ÓRÓ SÉ DO BHEATHA BHAILE

Mise agus Toshi agus Pete

November 30th 09

ÓRÓ SÉ DO BHEATHA BHAILE

Well done to St. Galls on a wonderful victory over The Loup. This Blog and Belfast Gaels are rooting for them to bring an all-Ireland title back to our city and county. Naomh Gall abú.

This Blog gets lucky sometimes. Truth to tell this Blog is lucky all the
time but every so often this Blog gets very, very lucky. Take last month
for example. Or to be very accurate earlier this month.

Regular readers will recall that this Blog was in the USA and Canada on one of those mad a-city-a-day schedule at the beginning of November. What you did not know was that in between all the other bits I got to meet with Pete Seeger and his wonderful wife Toshi. A mutual friend got me Pete’s contact details and I am eternally grateful to him for that.

When I was a teenager Pete Seeger was one of my heroes. He still is. He
was out there singing his songs and making music for workers and fighters
for civil rights, and women and disadvantaged people generally as I got interested in Irish and world politics. He is still at it at ninety one years of age.

Anyone who saw him on television with Bruce Springsteen and a gang of
other wonderful musicians at the Obama inauguration will have marvelled at the man’s energy and musicality. And he is still an activist. And an idealist.

So when he agreed to meet our small group we were delighted. He lives with Toshi in upstate New York in a forest. He and Toshi bought a bit of land there in 1949 and lived in a trailer before building a log cabin and after some time the house that they now live in. It is a very beautiful and quite isolated place.

When we arrived at the front door Pete was on his way out. He was pushing a wheelbarrow.

‘Here are our friends, all the way from Ireland’ he announced to Toshi, a
small cheery faced woman who was busy at the table in the big kitchen. She welcomed and shepherded us into the heat while her husband wheeled his barrow outside.

‘Pete was bringing in wooden blocks for the fire’ Toshi explained.

Soon we were gathered in a circle listening to Pete’s yarns. He is a
natural story teller and within minutes he was singing for us to illustrate a point. His first songs were pop songs from the 1920’s and he sang a few bars to give us a flavour of that time.

‘Now here’s one an Irish plumber taught me forty years ago and he launched into Óró Sé Do Bheatha Bhaile.

‘Óró sé do bheatha bhaile. Oró sé do bheatha bhaile. Oró sé do bheatha baile. Anios ar theacht an tsamhraidh.’

This Blog is pleased to say that I sang close harmony on that one. Your man was green with envy. I was delighted with myself. Imagine Pete Seeger singing Oró Sé Do Bheatha Baile. With me !!!

And before we knew we were into Guantanamera and then If I Had A Hammer and Pete was talking about his parents and his grandparents and his Irish great granny and Woodie Guthrie, and The Weavers and Ireland and Tommy Makem and the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Sands and Bruce Springsteen and the Clean Up the Hudson campaign, all interspersed with songs and Toshi was making tea and keeping him right and we were greatly honoured to be with this great man and very wonderful woman.

Tinya, their daughter who runs a pottery in their basement joined us and
talked about Portadown and we went out and I collected acorns from around
their house and before we knew it was time to go again.

Pete gave me his new book WHERE HAVE ALL THE FLOWERS GONE? It’s terrific. Tons of songs, music, stories and a cd. Your man might just get it for Christmas. If he is good. Well if he is very, very good. It’s available through Sing Out Corporation. P.O Box 5460. PA 18015-0460. USA.

************************************

News of the death of Violet Holland, matriarch of the Holland family, mother of the late Harry Holland reached me at the weekend. I want to extend my deepest sympathy and condolences to the Holland family.

Mrs. Holland was an outstanding Irish woman. She reared a large family through the worst of the conflict and many of them have gone on to play leading roles in the life of Belfast City.

Violet was the mainstay of her family and a staunch defender of her community. Go ndeanfaidh Dia trocaire uirthi.

Cherishing all the Children Equally

November 27th 09

Cherishing all the Children Equally

The report of the Commission of Investigation in the Catholic Archdiocese of Dublin has said that clerical child abuse was covered up by the Archdiocese and other Church authorities.

