name	Michael Lowry
honorific-suffix	TD
nationality	Irish
office	Teachta Dála
term start	February 1987
office2	Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications
term start2	15 December 1994
term end2	30 November 1996
predecessor2	Brian Cowen
successor2	John Bruton
birth date	March 13, 1953
birth place	County Tipperary, Ireland
constituency	Tipperary North
party	Independent (since 1997)
otherparty	Fine Gael (1979–97)
website

Michael Lowry (born 13 March 1953) is an Irish politician. He is currently a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Tipperary North constituency and continues to enjoy high popularity in his constituency despite being the subject of a criminal investigation resulting from various scandals while in office.

Early life[link]

Michael Lowry was born in County Tipperary and educated at Thurles CBS.

Career[link]

Local government and community work[link]

Lowry was elected to Tipperary North Riding County Council in 1979. He was an administrator in the Gaelic Athletic Association in the early 1980s as the youngest ever Chairman of the Tipperary County Committee. Later, as chairman of the Semple Stadium Development Committee, he was largely instrumental in raising the necessary funds for the refurbishment of the Stadium in preparation for the All-Ireland Centenary Hurling final in 1984.

Dáil Éireann[link]

He was first elected to Dáil Éireann as a Fine Gael TD for Tipperary North at the 1987 general election and in 1993 he became Chairman of the Fine Gael Parliamentary Party.

Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications[link]

In 1994 he was appointed Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications in the ''Rainbow Coalition'' government.

Controversies [link]

A succession of controversies broke during his period of office. These included allegations of irregularities related to the granting of a mobile phone licence to Esat Telecom which was later investigated by the Moriarty Tribunal, plans for the Dublin Light Rail System and the closure of rural post offices. At the 1997 McCracken Tribunal it was revealed that supermarket tycoon Ben Dunne had paid IR£395,000 for an extension to Lowry's home in Tipperary. The Tribunal concluded that Lowry had evaded tax.

This allegation prompted Lowry's resignation from the Cabinet in November 1996. Taoiseach John Bruton announced that Lowry would not be allowed stand as a Fine Gael candidate at the next election and he resigned from the party.

Resignation and career as independent TD[link]

Lowry announced that he would stand as an independent candidate in the 1997. He topped the poll in his constituency in that election and did so again in the 2002 and 2007 general elections.

Investigation by Moriarty Tribunal[link]

The investigation of payments to Lowry is one of the remits of the Moriarty Tribunal which sat from 1997 to 2011. In early 2007, Lowry announced that he had made a full and final settlement of all outstanding payments with the Revenue Commissioners in response to the findings concerning his tax evasion. His company Garuda had to pay up €1.2 million after a Revenue audit. He also paid almost €200,000 to settle his personal taxes.

In March 2011 the second and final report from the Moriarty Tribunal found that, during his time as Communications Minister, Michael Lowry assisted businessman Denis O'Brien's consortium Esat Digiphone in acquiring a lucrative mobile phone licence in the mid-90s which ultimately made O'Brien one of the richest men in Ireland.

It concluded that it is 'beyond doubt' that Lowry gave what it termed 'substantive information to Denis O'Brien, of significant value and assistance to him in securing the licence'. The Tribunal report found that Lowry, displayed 'an appreciable interest' in the process and had 'irregular interactions with interested parties at its most sensitive stages'. It also found that one of Lowry's interventions, which cut the selection process to the advantage of Esat, was 'disgraceful' and 'insidious', and that he had misled the Government, his party leader John Bruton and his own civil servants to influence the selection process in Esat's favour.

The tribunal also found that Lowry sought to procure unwarranted rent increases that over a seven-year period would have benefited businessman Ben Dunne. Lowry sought to influence the outcome of an arbitration being conducted in 1995 in relation to the rent payable by the then state-owned Telecom Éireann for Marlborough House to a company owned and controlled by Dunne. The report said that the matter was 'profoundly corrupt to a degree that was nothing short of breathtaking'.

The report also summarised the cumulative payments made to Lowry and says 'In aggregating the known payments from Mr Denis O'Brien to Mr Michael Lowry, it is apposite to note that, between the granting of the second GSM licence to Esat Digiphone in May 1996, and the transmission of £420,000 sterling to complete the purchase of the latter of Mr Lowry's English properties in December 1999, Mr O'Brien had made or facilitated payments to Mr Lowry of £147,000 sterling, £300,000 sterling and a benefit equivalent to a payment in the form of Mr O'Brien's support for a loan of £420,000 sterling.'

