Anthony McIntyre's Blog, page 1173
November 28, 2017
The Craigavon 2 Deserve Justice - Now!!
The McConville Family call on people to sign a petition in support of Brendan McConville and John Paul Wooton.
The Craigavon 2, Brendan McConville and John-Paul Wootton, are innocent Irishmen who have been wrongfully imprisoned for the past 8 years.
This petition calls upon Britain's Criminal Case Review Commission (CCRC) to thoroughly examine all evidence disclosed and undisclosed in the case. To speak with Witness M, his partner and re-examine his version of events and credibility.
If you already know the facts of this case the wife and family of Brendan McConville, who are running his campaign, would like you to show your support for the Craigavon 2 by signing and sharing this petition widely. We truly appreciate your time and support.
If you don't know the facts of the case, please read on. It could be your family this happens to next ...
On March 9th 2009 Constable Steven Carroll was fatally shot in Craigavon, County Armagh, Northern Ireland . On the 30th of March 2012 Brendan McConville and John Paul Wootton (The Craigavon 2) were convicted of the shooting and sentenced to spend the rest of their lives in prison.
If the paragraph above covered the complete story of the case it would have been duly noted in the history files, annotated with varying interpretations depending on political allegiance, & the world would have moved on.
Instead, beneath those 44 words lies the story of one the worst miscarriages of justice seen in the UK or Ireland since the days of the Guildford 4 or the Birmingham 6.\
It is a case that has attracted international attention & has earned the support of human rights activists, politicians & legal experts alike.
It is a case laced with a flawed “star witness” (Witness M) who was & still is being financially rewarded for his testimony, with secret hearings, tampered / disappeared evidence and enough Anonymity & Public Interest Immunity Orders to make sure neither the press nor the public could be aware of what was happening at the trial (which was held in a jury-less court presided over by a single judge acting as a “nominal jury”).
This is a case where the judge has said that he can not say for sure what part either defendant had in the shooting but sentenced them to life in prison anyway.
Referring to the Craigavon 2, Gerry Conlon, of the “Guildford 4” wrote “"We can't have innocent people going to jail and 15 years down the line them being released, their lives ruined … I believe a miscarriage of justice took place here on the basis of all the evidence I have read." ”.
Michael Mansfield QC, a leading barrister who represented both the Guildford 4 and the Birmingham 6 in their miscarriage of justice cases has said ““There is nothing more particular about it [the Craigavon 2 case] than any of the other miscarriages and the same features appear in all these things.”
Michael O'Brien, award winning author. human rights activist and himself the victim of a notorious miscarriage of justice which saw him wrongfully imprisoned for 12 years, has said “The case of The Craigavon 2 will not lie dormant in the grave, it will rise up and haunt them".
This last July the Dublin City Council unanimously passed a motion calling for the immediate release of both men. Writing about the motion, Cieran Perry, who introduced it wrote, “As the motion says, this case isn’t about a political ideology, it’s about a miscarriage of justice and an assault on the human rights of both men.
Regardless of your view on the political situation in the 6 counties it’s important that as many people as possible highlight the case and support the men.”.
On November 13th the South Dublin Council also unanimously passed a motion supporting The Craigavon 2 & stating in part “This Council acknowledges that the case of the Craigavon 2 requires significant re-examination due to concerns about how the convictions were achieved.”
As examples of the strong show of support for the Craigavon 2 throughout the UK, members of the UCU (University & College Union) meeting in conference in London last weekend unanimously supported a motion backing the call for a re-examination of the case and JENGba (Joint Enterprise: Not Guilty by Association), the influential UK based grassroots organization fighting wrongful convictions, has been a strong, vocal and extremely helpful supporter.
Here are the basic facts of the case:
On March 9th 2009 Constable Steven Carroll was fatally shot in Craigavon, County Armagh, Northern Ireland . On the 30th of March 2012 Brendan McConville and John Paul Wootton were convicted of the shooting and sentenced to life in prison.
At the trial no evidence of Brendan McConville or John-Paul Wootton’s direct involvement in the shooting was ever presented. It wasn't presented because it doesn't exist.
Instead the conviction was based on:
1.) The testimony of a witness who testified that on the heavily raining night of the shooting he saw McConville dressed in a green army jacket in the neighborhood of the shooting around the time of the shooting.
2.) DNA evidence from a jacket retrieved from Wootton's car after the shooting that an expert testified had McConville's DNA on it and traces of what possibly could be gunpowder.
3.) A GPS tracking device that had been placed in Wootton's car sometime prior to the shooting which showed the car leaving a housing estate adjacent to the one where the shooting occurred ten minutes after the shooting & passing near McConville's home on its way back to Wootton's. The prosecution used this information to surmise that McConville was dropped off by Wootton before he made his own way home.
The problems with the conviction are as follows:
1.) The prosecution's star witness, Witness M, gave the only testimony that placed either of the two men near the scene of the shooting. He testified that, on that very dark and rainy night, he saw McConville, from a distance of about 16 yards by an electricity box wearing a green knee length army coat with a German logo. The witness, however, was shown to be astigmatic & short shorted – conditions which would have made him unable to see what he said he saw.
In addition, his partner who was walking with him that night refused to corroborate his story.
Furthermore, he waited 11 months to come forward (by which time McConville's name had been widely spread by the press), was shown to have repeatedly lied under oath and had contacted the police on a number of occasions while drunk or drinking, including the night of his original call. Also large extracts of his witness statement to the police were redacted.
`
All of this is further compromised by the fact that the witness receives a weekly income from the PSNI and also receives an allowance for childcare. He has had loans and overseas holidays facilitated for his children and has received other financial benefits.
2.) When the AK47 that was used in the shooting was discovered, a partial fingerprint was found on the internal spring mechanism of the magazine. This fingerprint was checked against the fingerprints of McConville and Wootton. No matches were found. Also, according to the tracking device Wootton's car never went near the housing estate where the rifle was found.
3.) The prosecution claimed a jacket found in Wootton's car with McConville's DNA & traces of what might be gunpowder, were further proof of the men's involvement in the shooting. The jacket, however, was brown leather & waist length, not the green knee length army jacked with a German logo the witness had claimed to see. In addition, the jacket was completely dry, not very wet as it would have been if McConville had been wearing it during the shooting. In addition, when police searched both men's homes they found no traces of the wet and/or muddy clothes they were specifically looking for.