The report was published on Thursday. It also indicted senior members of An Garda Siochana who regarded priests as being outside their remit. The report said that there are examples of Gardaí reporting abuse complaints to the Diocese instead of investigating them and asserts that the relationship between some senior Gardaí and some priests and Bishops was inappropriate.

The 700 page report details particular priests and the abuse perpetrated by them. It also indicts the State authorities who facilitated the cover up by allowing the Church to be beyond the law. It claims that the welfare of children was not even a consideration by State and Church authorities.

This report follows on from the Ryan report which was published earlier in May of this year and which investigated all forms of abuse of children in care in the south. Its 2,500 pages provide a damning indictment of the reformatory and industrial schools operated by Catholic religious orders, which were funded and supervised by the Dublin Department of Education.

Over a thousand men and women gave traumatic accounts of their lives in these institutions to the Ryan Commission. They reported abuse in schools and children’s homes and hospitals and special needs schools and other places.

This Blog commented on the Ryan Report when it was published.

Today’s report will be another watershed in our history.

The relationship between Church and State, between society and clerics may well change for ever. But child abuse is not restricted to children in institutions and perpetrators of abuse are not only clerics. Abuse happens throughout Irish society and in all sectors of society, north and south.

One in four people in Ireland suffers from abuse or knows someone who has been abused. In many cases, the truth of childhood abuse emerges only when the victims have grown up. Sometimes that is triggered by flashback or other remembrance, and the effects can be devastating.

Victims need support, care, understanding and love. Most of all, victims need to be believed, especially if the abuser denies any wrongdoing. Victims and survivors need, as a minimum, acknowledgement of the great injustice that has been done to them.

Many people in families have suffered from abuse. This Blog knows how deeply hurtful and traumatic that can be, especially if a perpetrator refuses or fails to face up to their responsibilities. There is a huge onus on abusers to face up to their responsibilities.

No one should have to deal with abuse or its consequences in isolation. Everyone needs someone to talk to, and anyone who is affected by these issues should talk to someone and particularly to professionals who are best equipped to help.

There is a collective need for society to stand together and support individual victims of abuse and their families. Child protection services need to be strengthened. There are not enough social workers, counsellors or other front line staff. Service providers must be properly resourced, all citizens need to be educated, and our children need to be empowered and protected.

So, we have a lot to do to right the wrongs. If we are to truly cherish all the children of the nation equally, societal change is needed. A just society needs decency, fairness and equality alongside accountability and transparency.

Any reader of the Blog who is affected in any way by abuse should contact the Samaritans, their local Rape Crisis Centre, helplines, or other appropriate statutory or voluntary organisations and services.

A New Way of Dealing with the Economy

November 23rd 09

A New Way of Dealing with the Economy

Two weeks ago this Blog visited Dolphins Barn, a working class district of Dublin and met with some residents, including members of the residents committee. The local Sinn Fein Councillor Criona Ní Dhallaigh accompanied me.

Dolphin’s Barn is the second largest public housing flats complex in the city. It has almost 400 flats, including 44 senior citizens units, and has an overall population of close to 1,000.

The residents briefed us on the many problems confronting them. These include serious issues with the design and maintenance of the accommodation, the lack of play facilities for children, the poor state of the units housing the elderly, debt and rent arrears, as well as community safety concerns, including drug- related issues.

This Blog was deeply impressed by their calm dedication and determination to improve the quality of life for residents and especially the young and the elderly. Many of those this Blog spoke to give hours of voluntary service each week. The local community depends very much on the voluntary and low paid work of a core of community activists.

Inevitably many of the problems confronting residents exist because of a lack of adequate funding and resources. The harsh decisions of the government during the current economic crisis and the official spin emerging around the upcoming budget, have also led many of them to expect that worse is to come.

They believe that the Fianna Fáil/Green Party budget on December 9th is likely to rip the heart out of this small disadvantaged working class community.

The Celtic Tiger didn’t visit this area. It didn’t benefit from the boom years. And now it faces its greatest threat because of the mismanagement of the economy by the government.
Instead of dealing with this crisis properly the government has spent the last year rushing through cutbacks, attacking facilities school children, the elderly and working families.
The Government has chosen to bail out corrupt bankers, their shareholders and dodgy developers. They have opted to protect the Golden Circle rather than fund the building of hospitals, schools and other vital public services, and create jobs.