Lowry had addressed the Dáil saying that if he had been trying to hide a lot of money he would have “put it in an offshore account”, implying that no such account existed. The Tribunal found that he actually had at least four such accounts that he used for the purpose of evading tax and had not disclosed these accounts to the previous McCracken Tribunal.

Aftermath of allegations[link]

Lowry rejected the Moriarty report saying that it was flawed, saying that the assumptions and the conclusions that Justice Moriarty arrived at are totally baseless. Nonetheless, the Criminal Assets Bureau and the Bureau of Fraud were called in on 29 March 2011 to begin investigating his finances since his €1.4m settlement with the revenue commissioners did not grant him immunity from prosecution.

On 31 March 2011, an all party motion was passed in the Dáil calling on Lowry to voluntarily resign his seat in light of the publication of the Moriarty Report.

Defamation lawsuit[link]

In 2010, Lowry launched a defamation lawsuit against ''Irish Independent'' journalist Sam Smyth, over an article Smyth had written regarding the Moriarty Tribunal, as well as comments Smyth had made on a TV3 show describing Lowry as having been "caught with his hand in the till.". Smyth defended the defamation claim, stating he had "did not call Michael Lowry TD a thief, but did believe he was a liar and a tax cheat".. Lowry's defamation lawsuit was thrown out in the Circuit court, and again on appeal to the High Court. High Court Justice Nicholas Kearns noted that Lowry "did not dispute that he engaged in tax fraud", and ordered Lowry to pay Smyth's legal costs.

Continued popularity[link]

Lowry is backed by a strong local organisation in Tipperary known informally as "Team Lowry" which consists of 4 County Councillors in North Tipperary, 2 Town Councillors in Thurles and 1 Town Councillor in Templemore.

Lowry was re-elected to represent Tipperary North at the 2011 general election, heading the poll on the 1st count with 14,010 votes. Along with Michael Healy Rae and Noel Grealish, he is not a member of the Dáil Technical Group.

Business interests[link]

Lowry has directorships listed with the Companies Registration Office. He has two roles with Garuda Ltd, a manufacturer of electric domestic appliances; Abbeygreen Consulting, which involves construction work and special trades; and Gdlc Business Consultants Ltd., a business and management consultancy registered in Dublin.

References[link]

External links[link]

{{s-ttl|title = Fine Gael Teachta Dála for Tipperary North |years = 1987–1997}} {{s-ttl|title = Independent Teachta Dála for Tipperary North |years = 1997–present}} {{s-ttl|title = Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications |years = 1994–1996}} {{s-ttl|title = Chairman of the Fine Gael Parliamentary Party |years = 1993–1994}} Category:1953 births Category:Living people Category:Fine Gael politicians Category:Independent politicians in Ireland Category:Irish tax evaders Category:Members of the 25th Dáil Category:Members of the 26th Dáil Category:Members of the 27th Dáil Category:Members of the 28th Dáil Category:Members of the 29th Dáil Category:Members of the 30th Dáil Category:Members of the 31st Dáil Category:People from County Tipperary Category:Political scandals in the Republic of Ireland Category:Teachtaí Dála

de:Michael Lowry ga:Michael Lowry

name	Joan Burton
honorific-suffix	TD
nationality	Irish
office	Minister for Social Protection
term start	9 March 2011
predecessor	Éamon Ó Cuív
office2	Minister of State for Overseas Development Aid and Human Rights
term start2	20 December 1994
term end2	26 June 1997
predecessor2	Tom Kitt
successor2	Liz O'Donnell
office3	Minister of State at the Department of Social Welfare
term start3	14 January 1993
term end3	15 December 1994
predecessor3	New office
successor3	Office abolished
office5	Teachta Dála
term start5	May 2002
term start6	November 1992
term end6	June 1997
constituency6	Dublin West
birth date	February 01, 1949
birth place	Dublin, Ireland
party	Labour Party
spouse	Pat Carroll
children	1
alma mater	University College Dublin
website

Joan Burton (born 1 February 1949) is an Irish Labour Party politician and the current Minister for Social Protection. She is a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Dublin West constituency.

Burton was first elected to Dáil Éireann at the 1992 general election. From 1995–97, she was Minister of State at the Department of Foreign Affairs. She lost her seat at the 1997 general election but was re-elected to Dáil Éireann at the 2002 general election.