4.) The only “evidence” tying John Paul Wootton to the killing is his car & the GPS tracking device that was placed on it sometime prior to the shooting. The tracking device showed Wootton's car leaving a housing estate a quarter of a kilometer from the estate where the shooting took place about 10 minutes after the shooting occurred. It proceeded at a normal pace along one of the two available routes leading from where he was to his home. (Both routes pass close to McConville's house.)
According to the prosecution Wootton dropped off McConville and went home. However, at no time did the tracking device show the car's doors being opened anywhere near McConville's home. Even more worrying, data from the tracking device was mysteriously wiped while the device was in the hands of the army. No plausible explanation was ever given as to why this happened.
There is more. The fact that the men were denied the benefit of a trial by jury. Admitted deficiencies in witness testimony, state interference with new witnesses who were scheduled to testify at the appeal, etc.
As you can see from the facts of the case, no credible shred of evidence exists to connect either man with the shooting Every independent legal expert who has reviewed this case has agreed these men should never have been convicted.The flaws in the case are many and taken together can only result in a single conclusion:
This is a miscarriage of justice that needs to be corrected now!
Please sign this petition and ask the CCRC to make a full and complete re-examination of the case and then send it back to the Court of Appeals. Call on them to thoroughly examine all evidence disclosed and undisclosed in the case. Call on them to speak with Witness M, his partner and re-examine his version of events and credibility.
Fairness & decency demand no less.
This isn't just about The Craigavon 2, it's about all of us. If governments aren't held to account for what they do to others who will hold them to account when they turn on us?
Brendan McConville and John-Paul Wootton have spent eight years in the hell called Maghaberry Prison. It is no place for innocent men.
Please sign – sign now - and share this petition on all your social media sites.
Thank you for all your help & support.
JUSTICE FOR THE CRAIGAVON 2 --- NOW!!!
For more information:
Justice for The Craigavon 2 website: https://jftc2.com/
The C2 Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/MrsMcConville/
The Craigavon 2, Brendan McConville and John-Paul Wootton, are innocent Irishmen who have been wrongfully imprisoned for the past 8 years.
This petition calls upon Britain's Criminal Case Review Commission (CCRC) to thoroughly examine all evidence disclosed and undisclosed in the case. To speak with Witness M, his partner and re-examine his version of events and credibility.
If you already know the facts of this case the wife and family of Brendan McConville, who are running his campaign, would like you to show your support for the Craigavon 2 by signing and sharing this petition widely. We truly appreciate your time and support.
If you don't know the facts of the case, please read on. It could be your family this happens to next ...
On March 9th 2009 Constable Steven Carroll was fatally shot in Craigavon, County Armagh, Northern Ireland . On the 30th of March 2012 Brendan McConville and John Paul Wootton (The Craigavon 2) were convicted of the shooting and sentenced to spend the rest of their lives in prison.
If the paragraph above covered the complete story of the case it would have been duly noted in the history files, annotated with varying interpretations depending on political allegiance, & the world would have moved on.
Instead, beneath those 44 words lies the story of one the worst miscarriages of justice seen in the UK or Ireland since the days of the Guildford 4 or the Birmingham 6.\
It is a case that has attracted international attention & has earned the support of human rights activists, politicians & legal experts alike.
It is a case laced with a flawed “star witness” (Witness M) who was & still is being financially rewarded for his testimony, with secret hearings, tampered / disappeared evidence and enough Anonymity & Public Interest Immunity Orders to make sure neither the press nor the public could be aware of what was happening at the trial (which was held in a jury-less court presided over by a single judge acting as a “nominal jury”).
This is a case where the judge has said that he can not say for sure what part either defendant had in the shooting but sentenced them to life in prison anyway.
Referring to the Craigavon 2, Gerry Conlon, of the “Guildford 4” wrote “"We can't have innocent people going to jail and 15 years down the line them being released, their lives ruined … I believe a miscarriage of justice took place here on the basis of all the evidence I have read." ”.
Michael Mansfield QC, a leading barrister who represented both the Guildford 4 and the Birmingham 6 in their miscarriage of justice cases has said ““There is nothing more particular about it [the Craigavon 2 case] than any of the other miscarriages and the same features appear in all these things.”
Michael O'Brien, award winning author. human rights activist and himself the victim of a notorious miscarriage of justice which saw him wrongfully imprisoned for 12 years, has said “The case of The Craigavon 2 will not lie dormant in the grave, it will rise up and haunt them".
This last July the Dublin City Council unanimously passed a motion calling for the immediate release of both men. Writing about the motion, Cieran Perry, who introduced it wrote, “As the motion says, this case isn’t about a political ideology, it’s about a miscarriage of justice and an assault on the human rights of both men.
Regardless of your view on the political situation in the 6 counties it’s important that as many people as possible highlight the case and support the men.”.
On November 13th the South Dublin Council also unanimously passed a motion supporting The Craigavon 2 & stating in part “This Council acknowledges that the case of the Craigavon 2 requires significant re-examination due to concerns about how the convictions were achieved.”
As examples of the strong show of support for the Craigavon 2 throughout the UK, members of the UCU (University & College Union) meeting in conference in London last weekend unanimously supported a motion backing the call for a re-examination of the case and JENGba (Joint Enterprise: Not Guilty by Association), the influential UK based grassroots organization fighting wrongful convictions, has been a strong, vocal and extremely helpful supporter.
Here are the basic facts of the case:
On March 9th 2009 Constable Steven Carroll was fatally shot in Craigavon, County Armagh, Northern Ireland . On the 30th of March 2012 Brendan McConville and John Paul Wootton were convicted of the shooting and sentenced to life in prison.
At the trial no evidence of Brendan McConville or John-Paul Wootton’s direct involvement in the shooting was ever presented. It wasn't presented because it doesn't exist.
Instead the conviction was based on:
1.) The testimony of a witness who testified that on the heavily raining night of the shooting he saw McConville dressed in a green army jacket in the neighborhood of the shooting around the time of the shooting.