Its decision last April to end the Christmas Social Welfare payment (better known as the Christmas Bonus) was a mean spirited scrooge-like decision. The impact of this will be very hard on those families and senior citizens who live in areas like Dolphins Barn.

But as well as the hardship it will mean for those directly affected, the axing of the Christmas Bonus makes no economic sense. It will result in millions of euros being taken out of local economies and this will put more jobs at further risk.

The Government’s approach is to argue that restoring economic competitiveness can only be achieved by slashing wages and public spending. Regrettably the main opposition parties have bought into this. They have allowed the Fianna Fáil/Green Party coalition to fix the agenda and the perimeters within which any alternative proposals by the main opposition parties are set. So instead of thinking outside the box and looking for innovative answers Fine Gael and Labour are locked into an approach dictated by the government. This is bad economics, and bad politics.

There is an alternative. Last week the Shinners published ‘The Road to Recovery’ which was described by Michael Taft (UNITE's economist) on his blog spot 'notes on the front' as a “clear and coherent alternative to the deflationary orthodoxy, a more sophisticated fiscal platform from which to launch recovery. They have demonstrated a new way of how we can talk about our economy.”

You don’t need to be an expert to know that to meet the current economic crisis is to invest in the future, protect public services and social welfare, create jobs by building schools, hospitals, houses, and by investing in the renewable energy sector, and business infrastructure.

Such a long term approach will take the pressure off now while helping to solve longer term problems.

Of course, the government says that this cannot be done; it will cost too much and the money isn’t there!

They’re wrong. The fact is that with political will the funding can be found and the crisis dealt with effectively and in a way that doesn’t force hundreds of thousands more into poverty.

So, for example, it is possible to raise €7.623 billion to use as both a stimulus and a deficit reducing measure to keep international lenders happy.

This can be done by:
* Standardizing discretionary tax reliefs, raising €1.1 billion;

* Introducing a 3rd tax rate of 48% on income over €100,000, raising €355m;

* Placing a 1% wealth tax on assets over €1 million excluding farmland, raising €1.6 billion;

* And capping all public service salaries at €100,000, raising €450 million.

There is also the space to establish a stimulus package worth €600 million for a jobs retention fund, cut excise duty over the Christmas period and provide a cost of living reduction package for households.

It is also possible to reintroduce the Christmas social welfare Bonus.

None of this means creating a high tax economy. But it does mean creating a fair tax economy. That means dealing with the shortfall in revenue by increasing taxes for those who can afford it and reducing wages of higher grade public sector workers.

The December 9th Budget provides an opportunity to set a new course in tackling the economic crisis. It requires brave decisions, including tackling the corruption and abuses within the current system. It means producing a fair and equitable budget. Don’t expect it from this failed Fianna Fáil/Green Party government.

Justice for the Holland Family

November 20th 09

Justice for the Holland family

Last week Harry Holland's wife Pauline and family, their legal representative and myself, met with the British Attorney General and the acting Director of the PPS in the north, in the Bar Library in Belfast. It was the first ever meeting of its kind.

It arose because of serious concerns by the family – which this Blog shares – about the way in which the PPS handled the murder case that resulted from the arrest and charging of three people for the murder of Harry Holland near his home on Tuesday 11th September 2007.

Harry was a very popular local figure. His small greengrocers shop had a collection of boxes for progressive causes scattered throughout the shelves of fruit and vegetables. Posters publicising Irish language events were flanked by anti-Iraq war material.

Harry was always good for a bit of debate. There was more politicised sense in his shop than in the British Parliament, or in Government Buildings in Dublin for that matter.

Harry also did odd jobs for neighbours. He paved our back yard for example. And he could sing the blues in sean nós style. I recall one particularly good session at our street party during the Féile. Bob Dylan was Harry’s poet laureate.

Harry’s murder left his family deeply traumatised and evoked public revulsion throughout the community, especially in west Belfast. In response many people came forward with information and evidence to support an effective police investigation and the arrest and conviction of his killers.

Four people were implicated. Three were subsequently charged with murder.

Then last May the Public Prosecution Service withdrew the murder charge against two of the three when the third Stephen McKee pleaded guilty to the murder. The charges against the other two were reduced significantly to the lesser charges of affray and criminal assault.

One walked free from court on two years probation while the third Patrick Crossan was sentenced to four years. He was released several months ago and is back in custody again on charges relating to death driving.