Early and private life[link]

Burton is a native of the Stoneybatter area of Dublin. She was adopted by the Burton's as a baby and brought up in Inchicore. Her adoptive father worked in the local iron foundry. She was educated at St Gabriel's NS, Cowper St and St Joseph Sisters of Charity Secondary School, Stanhope Street and University College Dublin (UCD) where she graduated with a degree in Commerce. She is also a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants. She has worked as a lecturer in Accountancy in the Dublin Institute of Technology and the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

Political career[link]

She first stood for election at the 1989 general election, when she stood as one of two Labour candidates in the Dublin Central constituency, failing to get elected. At the local elections in 1991, she was elected to Dublin County Council for the Mulhuddart electoral area. Burton was first elected to Dáil Éireann at the 1992 general election, representing Dublin West in the 27th Dáil. She was appointed Minister of State at the Department of Social Welfare in the Fianna Fáil–Labour Party coalition that was formed after that election. With the breakdown of that coalition and establishment of a Rainbow Coalition between the Labour Party, Fine Gael and Democratic Left in early 1995, she became Minister of State at the Department of Foreign Affairs, a position she held until the coalition's defeat at 1997 general election.

She lost her seat at the 1997 general election to Joe Higgins of the Socialist Party. Joan was re-elected to Fingal County Council in the 1999 local elections, on this occasion winning a seat in the Castleknock electoral area. She was re-elected to the Dáil for Dublin West at the 2002 general election. She was then appointed the Spokesperson on Finance. She was a candidate for the deputy leadership of the party in 2002, obtaining 24% of the first preference vote, but was unsuccessful. She became deputy leader of the Labour Party in September 2007.

She was voted by political journalists as the Magill TD of the Year 2007 and 2008.

Burton was re-elected to represent Dublin West at the 2011 general election, topping the poll on the 1st count with 9,627 votes, and was the first TD to be elected in the country for the 31st Dáil.

References[link]

External links[link]

Joan Burton's page on the Labour Party website

{{s-ttl|title = Labour Party Teachta Dála for Dublin West |years = 1992–1997}} {{s-ttl|title = Labour Party Teachta Dála for Dublin West |years = 2002–present}} {{s-ttl|title = Minister of State at the Department of Social Welfare |years = 1993–1994}} {{s-ttl|title = Minister of State for Overseas Development Aid and Human Rights |years = 1994–1997}} {{s-ttl|title = Minister for Social Protection |years = 2011–present}} {{s-ttl|title = Deputy Leader of Labour Party |years = 2007–present}}

Category:1949 births Category:Living people Category:Alumni of University College Dublin Category:Female Teachtaí Dála Category:Labour Party (Ireland) politicians Category:Members of the 27th Dáil Category:Members of the 29th Dáil Category:Members of the 30th Dáil Category:Members of the 31st Dáil Category:People from County Dublin Category:Teachtaí Dála

de:Joan Burton ga:Joan Burton sco:Joan Burton

Birth date	August 10, 1981
Birth place	Mountain View, California
Occupation	Film actor, Television actor }}

Jon Prescott (born August 10, 1981) is an American actor.

Early life [link]

He was born in Mountain View, California, but raised near Portland, Oregon. Prescott has two brothers and a sister. He attended Emerson College in Boston.

Career [link]

After college he moved to Los Angeles. He hosted OLN's ''Outdoor Investigations'' and has also been seen on television in ''30 Rock'', ''Rescue Me'', ''CSI: New York'', ''As the World Turns'', ''Watch Over Me'', ''Law & Order'', ''Las Vegas'', ''One Life to Live'', ''Hot Properties'', ''The 1/2 Hour News Hour'', ''Celebrity Apprentice,'' and the HBO pilot ''Suburban Shootout.'' His films include: ''Howl'', ''The Holiday'', ''Careless'', and ''Placebo''. Prescott stars in ''The One'' released in 2011.

In 2012 Prescott was reported to join the hottest Lifetime Television series ''The Client List'' playing Mark Flemming in a recurring role.

TV series[link]

! Year !! Title !! Role	Notes
2012 -present		Mark Fleming	Recurring
2011	Untitled Jersey City Project	Frank George	Series regular
2011	Law & Order: Criminal Intent	Johnny Apreda	Guest star
2011	The Good Wife	Andre Felise	Guest star
2010		Memory Hank	Guest star
2010	30 Rock	The Guy	cameo
2009	One Life to Live	Chad Driscoll	Guest star; 3 episodes
2009	Law & Order	Davey Burke	Guest star
2008	As the World Turns	Mike Casnoff	Recurring
2007		Jeremy	Guest star
2007	Watch Over Me	Pette Weber	Main cast
2006	CSI: NY	Nick Gunn	Guest star
2006	Outdoor Investigations	Lucas Simms	Series regular
2005	Hot Properties	Nelson Buch	Guest star