2.) DNA evidence from a jacket retrieved from Wootton's car after the shooting that an expert testified had McConville's DNA on it and traces of what possibly could be gunpowder.
3.) A GPS tracking device that had been placed in Wootton's car sometime prior to the shooting which showed the car leaving a housing estate adjacent to the one where the shooting occurred ten minutes after the shooting & passing near McConville's home on its way back to Wootton's. The prosecution used this information to surmise that McConville was dropped off by Wootton before he made his own way home.
The problems with the conviction are as follows:
1.) The prosecution's star witness, Witness M, gave the only testimony that placed either of the two men near the scene of the shooting. He testified that, on that very dark and rainy night, he saw McConville, from a distance of about 16 yards by an electricity box wearing a green knee length army coat with a German logo. The witness, however, was shown to be astigmatic & short shorted – conditions which would have made him unable to see what he said he saw.
In addition, his partner who was walking with him that night refused to corroborate his story.
Furthermore, he waited 11 months to come forward (by which time McConville's name had been widely spread by the press), was shown to have repeatedly lied under oath and had contacted the police on a number of occasions while drunk or drinking, including the night of his original call. Also large extracts of his witness statement to the police were redacted.
`
All of this is further compromised by the fact that the witness receives a weekly income from the PSNI and also receives an allowance for childcare. He has had loans and overseas holidays facilitated for his children and has received other financial benefits.
2.) When the AK47 that was used in the shooting was discovered, a partial fingerprint was found on the internal spring mechanism of the magazine. This fingerprint was checked against the fingerprints of McConville and Wootton. No matches were found. Also, according to the tracking device Wootton's car never went near the housing estate where the rifle was found.
3.) The prosecution claimed a jacket found in Wootton's car with McConville's DNA & traces of what might be gunpowder, were further proof of the men's involvement in the shooting. The jacket, however, was brown leather & waist length, not the green knee length army jacked with a German logo the witness had claimed to see. In addition, the jacket was completely dry, not very wet as it would have been if McConville had been wearing it during the shooting. In addition, when police searched both men's homes they found no traces of the wet and/or muddy clothes they were specifically looking for.
4.) The only “evidence” tying John Paul Wootton to the killing is his car & the GPS tracking device that was placed on it sometime prior to the shooting. The tracking device showed Wootton's car leaving a housing estate a quarter of a kilometer from the estate where the shooting took place about 10 minutes after the shooting occurred. It proceeded at a normal pace along one of the two available routes leading from where he was to his home. (Both routes pass close to McConville's house.)
According to the prosecution Wootton dropped off McConville and went home. However, at no time did the tracking device show the car's doors being opened anywhere near McConville's home. Even more worrying, data from the tracking device was mysteriously wiped while the device was in the hands of the army. No plausible explanation was ever given as to why this happened.
There is more. The fact that the men were denied the benefit of a trial by jury. Admitted deficiencies in witness testimony, state interference with new witnesses who were scheduled to testify at the appeal, etc.
As you can see from the facts of the case, no credible shred of evidence exists to connect either man with the shooting Every independent legal expert who has reviewed this case has agreed these men should never have been convicted.The flaws in the case are many and taken together can only result in a single conclusion:
This is a miscarriage of justice that needs to be corrected now!
Please sign this petition and ask the CCRC to make a full and complete re-examination of the case and then send it back to the Court of Appeals. Call on them to thoroughly examine all evidence disclosed and undisclosed in the case. Call on them to speak with Witness M, his partner and re-examine his version of events and credibility.
Fairness & decency demand no less.
This isn't just about The Craigavon 2, it's about all of us. If governments aren't held to account for what they do to others who will hold them to account when they turn on us?
Brendan McConville and John-Paul Wootton have spent eight years in the hell called Maghaberry Prison. It is no place for innocent men.
Please sign – sign now - and share this petition on all your social media sites.
Thank you for all your help & support.
JUSTICE FOR THE CRAIGAVON 2 --- NOW!!!
For more information:
Justice for The Craigavon 2 website: https://jftc2.com/
The C2 Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/MrsMcConville/
Nightmares
Following the publication of Richard O'Rawe's book on Gerry Conlon, The Transcripts features an interview by Gerry Conlon and Paddy Joe Hill RTÉ Radio One Sunday With Miriam 23 March 2014.
Miriam O’Callaghan speaks to Paddy Joe Hill and Gerry Conlon as this year marks the fortieth anniversary of the Guildford and Birmingham pub bombings
Sunday with Miriam
RTÉ Radio One
23 March 2014
Audio Player
Miriam: First though today this year marks forty years since the IRA bombings in Guildford and Birmingham which killed twenty-six people and injured hundreds of others. As well as the devastation those attacks caused for the immediate victims they also set in motion a chain of events that ended in the wrongful imprisonment of my first guests. Gerry Conlon, one of the Guildford 4, spent fifteen years in prison and Paddy Hill, one of the Birmingham 6, was wrongly jailed for nearly seventeen years.
Audio: Paddy Joe Hill on 14 March 1991 addressing the media outside the Old Bailey in London after the Birmingham 6 convictions were quashed.
Audio: Gerry Conlon on 19 October 1989 addressing the media outside the Old Bailey in London after the Guildford 4 convictions were quashed.
Miriam: Morning, Gerry Conlon! Morning, Paddy Joe Hill!
Gerry: Good Morning, Miriam.
Paddy: Morning, Miriam.
Miriam: I’m going to start with you, Gerry. Do you remember the first time you heard about the bombings in Guildford in 1974?
Gerry: You know I think the first time I heard of them was when the allegation was put to me. I mean I came from West Belfast, the Lower Falls, and they were an everyday occurrence. And that was one of the reasons I went to England. You know, in the eyes of the local Republicans and the IRA I would have been one of these people who would have been creating problems by singing on corners and stuff like that, you know? So the bombings didn’t really mean a lot. The Birmingham pub bombing registered simply because of the amount of people that were murdered that night.
Miriam: Do you recall the moment that you were arrested? Is it still very vivid in your memory?