The family were understandably outraged and the community is angry.
In July I wrote to the British Attorney General on behalf of Harry’s family. I asked her to review the sentences of the accused and refer them to the Court of Appeal. She refused.

However, the British Attorney General did agree to a meeting. The family put a compelling case, particularly around the issue of the reduction of sentences and the failure by the PPS to provide them with all of the necessary documentation following the court case.

The PPS apologised to the family for not explaining their decisions adequately and for failing to provide the necessary documentation, but by the end of the meeting the family had still not received an adequate explanation around the reduction in sentences.

The British Attorney General and PPS agreed to reflect on the points put to them by the family and to come back to them.

They also accepted the need for greater transparency within the judicial system and in particular how it engages with victims and their families. However, the judicial system still has a long way to go to answer the concerns of Harry’s family and the community.

Death of Eleanor Kasrils

Eleanor Kasrils was a life long activist in the ANC and Umkhonto we Sizwe, as well as member of the Communist Party of South Africa. She died last week at the age of 73.



Eleanor became politically active following the Sharpville Massacre in 1960 in which the apartheid South African police killed 69 protestors and wounded almost 200 more. Following that Eleanor joined the South African Congress of Democrats, as well as Umkhonto we Sizwe. She became a target for the Apartheid regime and was the second white woman to be arrested. She escaped and went into exile where she worked for ANC President Oliver Tambo.

They were difficult and dangerous times. Many of her comrades and friends were killed or spent long years in prison.

Eleanor returned to South Africa in 1993 at a time when the South African peace process was moving forward rapidly and the experience and dedication of activists such as Eleanor were badly needed.

Both Eleanor and her husband Ronnie – who was Minister of Intelligence in the post apartheid South African government - were keenly interested in and supportive of the struggle in Ireland. At pivotal points in the peace process they travelled to Ireland to address public and private meetings of republican activists and to outline the ANC’s approach to their peace process.


In 2005 Eleanor and Ronnie came to Ireland as guests of Sinn Féin as we gathered to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the founding of our party. And they returned again in 2007 and were present when the political institutions were re-established with Sinn Féin as part of the government Executive.

News of her death came as a shock. Her loss to the South African people is immeasurable. She was one of its many heroines. To Ronnie Bridgette and Christopher and Andrew my deepest sympathy and that of my comrades in Sinn Féin.

Go ndeanfaidh Dia trocaire ar a h-anam.

A Busy Weekend

November 16th 09

A Busy Weekend

This Blog had a busy weekend. This last few weekends have been like that.
Hyper! I started off down in South Armagh doing a wee bit of work for Cú
Chulainn Tours. It was a very beautiful day. Bright and dry. South Armagh
is a most heavenly place. On Friday it shone like a green emerald in the
brittle sunshine, small field upon small field, hill after hill. Your man
recalled how the hills used to be defaced by British Army fortifications.

‘The cheek of them’ he said, ‘Describing this as bandit country. Sure they
were the only bandits in the place!’

South Armagh was once part of an ancient Irish speaking area called the
Oriel. It was made up of parts of South Down, North Louth and South
Armagh. There is a very unique song tradition based in that area also. And
before that the Red Branch Knights and the Fianna roamed freely through
this territory. In more modern times the local people resisted, and
defeated, the British Army.

Now in peace time a bunch of former political prisoners have organised tours of South Armagh. This Blog will bring you details of this at another
time. Suffice to say for now if you want a good day out, or even a weekend
of recession-free relaxation and education South Armagh is the place to
be. From Neolithic times, through Cú Chullain’s epic tale to our own times
you are guaranteed a good time.

To Béal Feirste again. To Cumann na Meirleach and the Ógra Shinn Féin congress. There was a very good turn out of young republicans – young women and men – for a weekend of discussion and debate.

This Blog did the welcome and the official opening and then left them to it. Mól an óige agus tiocfaidh sí.



From left to right: myself; Mary Lou McDonald; Aidrian Dunbar; Dianne Abbott; Ken Livingstone; Jeremy Corbyn and Janet Behan

Saturday was London time. Or Derrylondon as your man says. We were there
for a fundraising dinner. The first in that city for Friends of Sinn Féin.
And a very fine dinner it was too. In the Crown in Cricklewood.
The main course was slow roasted English. The chef has a very succulent sense of humour.