Film[link]

! Year !! Title !! Role
2006		James
2007	Careless	Jimmy
2009		Neal Cassidy
2011	The One	Daniel
2012	Maladies	Prescott

References [link]

External links[link]

Official Website

Category:1981 births Category:Living people Category:American male models Category:American television actors Category:Emerson College alumni

Name	Gerry Adams TD Gearóid Mac Ádhaimh
Office	President of Sinn Féin
Term start	13 November 1983
Predecessor	Ruairí Ó Brádaigh
Office2	Teachta Dála
Term start2	February 2011
Constituency2	Louth
Predecessor2	Arthur Morgan
Office3	Member of Parliament for Belfast West
Term start3	1 May 1997
Term end3	26 January 2011
Predecessor3	Joe Hendron
Successor3	Paul Maskey
Majority3	17,759 (54.7%)
Term start4	9 June 1983
Term end4	9 April 1992
Predecessor4	Gerry Fitt
Successor4	Joe Hendron
Majority4	16,862 (41.1%)
Office5	Member of the Northern Ireland Assembly for Belfast West
Term start5	25 June 1998
Term end5	7 December 2010
Predecessor5	Constituency Created
Successor5	Pat Sheehan
Birth date	October 06, 1948
Birth place	Belfast, Northern Ireland
Party	Sinn Féin
Spouse	Collette McArdle
Children	3
Nationality	Irish
Religion	Roman Catholicism
Website	Official website }}

Gerry Adams (; born 6 October 1948 in Belfast, Northern Ireland) is an Irish republican politician and Teachta Dála (TD) for the constituency of Louth. From 1983 to 1992 and from 1997 to 2011, he was an abstentionist Westminster Member of Parliament for Belfast West. He is the president of Sinn Féin, the second largest political party in Northern Ireland and the largest nationalist party. From the late 1980s onwards, Adams was an important figure in the Northern Ireland peace process, initially following contact by the then Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) leader John Hume and subsequently with the Irish and British governments and then other parties. In 2005, the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) indicated that its armed campaign was over and that it is now exclusively committed to democratic politics. Under Adams, Sinn Féin changed its traditional policy of abstentionism towards Oireachtas Éireann, the parliament of the Republic of Ireland, in 1986 and later took seats in the power-sharing Northern Ireland Assembly. However, Sinn Féin retains a policy of abstentionism towards the Westminster Parliament, but since 2002, receives allowances for staff and takes up offices in the House of Commons.

Ancestry and early life [link]

Adams' parents, Gerry Adams, Sr. and Annie Hannaway, came from republican backgrounds. Adams' grandfather, also called Gerry Adams, had been a member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) during the Irish War of Independence. Two of Adams' uncles, Dominic and Patrick Adams, had been interned by the governments in Belfast and Dublin. Although it is reported that his uncle Dominic was a one-time IRA chief of staff, J. Bowyer Bell states in his book, ''The Secret Army: The IRA 1916'' (Irish Academy Press), that Dominic Adams was a senior figure in the IRA of the mid-1940s. Gerry Sr. joined the IRA at age sixteen. In 1942, he participated in an IRA ambush on a Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) patrol but was himself shot, arrested and sentenced to eight years imprisonment.

Adams' maternal great-grandfather, Michael Hannaway, was a member of the Fenians during their dynamiting campaign in England in the 1860s and 1870s. Michael's son, Billy, was election agent for Éamon de Valera in 1918 in West Belfast but refused to follow de Valera into democratic and constitutional politics upon the formation of Fianna Fáil.

Annie Hannaway was a member of Cumann na mBan, the women's branch of the IRA. Three of her brothers (Alfie, Liam and Tommy) were known IRA members.

Adams attended St Finian's Primary School on the Falls Road where he was taught by De La Salle brothers. Having passed the eleven-plus exam in 1960, he attended St Mary's Christian Brothers Grammar School. He left St. Mary's with six O-levels and became a barman. He was increasingly involved in the Irish republican movement, joining Sinn Féin and Fianna Éireann in 1964, after being radicalised by the Divis Street riots during that year's general election campaign.

In 1971, Adams married Collette McArdle, with whom he has three children.

Early political career [link]

In the late 1960s, a civil rights campaign developed in Northern Ireland. Adams was an active supporter and joined the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association in 1967. However, the civil rights movement was met with protests from loyalist counter-demonstrators. In August 1969, Northern Ireland cities like Belfast and Derry erupted in major rioting and British troops were called in at the request of the Government of Northern Ireland (see 1969 Northern Ireland Riots).