Gerry: Not only is my arrest vivid but everyday of the torture in the various police stations from Springfield Road to Addlestone to Godalming to Guildford and every day of my prison experience is indelibly stamped in my brain. And at the least drop of a hat memories come flooding back of what they did to us.
Miriam: So time, the notion that time eases those memories, isn’t true for you, Gerry?
Gerry: No, not at all. You know, my father came over on the assurance of Jim Neville, who was the then head of the bomb squad, and my father spoke to him from Springfield Road police station. And Jim Neville told my father: Come over. You’ll have access to him and you’d be able to get a solicitor of your choosing to represent him. My father was no sooner in the country, four hours, and he was arrested and never came out.
Miriam: That was Guiseppe, of course, Gerry. Gerry, recall for me the actual arrest. Do you remember even where you were?
Gerry: Oh, I was in 32 Cypress Street. That’s where we lived at the time in the Lower Falls. And it was the start of a horrendous nightmare that we’re still living through because we’ve never had help for it.
Miriam: What do you mean you’ve never had help for it?
Gerry: Well we’ve never had help. The government have never gave us help for the trauma we suffered. I witnessed not only my father dying in prison but two people being murdered in front of my eyes in the most brutal of fashion. And when we came out I was given thirty-four pound ninety of a discharge grant and told to get on with it.
Miriam: Paddy, when was the first time you heard about the Birmingham bombings? Was it when you were detained that time, the first time, by the police?
Paddy: It was at the boat, the Heysham boat terminal. I’d already gone through the security check. And as far as the Heysham and Morecambe Police are concerned I have no complaints about them at all, Miriam. They were absolutely brilliant. And it was Sergeant Willoughby who took me off the boat and he told me, the sergeant, he wanted to talk to me and I went out and I’ll never forget his words – they’re burned into my brain. He said to me: Paddy, please excuse the pun but you know how things gets blown up out of all proportion when something happens but he said I can tell you something now, this is bad. The first reports we have is that there’s over two hundred people injured and that there’s over twenty people dead. I don’t know whether that’s true or not, he said, that could be blown up out of all proportion but it is serious. And that was the first time that I heard about it.
Miriam: But I assume, Paddy, a bit like Gerry there, when you look back on being detained, I assume at the very beginning you couldn’t actually believe this was happening to you.
Paddy: No, that’s the thing about it. We went to the police station of our own free will. And I remember I was sitting on a bench reading this book and suddenly the door beside me opened and two cops walked in and they had a couple of bundles of clothes in their hands and they threw them behind the door. And I looked up and both of them were standing there staring at me and you could feel the hatred coming out of them. And I happened to look out the door and I seen this guy standing there, another cop, and the funny thing about it was I’ve seen cops before with guns but I’ve never seen a cop with two guns. This guy that was standing there and he had a shoulder holster with a thirty-eight in it and he had a side arm on his hip with a thirty-eight. And I remember looking at him thinking: Jaysus! Some poor people are in for a rough ride. I never thought for one second it had anything to do with us.
Miriam: I mean, not a lot of people, Paddy, know this but your own family – your dad, I think three of your brothers – they were in the British Army. It’s not like you were the kind of guy who was going to be joining up with the IRA.
Paddy: No, definitely not.
Miriam: Gerry, in terms of both of you surviving in prison for something you didn’t do you said in the past if there is a hell it’s being in prison and knowing you’re innocent. But what sustained you through the years?
Gerry: What sustained me was knowing that my father was going to be tried by the same judge in the same dock in the same court by the same prosecutor and the possibility that he was going to be coming to prison – little did I know he was going to be dying in prison. But we made promises to each other, as Paddy and I did, and I think you find something in adversity and you find something when everything is against you.
Miriam: Gerry, obviously what happened to both of you was so horrific but did you find it particularly difficult that because of the situation you found yourself in your dad, who you adored, got embroiled in it, too, and in the end ended up dying in prison. Did you feel guilty about that?
Gerry: I still feel guilty about it. I remember being in Wormwood Scrubs in 1978 when two Labour MPs came, Philip Bennett and Andrew Whitehead, and they said – they called my dad ‘Joe’ because that’s the Anglicisation of Guiseppe – they said: Joe, we’ve secured a transfer for you back to the H-Blocks. You’d be out within three months. And he said: Is my son coming with me? And they went: No, we can’t get him a transfer. He says: Well, I’m not going. I came here to help my son. So of course I feel guilty. Of course I feel guilty.
Miriam: Those moments when you finally got out, Paddy…
Paddy: …Yes?
Miriam: Do they, in the way in which you were both talking earlier about the horror of being put away for something you didn’t do stay indelibly etched in your mind, do you also remember the moments of release incredibly vividly?
Paddy: Yes, I still remember it. Like even though I look back on it and I seen it that many times on television etc it seems a bit ethereal. It’s like something that you’re looking d
own on. You know?
Gerry: You know you’re talking about the moment we got out which should have been filled with joy and elation but too much pain had gone on, Miriam, beforehand. You know, Paddy didn’t know what was happening to his children while he was in prison and obviously I had lost my father but too much had been done. When we went in, as Paddy says, the prison officers – they were defecating in our food, they were urinating in our food, they were putting glass and stones and crushed florescent tubing in our food – we were being targeted more so than any member of the IRA. But when my father died and the ‘appalling vista‘ happened there was a slow sea of change. And of course we were very lucky – British documentary makers started coming to our aid – World in Action, Panorama, First Tuesday – major broadsheet newspapers started publishing editorials. And what also should not be forgotten was that the Irish government, and the Irish Embassy in particular, didn’t do anything for us until after these programmes and these editorials were written. In fact, we never seen any Irish politicians until early ’87 – twelve years, thirteen years, after our incarceration – did any Irish politicians want to come to help us.