‘Oh, the craic was good in Cricklewood.
And they wouldn’t leave the Crown.
With glasses flying
And biddies crying
‘Cause Paddy was going to town’.

That’s how Dominic Behan described it in his McAlpine’s Fusilers made
famous by the Dubliners. In those days the Irish were victims of the most
extreme racism.

Boarding houses often sported a notice, No Irish, No Blacks No Dogs.

That was then. This is now.

Today the Irish are active in political life, in business, the trade union movement, the arts and within local communities – in all spheres of life in this society.
In 2001, there were 674,786 people in England (1.4 per cent of the population) who had been born in Ireland.

This is the greatest concentration of Irish-born - as distinct from persons of Irish ancestry - abroad anywhere in the world.

In a London poll several years ago 11 per cent of those polled said that one or more of their parents were Irish.

This means that in London the Irish are by far the largest ethnic minority.
I tell you all of this because Sinn Féin wants to tap into the potential of the Irish in Britain.

We are looking for allies to place Irish freedom and independence and reunification back at the top of the political agenda.

Of course, achieving Irish reunification is primarily the work of the people of Ireland, but as with the peace process, the international community and in particular the Irish diaspora can play a vital role.

So, well done to everyone involved in organising the dinner. The organising committee, the musicians, and especially the guests. A fine night was had by all.



Liam McParland

Sunday afternoon and back here to the mainland and Belfast and an event to honour and celebrate the life of Ballymurphy republican Liam McParland. Liam died in a car crash in 1969. I was with him that fateful day. In fact we changed seats not long before the car plunged off the MI motorway just up from Kennedy Way at the entrance to Belfast. That was forty years ago. Hard to imagine. Liam was a great guy. A former internee from the 50s period, a gaeilgeoir and a very quiet unassuming fior Gael Liam came from a fine republican family. His mother Annie was a great woman and Paddy his Da, another good man.

Liam was a bachelor. He was in his mid forties when he was killed. A
plaque was erected at a family home, his sister Kate’s in the New Barnsley
estate. Liam Stone spoke remarkably well to a large crowd. There was music
and song. Liam would have been chuffed. Again well done to every one
involved. His brother took the time to tell me Rossa hurlers won
their Under 21 game on Friday night against Dunloy. Comhghairdeas. An Rossa Abú!

Celebrating 125 years of the GAA

November 13th 09

Celebrating 125 years of the GAA
Anyone can hold an event in good weather. It takes real endurance to do so in the face of a ‘severe weather warning’ from the Met office including high winds, torrential rain and bitter cold.

But that’s exactly what a small group of us did on Thursday afternoon in the grounds of Parliament Buildings. We gathered to dedicate a tree to mark 125 years of great work by An Cumann Luthchleas Gael.

There is a good story about how we got the tree that we got but é sin sceal eile. Suffice to say the necessary advance work was done, particularly by Maire from our office. She also plays football for Carrickmore and she and the Stormont Estates managed our event wonderfully well.

In attendance were several dozen senior GAA members, including Tom Daly, the Ulster President, Gerry Doherty, President of the Ulster Ladies Football Association, Catherine O Hara, Chairperson of Ulster Camogie; Danny Murphy Ulster GAA Provincial Director and others, along with politicians from the Hill, brave the elements.

Tom and this blog unveiled a small plaque, the tree was dedicated and very short speeches were made praising the enormous contribution the GAA has and is making to Irish society.

A short distance from where we gathered Unionist leader Edward Carson looked down at us from his plinth.

He has witnessed some strange events since he was first erected in 1932; including the blocking of the estate by farmers and their tractors during the UWC strike in ’74 and the sight of a Sinn Féin convoy of cars driving up the main road to take part in our first meeting with British officials following the ’94 cessation.

But I’m sure as a hurler for Trinity College in Dublin he would have taken some pleasure from this little ceremony of thanks for the hard work of the GAA over 125 years.



It was a nice ceremony and a well deserved tribute to a great organisation. The positive role of the GAA in Ireland and the diaspora has been enormous. The GAA brings together individuals and communities like no other organisation. It embodies a spirit of pride and identity which enthuses and motivates.