Adams was active in Sinn Féin at this time, siding with the Provisionals in the split of 1970. In August 1971, internment was reintroduced to Northern Ireland under the Special Powers Act 1922. Adams was interned in March 1972, on , but was released in June to take part in secret, but abortive talks in London. The IRA negotiated a short-lived truce with the British government and an IRA delegation met with the British Home Secretary, William Whitelaw at Cheyne Walk in Chelsea. The delegation included Gerry Adams, Martin McGuinness, Sean Mac Stiofain (IRA Chief of Staff), Daithi O'Conaill, Seamus Twomey, Ivor Bell and Dublin solicitor Myles Shevlin. The IRA insisted Adams be included in the meeting and he was released from internment to participate. Following the failure of the talks, he played a central role in planning the bomb blitz on Belfast known as Bloody Friday. He was re-arrested in July 1973 and interned at the Long Kesh internment camp. After taking part in an IRA-organised escape attempt, he was sentenced to a period of imprisonment. During this time, he wrote articles in the paper ''An Phoblacht'' under the by-line "Brownie", where he criticized the strategy and policy of Ruairí Ó Brádaigh and Billy McKee. He was also highly critical of a decision taken in Belfast by McKee to assassinate members of the rival Official IRA, who had been on ceasefire since 1972. After his release in 1976, he was again arrested in 1978 for alleged IRA membership, the charges were subsequently dismissed.

During the 1981 hunger strike, Adams played an important policy-making role, which saw the emergence of his party as a political force. In 1983, he was elected president of Sinn Féin and became the first Sinn Féin MP elected to the British House of Commons since Phil Clarke and Tom Mitchell in the mid-1950s. Following his election as MP for Belfast West, the British government lifted a ban on him travelling to Great Britain. In line with Sinn Féin policy, he refused to take his seat in the House of Commons.

On 14 March 1984 in central Belfast, Adams was seriously wounded in an assassination attempt when several Ulster Freedom Fighters (UFF) gunmen fired about 20 shots into the car in which he was travelling. He was hit in the neck, shoulder and arm. After the shooting, he was rushed to the Royal Victoria Hospital, where he underwent surgery to remove the three bullets which had entered his body. Under-cover plain clothes police officers seized three suspects who were later convicted and sentenced. One of the three was John Gregg, who would be killed by rival loyalists in 2003. Adams claimed that the British army had prior knowledge of the attack and allowed it to go ahead.

Allegations of IRA membership [link]

Adams has stated repeatedly that he has never been a member of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA). However, authors such as Ed Moloney, Peter Taylor, Mark Urban and historian Richard English have all named Adams as part of the IRA leadership since the 1970s. Adams has denied Moloney's claims, calling them "libellous".

President of Sinn Féin [link]

In 1978, Gerry Adams became joint vice-president of Sinn Féin and a key figure in directing a challenge to the Sinn Féin leadership of President Ruairí Ó Brádaigh and joint vice- president Dáithí Ó Conaill.

The 1975 IRA-British truce is often viewed as the event that began the challenge to the original Provisional Sinn Féin leadership, which was said to be Southern-based and dominated by southerners like Ó Brádaigh and Ó Conaill. However, the Chief of Staff of the IRA at the time, Seamus Twomey, was a senior figure from Belfast. Others in the leadership were also Northern based, including Billy McKee from Belfast. Adams (allegedly) rose to become the most senior figure in the IRA Northern Command on the basis of his absolute rejection of anything but military action, but this conflicts with the fact that during his time in prison, Adams came to reassess his approach and became more political.

One of the reasons that the Provisional IRA and provisional Sinn Féin were founded, in December 1969 and January 1970, respectively, was that people like Ó Brádaigh, O'Connell and McKee opposed participation in constitutional politics. The other reason was the failure of the Goulding leadership to provide for the defence of nationalist areas. When, at the December 1969 IRA convention and the January 1970 Sinn Féin Ard Fheis the delegates voted to participate in the Dublin (Leinster House), Belfast (Stormont) and London (Westminster) parliaments, the organizations split. Gerry Adams, who had joined the Republican Movement in the early 1960s, sided with the Provisionals.