Paddy: And not only that, Miriam, when they did come to see us in March 1987, that was the first time that the six of us had all been put together and they sent an all-party delegation. And when they came over they brought the six of us up into the education department, in a classroom, and they spent an hour with us. And about six o’clock they said they were leaving. And I said: What do you mean you’re leaving? What about Gerry Conlon? What about the Guildford 4? You better see them before you go. And they turned around and said: Oh, no. we haven’t get the time. We’ve got to get a plane. I said: Ach! The only thing you’ll be getting is an ambulance. And I picked up two of the table legs and Richard McIlkenny, God rest his soul, Richard grabbed the other two and I told them: The only place you’re going to go is to the hospital. You’re not leaving here until you see the Guildford 4. And ten minutes later they brought Gerry up and when he walked into the room you know the first thing they said to him? I’m sorry, Gerry, to hear about your uncle dying in prison. His uncle?! That’s how much they knew about us in 1987!
Miriam: Paddy, had you thought beforehand about what you were going to say when you were released?
Paddy: No. I never do. It just comes off the cuff.
Miriam: Good! And you, Gerry, had you thought?
Gerry: I mean those words that came out of my mouth that day I believe it was my father speaking through me. When you ‘go in’, Miriam, you learn a whole new vocabulary and it’s very coarse and very abrupt and very harsh. How those words came out in sequence and with the right amount of meaning and truth was just incredible. I don’t believe – I believe my father spoke them through me.
Miriam: Of course we heard your eloquent words there at the beginning of today’s show. We have some clips now which is what you both said shortly after you were released about how life had changed from the time you went into prison to the time you were released. Let’s listen to them now.
Audio: Paddy Joe Hill comments on technology and changes.
Audio: Gerry Conlon comments on technology and changes.
Miriam: Were they a huge change, Paddy?
Paddy: Massive changes. Massive changes. Like when I came out I never believed there was that many motors and what have you, vehicles, on the road in the world never mind in London. In prison the one thing that you don’t have is long vision. You can only see ‘x’ amount of yards and then you come against a big wall and barbed wire. The only long-vision you have is looking up at the sky. And of course there’s no such thing as colours in prison. And when we came out all you could see was these big buildings with all these funny glass, coloured things and big fancy trucks flying down the road at you. The only time I seen some of these trucks was on television in one of these American movies. And suddenly you come out and you’re standing in the middle of Holloway Road and I’m standing there like somebody that’s been hypnotised or something. And I’m standing in the middle of the road and this big thing’s flying at me! And I couldn’t move. I was completely paralysed. Everything, everything had changed so much. And you’re completely lost. Your mind can’t take it in so quickly. And the more you try to take it in, the funny thing about it is, the more your mind closes down. You just can’t handle it. And then for so many people who come out, Gerry’ll tell you this, they start becoming hermits. They don’t go out because they can’t handle the outside world. And they start locking themselves in their room or where ever they are living. The only time that you go out is at night when it’s quiet and it’s dark and you walk the streets at night. Like I’ve had people that’s come out of jail and I’ve picked them up – Johnny Kamara etc – or Paddy Nicholls etc…
Gerry: …Rob Brown.
Paddy: Rob – I picked them all up and brought them home to live with me. And they were all the same. The only time they went out was at night. It’s just – I don’t know what it is. And as Gerry said, we get no help. No help whatsoever. And like I try to tell people when they come out: Don’t bother going to doctors. Going to doctors – the only thing they’re going to tell you is that you’re depressed and the only thing they’re going to do is try and shovel you full of pills. Our problem is not pill problems. Our problem is not medication. Our problem is trauma. And we’ve been fighting for years to get help. And yes, we get angry at times, and – don’t get me wrong, don’t take this the wrong way – if anybody that suffers trauma if there’s help and they need it and they can get it fair play to them for getting it and for having it and I thank the authorities for giving it to them but at the same time – why should we be left out?
Gerry: But getting back to what you were saying about difficulties: There’s also this suspended animation in relation to maturing over those years you are in prison. So you’re playing catch-up. And Miriam, you became a close friend of my family’s. So you knew my mother well and you knew my sisters and you knew my aunts and uncles. I mean, we became disenfranchised from our families while we were in prison. Your visits were heavily populated by prisoner officers. You weren’t allowed to talk about prison. So you lied to each other. And then when you come out after fifteen years of telling lies, that you believed the other side is telling you the truth even though you knew you were telling them lies, because there’s this idea in their head: They don’t want to tell you something that you’re going to take back to your cell that’s going to worry you and you think: I’m not going to tell them anything about this prison that’s bad because I don’t want them taking it home and worrying. So the relationship fractures. I’ve been in treatment for nearly seven years – seeing a psychiatrist, a trauma counselor, twice a week, and for the first three years all I did was cry. I couldn’t get over when he mentioned my father or a certain prison I would just burst into tears – the trauma was so deep.
Miriam: Gerry, are you still getting therapy now?
Gerry: Yeah.
Miriam: Because listening to you you sound in a very good place at the moment.
Gerry: I am in a very good place, Miriam. I’ve been very lucky and I’ve had to fight very hard and I’ve had to go through – I mean, for a long time I wanted to kill myself. It’s only the last year that my life is, for some reason, the therapy has kicked in. I never thought I’d get to this position, Miriam, where I would be able to feel relatively happy, able to deal with what had happened in a positive way – but I’m going to be doing this for the rest of my life.
Miriam: Your mum and dad would be very pleased to hear you say that – to know you’re in a good place.
Gerry: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well you know, the healing started when my mother got cancer in 2005 and she asked me would I come home to look after her and it was a traumatic experience looking after her. It was always – it was crazy. But after nine months of living together, you know, I started to have this empathy again with her. I started to feel this paternal love. And she started to trust me and started to engage with me and we became not only a loving mother and son we became best friends. And I got enormous pleasure out of getting up every morning and going into the town and buying some food and cooking her different meals that she’d never tasted before and getting her to watch programmes she’d’ve never had watched and becoming good friends.
Miriam: In terms of how you are, Paddy, right now – I know because you have, of course, children and you were missing from their lives for seventeen years. Is it possible to heal those fractured relationships after such a long time?
