsed, separately - though that’s none of your business - into jetlagged but much needed slumber.

The next morning breakfast or what passed for breakfast in our accommodation, put your man in thoroughly bad form.

‘There’s no porridge’ he declared.

‘They call it oatmeal here’ I reminded him.

‘Well there’s none of that either’ he retorted.

And he was right. Poor coffee in paper cartons. Multi coloured cereals, Cheerios, in polystyrene bowls. Mixed fruit. Plastic knives, forks and spoons. A machine for making waffles.

‘Remind me not to come here again’ your man grumped.

‘Maith go leor’ I said as I munched my way through the plastic fodder and hoped that he would get into better form.

The gig at Allegheny College was a very good affair. A capacity crowd, a series of interviews and an informed discussion lightened your man’s cranky mood. And the good weather helped. Bright autumnal sunshine and acres upon acres of tall trees resplendent in their russet, orange, yellow and gold foliage surrounded and dotted the campus.

Allegheny county has passed a United Ireland motion. So has its neighbours the cities of Pittsburgh and Philadelphia.

Aside from Ireland the politics here are all about this weeks election results. The Democrats took a pounding. They lost the Congress but kept the Senate. But all the talk around here is about the negativity and coarseness of the campaign.

From home came news of Senator Pearse Doherty’s victory at the High Court in Dublin and scéal that the Government would have little choice but to move the writ for the by-election that they have avoided for over eighteen months.

‘That means we get to Donegal’ your man beamed at me.

‘To work’ I said.

Tomorrow night our big event is in the Úll Mor.

Alec Maskey will be there and Raymond McCartney. As well as Martina Anderson. They will speak on their Policing and Justice portfolios. Raymond is the Vice Chair of the Assembly Justice committee and Alec and Martina are Sinn Féin representatives on the Policing Board. The three of them are also former political prisoners. Raymond served nineteen years, Alec four and a bit and Martina did thirteen years in the worst possible penal institutions. In Britain itself. With all the racism, bad practice and down right bad mindedness and brutality of that system. At least in Ireland prisoners had lots of company. Prison life in Britain was a lonely grind for Irish politicos. And for their families.

But they came through it all. In many ways their election as public representatives and their work on these big issues of Policing and Justice shows how far we have all come. Of course we have still a long way to go but if someone ever laments the distance still to be travelled point them at the distance travelled those far. And take succor from that. We will complete our journey. Our people will be free, And united.

But for now as the New York skyline open below us we begin our descent. Here for a day. On Friday the flight home. It will be slán New York. Good Morning Ireland! Home for the mother and father of all election campaigns in Donegal South West.

This blog is looking forward to that. So, I am pleased to note, is your man. He is now in good form again.

And that my friends is a very important place for him to be. Especially for me.

Ballymurphy Massacre Families seek new Inquests

Press Conference by Ballymurphy Families about submission to Attorney General

On Friday morning this blog travelled down to Belfast City centre for a brief meeting with the Attorney General. My purpose was to hand over to him two large folders containing information gathered by the families of the Ballymurphy Massacre which are the bulk of a submission being made to the Attorney General asking him to hold new inquests into the deaths of their loved ones.

The Ballymurphy Massacre happened 40 years ago next year. As regular readers will know in the 36 hours after the introduction of internment in August 1971 eleven people - ten men, including a local priest and a mother of eight children - were killed by the British Army’s Parachute Regiment in the Ballymurphy area.

The accounts of how the 11 died bears a striking similarity to the stories told by the Bloody Sunday families.

On Friday evening one local television news channel carried old black and white footage of the Henry Taggart British Army base on the Springfield Road which was at the centre of this massacre. The TV images showed heavily armed British troops rushing from the base and running across the road into Ballymurphy.

For those watching these images at home it must have seemed like something from the History Channel. But for the families of those killed the pain and grief, and desire for truth, is as if it was yesterday.

That is true for all of those hurt or bereaved during the war.

The families believe that the RUC or British Army’s Military Police did not properly investigate the killings. They also have grave concerns about the inquests that were carried out at that time. They believe that these inquests did not receive the facts of these events.

However, there have been significant changes to the inquest system. Inquests must now meet the international human rights standards for independence, effectiveness and promptness. Any new inquest would also present a chance for the families to fully participate.

The change to the inquest system, which demands that inquests must be Article 2 (European Convention on Human Rights) compliant occurred after 2002 when several families successfully brought their cause to Europe.

The European Court of Human Rights found that the British government and its agencies had repeatedly violated Article 2.

The new rules mean the families are entitled to full legal representation, forensic and ballistic experts, and are entitled to seek disclosure of information still withheld by the British government from them about the murder of their loved ones.

The reason why this matter can be taken up with a local Attorney General is because of the successful negotiations earlier this year for the transfer of policing and justice powers back to Ireland.



The Ballymurphy families have now spent many years carrying out their own inquiries into the circumstances surrounding the deaths of their loved ones.

All of this has been gathered into the submission to the Attorney General. It includes inquest verdicts, autopsy reports, inquest depositions and statements by Royal Military Police personnel, RUC reports from the date of incident, the Catholic Church archive documents handed over to the families in July, and a preliminary report into the circumstances of the deaths of the deceased.

In addition new eyewitness statements have been taken and these will be presented to the Attorney General in the next few weeks.

The submission requests that the Attorney General review all of the available material and under Section 14 of The Coroner’s Act 1959, he agrees to reopen the inquests on the 11 victims.

As an independent legal expert appointed by the First and deputy First Minister and answerable to the local Assembly, the Attorney General will have to form his own independent assessment of the validity of the case put by the families for reopening the inquests.

A decision by the Attorney General to hold new inquests will provide an opportunity for families to uncover more of the facts surrounding the events of August 1971.

The effort to secure new inquests and an apology and acknowledgement of innocence for their family members, is not an alternative to the demand for an International Independent Investigation into the Ballymurphy Massacre.

That remains the focus of the families’ efforts but they see the submission for new inquests as a stage along the road to this goal.

The Ballymurphy families have been campaigning for justice for many years. Their courage and determination in the face of significant opposition from the British system is astonishing and inspiring.