In Long Kesh in the mid-1970s, and writing under the pseudonym "Brownie" in ''Republican News'', Adams called on Republicans for increased political activity, especially at a local level. The call resonated with younger Northern people, many of whom had been active in the Provisional IRA but had not necessarily been highly active in Sinn Féin. In 1977, Adams and Danny Morrison drafted the address of Jimmy Drumm at the Annual Wolfe Tone Commemoration at Bodenstown. The address was viewed as watershed in that Drumm acknowledged that the war would be a long one and that success depended on political activity that would complement the IRA's armed campaign. For some, this wedding of politics and armed struggle culminated in Danny Morrison's statement at the 1981 Sinn Féin Ard Fheis in which he asked "Who here really believes we can win the war through the Ballot box? But will anyone here object if, with a ballot paper in one hand and the Armalite in the other, we take power in Ireland". For others, however, the call to link political activity with armed struggle had been clearly defined in Sinn Féin policy and in the Presidential Addresses of Ruairí Ó Brádaigh, but it had not resonated with the young Northerners.

Even after the election of Bobby Sands as MP for Fermanagh/South Tyrone, a part of the mass mobilization associated with the 1981 Irish Hunger Strike by republican prisoners in the ''H blocks'' of the Maze prison (known as Long Kesh by Republicans), Adams was cautious about the level of political involvement by Sinn Féin. Charles Haughey, the Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland, called an election for June 1981. At an Ard Chomhairle meeting, Adams recommended that they contest only four constituencies which were in border counties. Instead, H-Block/Armagh Candidates contested nine constituencies and elected two TDs. This, along with the election of Bobby Sands, was a precursor to a big electoral breakthrough in elections in 1982 to the Northern Ireland Assembly. Adams, Danny Morrison, Martin McGuinness, Jim McAllister, and Owen Carron were elected as abstentionists. The Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) had announced before the election that it would not take any seats and so its 14 elected representatives also abstained from participating in the Assembly and it was a failure. The 1982 election was followed by the 1983 Westminster election, in which Sinn Féin's vote increased and Gerry Adams was elected, as an abstentionist, as MP for Belfast West. It was in 1983 that Ruairí Ó Brádaigh resigned as President of Sinn Féin and was succeeded by Gerry Adams.

Republicans had long claimed that the only legitimate Irish state was the Irish Republic declared in the Proclamation of the Republic of 1916, which they considered to be still in existence. In their view, the legitimate government was the IRA Army Council, which had been vested with the authority of that Republic in 1938 (prior to the Second World War) by the last remaining anti-Treaty deputies of the Second Dáil. Adams continued to adhere to this claim of republican political legitimacy until quite recently — however, in his 2005 speech to the Sinn Féin Ard Fheis he explicitly rejected it. "But we refuse to criminalise those who break the law in pursuit of legitimate political objectives. ... Sinn Féin is accused of recognising the Army Council of the IRA as the legitimate government of this island. That is not the case. ... do not believe that the Army Council is the government of Ireland. Such a government will only exist when all the people of this island elect it. Does Sinn Féin accept the institutions of this state as the legitimate institutions of this state? Of course we do."

As a result of this non-recognition, Sinn Féin had abstained from taking any of the seats they won in the British or Irish parliaments. At its 1986 Ard Fheis, Sinn Féin delegates passed a resolution to amend the rules and constitution that would allow its members to sit in the Dublin parliament (Leinster House/Dáil Éireann). At this, Ruairí Ó Brádaigh led a small walkout, just as he and Sean Mac Stiofain had done sixteen years earlier with the creation of Provisional Sinn Féin. This minority, which rejected dropping the policy of abstentionism, now nominally distinguishes itself from Provisional Sinn Féin by using the name Republican Sinn Féin (or Sinn Féin Poblachtach), and maintains that they are the true Sinn Féin republicans.

Adams' leadership of Sinn Féin was supported by a Northern-based cadre that included people like Danny Morrison and Martin McGuinness. Over time, Adams and others pointed to Republican electoral successes in the early and mid-1980s, when hunger strikers Bobby Sands and Kieran Doherty were elected to the British House of Commons and Dáil Éireann respectively, and they advocated that Sinn Féin become increasingly political and base its influence on electoral politics rather than paramilitarism. The electoral effects of this strategy were shown later by the election of Adams and McGuinness to the House of Commons.

Voice ban [link]

Adams's prominence as an Irish Republican leader was increased by the ban on the media broadcast of his voice (the ban actually covered eleven republican and loyalist organisations, but in practice Adams was the only one prominent enough to appear regularly on TV). This ban was imposed by the then prime minister Margaret Thatcher on 19 October 1988, the reason given being to "starve the terrorist and the hijacker of the oxygen of publicity on which they depend" after the BBC interviewed Martin McGuinness and Adams had been the focus of a row over an edition of ''After Dark'', an intended Channel 4 discussion programme which was never made.