Paddy: No. Definitely not. I’m still a stranger to my kids. I spent more time here this morning talking to you than I’ve done with my kids, some of them for years. I hardly ever see them. And when I go I get such – I don’t know what it is – for the want of a better word you get this sort of guilt feeling and I know we’ve got nothing to feel guilty about but, when you’re there, you feel like an intruder. There’s nothing there. I don’t know what it is. Prison kills you a little bit every day particularly for innocent people. One day you’ll waken up and you won’t feel nothing because one thing you can’t afford to have in prison is emotion. Emotions will get you killed in prison. So you bury your emotions so deep. And after a while it comes to the point in prison where you don’t even want to have visits because they’re too traumatic. And you don’t get visits – instead of having a visit every month you may get two visits a year – and you’re thankful for them but even at the time you don’t want them. Gerry will tell you the same things and so will most people in prison and when they come out trying to re-build relationships – it just doesn’t work. The money, the first fifty thousand pound they gave me interim payment, I was going out buying my kids and grand kids things. And what I was actually doing was just trying to buy love and affection and I realised after a year: You can’t do that. It’s an impossibility. But more importantly I realised, and had to be honest with myself and my kids, I didn’t feel nothing for them. Even today, I’ve been out twenty-three years now last week, and I feel sorry for my kids for the simple reason is that none of them is ever, ever going to have a father and daughter or father and son relationship with me like we should’ve have. And that’s just the way it is. It’s the only way I can handle it.
Gerry: See you become dependent, you become institutionalised after that length of time. Whether you want to admit it or not. And the only people that you’re really comfortable around are people who have had a shared experience with you. So you gravitate to people who’d been in prison because there’s no need to qualify how you’re feeling. You know, I’ve often thought that they did ‘silent lobotomies’ on us when we were in prison – clip the emotion and clip the love – and it’s something that’s very hard to get back once it’s gone.
Miriam: Paddy, obviously listening to Gerry he has said he’s been going to therapy, going to see a psychiatrist, still is and it has clearly worked a lot for him. Have you gone to therapy and do you think you’re in as good a place as say Gerry is psychologically at the moment?
Paddy: No. I’m not in the same place as Gerry. And as far as treatment is concerned I’ve never had any.
Miriam: Gerry and Paddy, you’re both very involved now in helping other people who are victims of miscarriages of justice, aren’t you?
Paddy: Yes. I’ve been doing this ever since I got out. And I’m still doing it.
Miriam: Do you find that in itself is almost therapeutic, Paddy? That you can work to try and help other people?
Paddy: Yeah, yeah. It’s therapeutic in the simple fact that if I wasn’t doing it I’d probably be sitting at home and just thinking, thinking, thinking and that’s the worst thing for people coming out of jail, innocent people coming out. It’s having nothing to do and just sitting, hiding away in a room. It kept me going. I made a promise to certain people when I got out – the Bridgewater 4, the Tottenham 3, etc, John McGranahan and a number of other people and I gave them the first year of my life.
Miriam: Also Paddy, I mentioned at the beginning it’s forty years since the Birmingham bombings themselves and you work also today, don’t you, with the families of the victims of those bombings? I mean, nobody’s ever been put away for those bombings.
Paddy: No, no, no. I got involved with this just over a year ago in relation to a petition that was up by Brian and Julie Hambleton. This is a brother and sister whose other sister was killed in the bombs. And of course since we got out these people have been a thorn in the side of the Birmingham Police. And I must say, in Birmingham, I thought they would’ve got a hundred thousand signatures in no time. And all I can say, particularly to the Irish people in Birmingham: Shame on you for not joining this! If anyone should want to know the truth it should be the people of Birmingham, particularly the Irish people. And when I met Brian and Julie I think they were more nervous of meeting me, we had been the figures of hate and the police have made them hate us. And I sat with them for about two and a half three hours.
Miriam: Gerry, I know the organisation, MOJO, Miscarriages of Justice Organisation, is the one that you and Paddy do a lot with. Are there any particular cases you’d like to mention this morning?
Gerry: Oh, well I certainly would like to mention the case of Brendan Dixon who’s a Doire man who’s been in prison in a Scottish jail for ten years for a crime we think he’s absolutely innocent of. And how he came to be a suspect was someone said that they seen ‘Irish Brendan’ near the house where the pensioner was murdered. And the evidence that we have checked out, you know, shows that Brendan Dixon was in another place. He was living an intransient type of life and he was involved in drugs and alcohol but because you’re involved in drugs and alcohol doesn’t necessarily mean you’re a killer. And of course there’s the case of the Craigavon Two. And the things that I heard there started to disturb me and you spoke to the family and you spoke to witnesses and stuff like that – you seen that here was a high profile case that need a conviction. But in the Brendan McConville – John Paul Wootten case I firmly believe that they’re innocent.
MOJO’s Latest Campaign
#SayImInnocent
Follow MOJO on Twitter and Facebook
Miriam: Well we’re going to put a link on our website as well, Paddy and Gerry, to that organisation you’re both really involved in, Miscarriages of Justice Organisation, anyone who wants to find out about it or about those cases can get in touch with you. Final question for you, Gerry: You seem in a good place. I’m so happy to see that. Do you wake up, by and large, content?
Gerry: I still have the nightmares. I still have the nightmares. I don’t think they’ll ever go. The trauma people don’t think they’ll ever go. They’re so deep. They’re so brutal. And they lasted for so long in prison. But it’s something that’s now manageable, Miriam. It’s something within a short space of time of getting out of bed I’ve learned techniques how to not disassociate and how to focus on other things. So yeah, life is better than it’s ever been at the moment.
Miriam: And you, Paddy?
Paddy: No, I’m not there yet. I still have bad times, you know? But of course, I’ve never had any help. The only help, I learned a long time ago that the only help I’m going to get is the help that I give myself. They come up with this old cliché, Miriam, that time’s a great healer. That’s a load of garbage. Time doesn’t heal nothing. The only thing that you can do with time is hopefully, with time, you’ll learn to handle it a little bit better than you did.
Gerry: Just to interject there: The guy who’s treating me and treats me twice a week has offered to help Paddy and Paddy’s met him but the government won’t pay for Paddy’s fares to come from Scotland two or three times a month to have that treatment. I think that would be very little for them to pay in order to give Paddy Joe Hill a quality of life that he so richly deserves and that his family deserves. I think we all should be getting it without having to go cap in hand.
Paddy: Exactly.