The founders of Cumann Lúthchleas Gael could not have envisaged how it would develop. But I’m sure they would be proud of everything that has been achieved.

A century and a quarter later Gaelic sports are thriving, both because of their sheer excitement and local pride, but also because of the community participation from the club level upwards.

Other factors such as televised games, fashions (with an increase in the popularity of sporting clothes, including GAA tops), and the GAA promoting itself to popularise the sport, means that there is an increase in the level of participation and interest in Gaelic games.

In this atmosphere that Gaelic games can only continue to grow and grow. From its foundation 125 years ago to today the GAA has demonstrated again and again its capacity to unite communities, to empower and encourage our young people, to uplift and inspire and to bring great joy to citizens.

This blog is very proud to be a member of this great organisation and I wish it well during its next 125 years.

A few weeks from now, on December 5th, I will be back at another tree planting event in the grounds at Stormont. The Ulster Camogie Council will be planting 1,000 Ash trees. The project is in support of the environment but is also intended to stress the importance of Ash trees in the making of hurls and camogie sticks.

Present at the dedication event on Thursday was John Hurson, from Tyrone. John has been fiercely active in support of the Palestinian people, particularly in the Gaza Strip. John was telling this blog about his plan to establish a GAA club in Gaza within the existing Gaza Sporting Club. Noam Chomsky, internationally renowned philosopher and political activist has agreed to participate and John has also secured the support of GAA activists, including Peter Canavan. This blog fully supports his efforts.

I wish John well. The situation in Gaza grows worse daily. The conditions for people living there are dreadful, and especially for the young people who make up the majority of the population.

Sport is hugely important and can help lift morale and bring enjoyment and fun into an otherwise bleak situation. Equally important is the solidarity work which goes on daily to highlight the desperate situation in the Middle East.



On Wednesday evening I spent several hours in Dublin speaking to a group of Irish speakers at the launch in Irish of my report of a visit to the region. Aengus O Snodaigh, who has also travelled to the Gaza Strip and faced the wrath of the Israeli Defence Forces seeking to sustain their illegal stranglehold on the area, also addressed the meeting. Colm Ó Snodaigh (from Kíla) and Cormac Breatnach played a newly composed lament for Palestine. It was a very good and informative event. Nollaig Ó Cionnaith rounded off the evening with a few lively Irish traditional tunes.

Twenty Years a Growing

November 10th 09

Twenty Years A Growing.


Twenty years ago today the Berlin Wall came down. This blog remembers
watching the scenes of jubilation on television in 1989. This evening’s
television news revisited those times and the scenes of euphoria and
jubilation. The great and the good are gathered at the Brandenburg Gate
for tonight’s formal celebrations.

It is interesting to see Mikhail Gorbachev, former Secretary General of the
Communist Party of the Soviet Union alongside other world leaders of that
period. Until his reign the Kremlin had intervened militarily to stifle
dissent, most famously in my memory in Prague in 1968.

At that time I was working in the Duke of York public house in downtown
Belfast. The Duke’s was the watering hole, and eating house, for Belfast
union leaders, Labour Party types, Communist Party leadership and a
scattering of Republican leaders. Our own civil rights struggle was
starting to assert itself but I have clear recollections of how
discussions among Belfast’s ‘Left’ or at least ‘the Left’ as represented
in the Duke’s was galvanised by the events on the streets of Prague. But
for all the soul searching and heated but intelligent debate no one was
predicting that a brief few decades later the Soviet Union would be no
more.

Gorbachev certainly was about reforming and modernising the Soviet Union,
and not about ending it.

In the 1980s when Solidarity organised across Poland there was no repeat
of the Prague crack down. By the summer of 1988 hefty hikes in food prices
led to strikes across Poland. Before long negotiations dealt with political as well as social and economic matters. Hungary followed. My guess is that the bulk of the protestors, at the start at least, wanted only to improve their systems not to overthrow them. Though, and this is another guess, I’m sure many became more ambitious and more radical as they became more politicised. And more successful.

I am also sure the masses of people assembled in Berlin for the
celebrations include many of the people who participated in the momentous
events which led to the walls coming down. Of course young Germans - twenty somethings - will have no memory of the Wall. Maybe their parents
or grandparents were activists. Maybe they were reared on stories of what
things were like in a divided Germany and a separated Berlin. It must be
an extremely emotional event for an activist to be at the Brandenburg Gate
tonight with children or grandchildren and to be part of all that.