A similar ban, known as Section 31, had been law in the Republic of Ireland since the 1970s. However, media outlets soon found ways around the ban, initially by the use of subtitles, but later and more commonly by the use of an actor reading his words over the images of him speaking. One actor who voiced Adams was Paul Loughran.

This ban was lampooned in cartoons and satirical TV shows, such as ''Spitting Image'', and in ''The Day Today'' and was criticised by freedom of speech organisations and British media personalities, including BBC Director General John Birt and BBC foreign editor John Simpson. The ban was lifted by British Prime Minister John Major on 17 September 1994.

Moving into mainstream politics [link]

Sinn Féin continued its policy of refusing to sit in the Westminster Parliament even after Adams won the Belfast West constituency. He lost his seat to Joe Hendron of the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) in the 1992 general election, regaining it at the following 1997 election.

Under Adams, Sinn Féin appeared to move away from being a political voice of the Provisional IRA to becoming a professionally organised political party in both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.

SDLP leader John Hume, MP, identified the possibility that a negotiated settlement might be possible and began secret talks with Adams in 1988. These discussions led to unofficial contacts with the British Northern Ireland Office under the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Peter Brooke, and with the government of the Republic under Charles Haughey – although both governments maintained in public that they would not negotiate with "terrorists".

These talks provided the groundwork for what was later to be the Belfast Agreement, as well as the milestone Downing Street Declaration and the Joint Framework Document.

These negotiations led to the IRA ceasefire in August 1994. Irish Taoiseach Albert Reynolds, who had replaced Haughey and who had played a key role in the Hume/Adams dialogue through his Special Advisor Martin Mansergh, regarded the ceasefire as permanent. However, the slow pace of developments contributed in part to the (wider) political difficulties of the British government of John Major and the consequent reliance on Ulster Unionist Party votes in the House of Commons, led the IRA to end its ceasefire and resume the campaign.

A re-instituted ceasefire later followed as part of the negotiations strategy, which saw teams from the British and Irish governments, the Ulster Unionist Party, the SDLP, Sinn Féin and representatives of loyalist paramilitary organizations, under the chairmanship of former United States Senator George Mitchell, produced the Belfast Agreement (also called the ''Good Friday Agreement'' as it was signed on Good Friday, 1998). Under the agreement, structures were created reflecting the Irish and British identities of the people of Ireland, with a British-Irish Council and a Northern Ireland Legislative Assembly created.

Articles 2 and 3 of the Republic's constitution, which claimed sovereignty over all of Ireland, were reworded, and a power-sharing Executive Committee was provided for. As part of their deal, Sinn Féin agreed to abandon its abstentionist policy regarding a "six-county parliament", as a result taking seats in the new Stormont-based Assembly and running the education and health and social services ministries in the power-sharing government.

On 15 August 1998, four months after the signing of the Good Friday Agreement, the Real IRA exploded a car bomb in Omagh, County Tyrone, killing 31 people and injuring 220, from many communities. Breaking with tradition, Adams said in reaction to the bombing "I am totally horrified by this action. I condemn it without any equivocation whatsoever." Prior to this, Adams had maintained a policy of refusing to condemn IRA or their splinter groups' actions.

Opponents in Republican Sinn Féin accused Sinn Féin of "selling out" by agreeing to participate in what it called "partitionist assemblies" in the Republic and Northern Ireland. However, Gerry Adams insisted that the Belfast Agreement provided a mechanism to deliver a united Ireland by non-violent and constitutional means, much as Michael Collins had said of the Anglo-Irish Treaty nearly 80 years earlier.

When Sinn Féin came to nominate its two ministers to the Northern Ireland Executive, for tactical reasons the party, like the SDLP and the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), chose not to include its leader among its ministers. (When later the SDLP chose a new leader, it selected one of its ministers, Mark Durkan, who then opted to remain in the Committee.)

Adams remains the President of Sinn Féin. In 2011 he succeeded Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin as Sinn Féin parliamentary leader in Dáil Éireann. Daithí McKay is the head of the Sinn Féin group in the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Adams was re-elected to the Northern Ireland Assembly on 8 March 2007, and on 26 March 2007, he met with DUP leader Ian Paisley face-to-face for the first time, and the two came to an agreement regarding the return of the power-sharing executive in Northern Ireland.

In January 2009, Adams attended the United States presidential Inauguration of Barack Obama as a guest of US Congressman Richard Neal.

On 6 May 2010, Adams was re-elected as MP for West Belfast garnering 71.1% of the vote. In 2011 the Chancellor appointed Adams to the British title of Steward and Bailiff of the Manor of Northstead to allow him to resign from the House of Commons and to stand for election in the Dáil. Initially it was claimed by David Cameron that Adams had accepted the title but Downing Street has since apologized for this and Adams has publicly rejected the title stating, "I have had no truck whatsoever with these antiquated and quite bizarre aspects of the British parliamentary system".