Miriam: Okay, listen Gerry, Paddy, it’s been a real pleasure and privilege for me to chat to you both today – delighted you’re in a great place, Gerry. And Paddy, I hope you get there one day very soon, too.
Gerry: Miriam, thank you for your support down the years in highlighting the injustice that happens to people in life. Thank you!
Miriam: Thanks, Gerry.
Paddy: It’s been a pleasure and thanks for keeping other people aware of what is actually going on in miscarriage of justice cases.
Miriam: Thank you, Paddy. Thank you, Gerry. Take good care of yourselves.
Gerry: Bye.
Paddy: Same to you. Bye.
You can follow The Transcripts on Twitter @RFETranscripts
Miriam O’Callaghan speaks to Paddy Joe Hill and Gerry Conlon as this year marks the fortieth anniversary of the Guildford and Birmingham pub bombings
Sunday with Miriam
RTÉ Radio One
23 March 2014
Audio Player
Miriam: First though today this year marks forty years since the IRA bombings in Guildford and Birmingham which killed twenty-six people and injured hundreds of others. As well as the devastation those attacks caused for the immediate victims they also set in motion a chain of events that ended in the wrongful imprisonment of my first guests. Gerry Conlon, one of the Guildford 4, spent fifteen years in prison and Paddy Hill, one of the Birmingham 6, was wrongly jailed for nearly seventeen years.
Audio: Paddy Joe Hill on 14 March 1991 addressing the media outside the Old Bailey in London after the Birmingham 6 convictions were quashed.
Audio: Gerry Conlon on 19 October 1989 addressing the media outside the Old Bailey in London after the Guildford 4 convictions were quashed.
Miriam: Morning, Gerry Conlon! Morning, Paddy Joe Hill!
Gerry: Good Morning, Miriam.
Paddy: Morning, Miriam.
Miriam: I’m going to start with you, Gerry. Do you remember the first time you heard about the bombings in Guildford in 1974?
Gerry: You know I think the first time I heard of them was when the allegation was put to me. I mean I came from West Belfast, the Lower Falls, and they were an everyday occurrence. And that was one of the reasons I went to England. You know, in the eyes of the local Republicans and the IRA I would have been one of these people who would have been creating problems by singing on corners and stuff like that, you know? So the bombings didn’t really mean a lot. The Birmingham pub bombing registered simply because of the amount of people that were murdered that night.
Miriam: Do you recall the moment that you were arrested? Is it still very vivid in your memory?
Gerry: Not only is my arrest vivid but everyday of the torture in the various police stations from Springfield Road to Addlestone to Godalming to Guildford and every day of my prison experience is indelibly stamped in my brain. And at the least drop of a hat memories come flooding back of what they did to us.
Miriam: So time, the notion that time eases those memories, isn’t true for you, Gerry?
Gerry: No, not at all. You know, my father came over on the assurance of Jim Neville, who was the then head of the bomb squad, and my father spoke to him from Springfield Road police station. And Jim Neville told my father: Come over. You’ll have access to him and you’d be able to get a solicitor of your choosing to represent him. My father was no sooner in the country, four hours, and he was arrested and never came out.
Miriam: That was Guiseppe, of course, Gerry. Gerry, recall for me the actual arrest. Do you remember even where you were?
Gerry: Oh, I was in 32 Cypress Street. That’s where we lived at the time in the Lower Falls. And it was the start of a horrendous nightmare that we’re still living through because we’ve never had help for it.
Miriam: What do you mean you’ve never had help for it?
Gerry: Well we’ve never had help. The government have never gave us help for the trauma we suffered. I witnessed not only my father dying in prison but two people being murdered in front of my eyes in the most brutal of fashion. And when we came out I was given thirty-four pound ninety of a discharge grant and told to get on with it.
Miriam: Paddy, when was the first time you heard about the Birmingham bombings? Was it when you were detained that time, the first time, by the police?
Paddy: It was at the boat, the Heysham boat terminal. I’d already gone through the security check. And as far as the Heysham and Morecambe Police are concerned I have no complaints about them at all, Miriam. They were absolutely brilliant. And it was Sergeant Willoughby who took me off the boat and he told me, the sergeant, he wanted to talk to me and I went out and I’ll never forget his words – they’re burned into my brain. He said to me: Paddy, please excuse the pun but you know how things gets blown up out of all proportion when something happens but he said I can tell you something now, this is bad. The first reports we have is that there’s over two hundred people injured and that there’s over twenty people dead. I don’t know whether that’s true or not, he said, that could be blown up out of all proportion but it is serious. And that was the first time that I heard about it.
Miriam: But I assume, Paddy, a bit like Gerry there, when you look back on being detained, I assume at the very beginning you couldn’t actually believe this was happening to you.
Paddy: No, that’s the thing about it. We went to the police station of our own free will. And I remember I was sitting on a bench reading this book and suddenly the door beside me opened and two cops walked in and they had a couple of bundles of clothes in their hands and they threw them behind the door. And I looked up and both of them were standing there staring at me and you could feel the hatred coming out of them. And I happened to look out the door and I seen this guy standing there, another cop, and the funny thing about it was I’ve seen cops before with guns but I’ve never seen a cop with two guns. This guy that was standing there and he had a shoulder holster with a thirty-eight in it and he had a side arm on his hip with a thirty-eight. And I remember looking at him thinking: Jaysus! Some poor people are in for a rough ride. I never thought for one second it had anything to do with us.
Miriam: I mean, not a lot of people, Paddy, know this but your own family – your dad, I think three of your brothers – they were in the British Army. It’s not like you were the kind of guy who was going to be joining up with the IRA.
Paddy: No, definitely not.
Miriam: Gerry, in terms of both of you surviving in prison for something you didn’t do you said in the past if there is a hell it’s being in prison and knowing you’re innocent. But what sustained you through the years?
Gerry: What sustained me was knowing that my father was going to be tried by the same judge in the same dock in the same court by the same prosecutor and the possibility that he was going to be coming to prison – little did I know he was going to be dying in prison. But we made promises to each other, as Paddy and I did, and I think you find something in adversity and you find something when everything is against you.