I wonder how history would have flowed if the border guards had opened
fire on those brave people who first pushed their way through the border
crossing that fateful day twenty years ago.

Or if Thatcher’s warnings against German unity had been heeded? But of
course she was wrong. Again. And not only on Ireland, though that is little consolation.

Then on October 3 1990 Germany was re-united, irony of ironies, under an
Irish presidency of the European Union. Charlie Haughey was EU President.

There have been acres of books written about why all this happened. It’s
simple stoopid. It’s called the human spirit. It has a way of overcoming
all the odds. It can even destroy empires. And knock down walls. And
re-unite people and countries.

And despite all the doomsday warnings and threats and concerns it seems
that Germans are glad to be united. And why wouldn’t they?

From the limited dip I did into international news agencies’ coverage of
the celebrations most young Germans are happy with their country. They
take unity for granted. That is clear from a series of polls to coincide
with the twentieth anniversary.

A bit like our own young people will be at the twentieth anniversary of
our own reunification

Missing you already

The panel of Speakers for the United Ireland conference in Toronto.

Left to right: Warren Allmand, Former Solicitor General of Canada; Christopher Axworthy Former Attorney General of Saskatchewan; Eleanor McGrath, writer; Charlie Angus MP of New Democratic Party; myself; and Manon Perron, Treasurer of the Montreal Council of the Federation of National Trade Unions (CSN).

November 6th 09

Missing you already

This Blog has been ridiculed in the past because of my outpourings on the issue of flying. I mean flying in a plane of course.

As is well documented humans, unlike birds, angels or fairies, can’t fly unaided.

We need airships, balloons, gliders, helicopters and airplanes. This morning as we arrived at the airport in New Jersey I watched as flocks of birds showed us how easy it is for them. No check in, security procedures or waiting about the place for sparrows, starlings or seagulls. They just spread their wings and head skywards, showing off above us ground bound mortals.

Now strapped in and squeezed into too small a seat this Blog is airborne once again.

As I scribble furiously in long hand the plane containing me and other jet lagged souls is banking to the left above Newark and away to our right New York and the iconic vista of Manhattan falls away from us.

For a second I reflect on other planes heading towards that vista on that fateful day in September 2001. And then we wheel upwards into the clouds and the earth disappears.

We are heading for Canada. For Toronto, the last leg of a quick but successful trip which started in New York at the annual Friends of Sinn Fein dinner. It was a great event. The Friends of Sinn Fein really are friends. They defied the recession and gathered, around 800 or so to pledge their commitment to the Irish cause and to invest in a free and united Ireland.

Not only did they defy the recession – the New York Yankees were playing the Phillies that evening up the road in the Bronx. It’s called the World Series. By the same logic Kerry are the All Ireland World Champions and Kilkenny and the Aontroim Ladies Football team. World Champions all!!!

But our faithful New York constituency gave the big game a by ball and came to our event instead.

Yesterday Drew University in New Jersey was the venue for a series of more very successful and worthwhile engagements.

And in another few hours another round of interviews, another fundraiser and tomorrow another conference. Canada is good to us as well. The Irish here are not as powerful as their American cousins but they do well.

Canada has long featured in the diaspora. From before An Gorta Mor – the Great Hunger. They say ice hockey is a hybrid which came from native people playing lacrosse and Irish settlers playing hurling.

My Canadian cousin Frank – a one time ice hockey jock – tells me there is a hurling stick in the Ice Hockey Hall of Fame to mark this marriage of sporting cultures.

Canada also gave the Irish peace process Judge Cory, a man of integrity who stood up for truth and for the Finucane family’s right to an enquiry into the murder of human rights lawyer Pat Finucane. John de Chastelain played and continues to play an important role. So did Patten Commission member Clifford Shearing, another Canadian.

In their time the Fenians invaded Canada – the first time the title Irish Republican Army was used. The plan was to hold Canada until the English left Ireland.

Children of An Gorta Mor found a home here and the mass graves of the Irish dead are scattered through this great country.

Brendan Behan was famously deported once. In defence of his intoxicated state he declared ‘when I got to the airport I saw the sign Drink Canada Dry. I did my best to comply with that instruction.’