Dáil Éireann Election [link]

In 2010, Adams announced that he would be seeking election as a TD (member of Irish Parliament) for the constituency of Louth at the 2011 Irish general election. He subsequently resigned his West Belfast Assembly seat on 7 December 2010.

Following the announcement of the Irish general election, 2011, Adams wrote to the House of Commons to resign his seat. This was treated as an application for the position of Crown Steward and Bailiff of the Manor of Northstead, an office of profit under the Crown, the traditional method of leaving Westminster as plain resignation is not possible, and granted as such even though Adams had not explicitly made the request.

He was elected to the Dáil, topping the Louth constituency poll with 15,072 (21.7%) first preference votes.

Gerry Adams in film and fiction [link]

The character of Gerry Adams has been portrayed in a number of films, TV programmes or in fiction:

2004 film ''Omagh'' by actor Jonathan Ryan. It is a dramatisation of the 1998 Omagh bombing and its aftermath.

2010 TV film ''Mo'' by actor John Lynch; the story of Mo Mowlam and the Good Friday Agreement.

Novel ''The Marching Season''; a spy fiction novel by Daniel Silva.

1996 Novel Eureka Street by Robert McLiam Wilson, as the character Jimmy Eve.

Published works [link]

''Falls Memories'', 1982

''The Politics of Irish Freedom'', 1986

''A Pathway to Peace'', 1988

''An Irish Voice''

''Cage Eleven'', 1990, Brandon Books, ISBN 978-0-86322-114-9

''The Street and Other Stories'', 1993, Brandon Books, ISBN 978-0-86322-293-1

''Free Ireland: Towards a Lasting Peace'', 1995

''Before the Dawn'', 1996, Brandon Books, ISBN 978-0-434-00341-9

''Selected Writings''

''Who Fears to Speak...?'', 2001(Original Edition 1991), Beyond the Pale Publications, ISBN 978-1-900960-13-7

''An Irish Journal'', 2001, Brandon Books, ISBN 978-0-86322-282-5

''Hope and History'', 2003, Brandon Books, ISBN 978-0-86322-330-3

''A Farther Shore'', 2005, Random House

"The New Ireland: A Vision For The Future", 2005, Brandon Books, ISBN 978-0-86322-344-0

''An Irish Eye'', 2007, Brandon Books, ISBN 978-0-86322-370-9

Further reading [link]

Allen Randolph, Jody. "Gerry Adams, August 2009." ''Close to the Next Moment: Interviews from a Changing Ireland.'' Manchester: Carcanet, 2010.

Keena, Colm. ''Biography of Gerry Adams.'' Cork: Mercier Press, 1990

See also [link]

Public Prosecution Service of Northern Ireland v. Liam Adams

Resignation from the British House of Commons

References [link]

External links [link]

Léargas blog by Gerry Adams MP

Column archive at ''The Guardian''

Gerry Adams Sinn Féin profile

Gerry Adams TD Louth election candidate

Gerry Adams Man Of War and Man Of Peace? Anthony McIntyre, ''The Blanket'', 28 April 2004

Interview with Gerry Adams February 2006

Gerry Adams Profile at ''New Statesman''

{{s-ttl | title = Member of Parliament for Belfast West | years = 1997–2011}} {{s-ttl | title = Member of the Legislative Assembly for Belfast West | years = 1998–2010 }} {{s-ttl | title = Teachta Dála for Louth | years = 2011–present }}

Category:1948 births Category:Living people Category:Attempted assassination survivors Category:Irish republicans interned without trial Category:Irish socialists Category:Leaders of Sinn Féin Category:Members of the Northern Ireland Forum Category:Members of the 31st Dáil Category:Members of the United Kingdom Parliament for Belfast constituencies Category:Northern Ireland MPAs 1982–1986 Category:Northern Ireland MLAs 1998–2003 Category:Northern Ireland MLAs 2003–2007 Category:Northern Ireland MLAs 2007–2011 Category:People educated at St. Mary's Christian Brothers' Grammar School, Belfast Category:People from Belfast Category:Shooting survivors Category:Sinn Féin MPs (UK) Category:Teachtaí Dála Category:UK MPs 1983–1987 Category:UK MPs 1987–1992 Category:UK MPs 1997–2001 Category:UK MPs 2001–2005 Category:UK MPs 2005–2010 Category:UK MPs 2010–

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