Brendan was a friend and comrade of my Uncle Dominic. They were in Mountjoy Prison together. Dominic told me that Brendan used to write like a devil in both Irish and English and leave scores of his stories and poems lying in the cell to be lost forever. Is mor an trua.

And with that our plane starts to descend. Two busy days here. I also get to see my favourite Aunt, Rita and her family. And then with the help of God and a good tail wind Belfast beckons on Monday morning. This Blog can’t wait to get back. Missing you already.

Get Up Stand Up

2 Samhain 09

Get Up Stand Up

On Friday the Irish Congress of Trade Unions is holding a series of rallies to protest against planned or likely cuts in public spending arising out of Decembers budget by the Irish government and by the Health Minister, Michael McGimpsey in the north.

The public is being invited to participate and there is a serious effort being made to mobilize mass public support and solidarity for the events.

In the south the National Day of Protest is against the Fianna Fáil/Green Government’s disastrous approach to the economic crisis. The ICTU is arguing for a better and fairer way of tackling this crisis and protecting jobs and public services. It is part of ICTU’s ‘Get Up Stand Up’ Campaign. And the demonstrations come just a month before what is expected to be one of the most savage Budgets ever by a Dublin government.

The government has set its face against constructive proposals from the trade union movement, from Sinn Féin and others, and continues to do almost nothing to save jobs and create alternative employment. Its policies are primarily about protecting those within the golden circle in the banks, the developers and political elite who created the current mess in the first place.

People who have lost their jobs or had their working hours reduced, or who face the repossession of their homes, are rightly angry at the amount of public money that is being poured into NAMA while they are being threatened with cuts in dole payments and child benefit.

One issue which has not received the media attention it deserves is the decision last April by the government to cut the Christmas Social Welfare Bonus.

Most recipients are probably still unaware that there will be no bonus this year. This affects the most vulnerable social welfare recipients who depend on it to meet seasonal expenses. It is especially anti-children.

And this is just the most glaring of the cuts introduced so far, with worse to come in the December Budget. These cuts are socially damaging, but they also make no economic sense. Money spent on social welfare goes straight back into the economy because recipients spend it on their daily and weekly needs. They cannot afford to hoard or to invest it. So cutting social welfare will further depress the economy; it will also marginalise working families and the communities they are from.

The Government has clearly decided that the unemployed and other social welfare recipients are an easy target. They are not electorally organised and less well able to defend themselves.



The ICTU National Day of Protest will provide an opportunity in at least eight major locations in the south - Dublin, Cork, Galway, Limerick, Waterford, Sligo, Tullamore, and Dundalk – for people to demonstrate their opposition to the policies of the government and to show that they do care for the most vulnerable in our society.

In the north the rallies are in Belfast, Derry, Magherafelt and Newry and the focus on Friday will very much be on planned cuts to the health service, including job losses, the closure of hospital beds and other proposals to slash health spending. The British Treasury is demanding ‘efficiency savings’ of £700 million over the next three years.

This is likely to mean the loss of an estimated 925 administrative jobs, 450 social services positions and more than 722 nursing jobs by 2011; Ambulance provision across the North may be cut by 70,000 hours; and mental health beds are also coming under pressure, with one of four wards for older people in Knockbracken Hospital in south Belfast being considered for closure.

Other actions that have been proposed include a greater reliance on a “skills mix” within the medical profession – that is, relying on less qualified health-care workers to carry out the work of nurses and midwives in order to cut costs.

The Belfast Trust also plans to ban staff overtime and the use of agency nurses. There is a push to cut patients stay in hospital to the shortest time possible, including those who have undergone surgery. Women's health professionals have expressed dismay at the Belfast Trust's plans that new mothers be released from hospital just six to 12 hours after they give birth.

The reality is that it will be the most disadvantaged, whose life expectancy is already significantly lower than others who will be most adversely affected by cuts.

So, it is time to choose what side you are on. For this blog there is no choice.

The ICTU is right. There is a better fairer way to organise our economy and society.

It is time to mobilise, agitate, educate and politicise for real change. Friday’s rallies are part of this necessary work. But they are not sufficient in themselves to bring about the changes that are required.

They are an important part of the fightback. That fightback has to continue beyond Friday.