Miriam: Gerry, obviously what happened to both of you was so horrific but did you find it particularly difficult that because of the situation you found yourself in your dad, who you adored, got embroiled in it, too, and in the end ended up dying in prison. Did you feel guilty about that?
Gerry: I still feel guilty about it. I remember being in Wormwood Scrubs in 1978 when two Labour MPs came, Philip Bennett and Andrew Whitehead, and they said – they called my dad ‘Joe’ because that’s the Anglicisation of Guiseppe – they said: Joe, we’ve secured a transfer for you back to the H-Blocks. You’d be out within three months. And he said: Is my son coming with me? And they went: No, we can’t get him a transfer. He says: Well, I’m not going. I came here to help my son. So of course I feel guilty. Of course I feel guilty.
Miriam: Those moments when you finally got out, Paddy…
Paddy: …Yes?
Miriam: Do they, in the way in which you were both talking earlier about the horror of being put away for something you didn’t do stay indelibly etched in your mind, do you also remember the moments of release incredibly vividly?
Paddy: Yes, I still remember it. Like even though I look back on it and I seen it that many times on television etc it seems a bit ethereal. It’s like something that you’re looking d
own on. You know?
Gerry: You know you’re talking about the moment we got out which should have been filled with joy and elation but too much pain had gone on, Miriam, beforehand. You know, Paddy didn’t know what was happening to his children while he was in prison and obviously I had lost my father but too much had been done. When we went in, as Paddy says, the prison officers – they were defecating in our food, they were urinating in our food, they were putting glass and stones and crushed florescent tubing in our food – we were being targeted more so than any member of the IRA. But when my father died and the ‘appalling vista‘ happened there was a slow sea of change. And of course we were very lucky – British documentary makers started coming to our aid – World in Action, Panorama, First Tuesday – major broadsheet newspapers started publishing editorials. And what also should not be forgotten was that the Irish government, and the Irish Embassy in particular, didn’t do anything for us until after these programmes and these editorials were written. In fact, we never seen any Irish politicians until early ’87 – twelve years, thirteen years, after our incarceration – did any Irish politicians want to come to help us.
Paddy: And not only that, Miriam, when they did come to see us in March 1987, that was the first time that the six of us had all been put together and they sent an all-party delegation. And when they came over they brought the six of us up into the education department, in a classroom, and they spent an hour with us. And about six o’clock they said they were leaving. And I said: What do you mean you’re leaving? What about Gerry Conlon? What about the Guildford 4? You better see them before you go. And they turned around and said: Oh, no. we haven’t get the time. We’ve got to get a plane. I said: Ach! The only thing you’ll be getting is an ambulance. And I picked up two of the table legs and Richard McIlkenny, God rest his soul, Richard grabbed the other two and I told them: The only place you’re going to go is to the hospital. You’re not leaving here until you see the Guildford 4. And ten minutes later they brought Gerry up and when he walked into the room you know the first thing they said to him? I’m sorry, Gerry, to hear about your uncle dying in prison. His uncle?! That’s how much they knew about us in 1987!
Miriam: Paddy, had you thought beforehand about what you were going to say when you were released?
Paddy: No. I never do. It just comes off the cuff.
Miriam: Good! And you, Gerry, had you thought?
Gerry: I mean those words that came out of my mouth that day I believe it was my father speaking through me. When you ‘go in’, Miriam, you learn a whole new vocabulary and it’s very coarse and very abrupt and very harsh. How those words came out in sequence and with the right amount of meaning and truth was just incredible. I don’t believe – I believe my father spoke them through me.
Miriam: Of course we heard your eloquent words there at the beginning of today’s show. We have some clips now which is what you both said shortly after you were released about how life had changed from the time you went into prison to the time you were released. Let’s listen to them now.
Audio: Paddy Joe Hill comments on technology and changes.
Audio: Gerry Conlon comments on technology and changes.
Miriam: Were they a huge change, Paddy?
Paddy: Massive changes. Massive changes. Like when I came out I never believed there was that many motors and what have you, vehicles, on the road in the world never mind in London. In prison the one thing that you don’t have is long vision. You can only see ‘x’ amount of yards and then you come against a big wall and barbed wire. The only long-vision you have is looking up at the sky. And of course there’s no such thing as colours in prison. And when we came out all you could see was these big buildings with all these funny glass, coloured things and big fancy trucks flying down the road at you. The only time I seen some of these trucks was on television in one of these American movies. And suddenly you come out and you’re standing in the middle of Holloway Road and I’m standing there like somebody that’s been hypnotised or something. And I’m standing in the middle of the road and this big thing’s flying at me! And I couldn’t move. I was completely paralysed. Everything, everything had changed so much. And you’re completely lost. Your mind can’t take it in so quickly. And the more you try to take it in, the funny thing about it is, the more your mind closes down. You just can’t handle it. And then for so many people who come out, Gerry’ll tell you this, they start becoming hermits. They don’t go out because they can’t handle the outside world. And they start locking themselves in their room or where ever they are living. The only time that you go out is at night when it’s quiet and it’s dark and you walk the streets at night. Like I’ve had people that’s come out of jail and I’ve picked them up – Johnny Kamara etc – or Paddy Nicholls etc…
Gerry: …Rob Brown.
Paddy: Rob – I picked them all up and brought them home to live with me. And they were all the same. The only time they went out was at night. It’s just – I don’t know what it is. And as Gerry said, we get no help. No help whatsoever. And like I try to tell people when they come out: Don’t bother going to doctors. Going to doctors – the only thing they’re going to tell you is that you’re depressed and the only thing they’re going to do is try and shovel you full of pills. Our problem is not pill problems. Our problem is not medication. Our problem is trauma. And we’ve been fighting for years to get help. And yes, we get angry at times, and – don’t get me wrong, don’t take this the wrong way – if anybody that suffers trauma if there’s help and they need it and they can get it fair play to them for getting it and for having it and I thank the authorities for giving it to them but at the same time – why should we be left out?
Gerry: But getting back to what you were saying about difficulties: There’s also this suspended animation in relation to maturing over those years you are in prison. So you’re playing catch-up. And Miriam, you became a close friend of my family’s. So you knew my mother well and you knew my sisters and you knew my aunts and uncles. I mean, we became disenfranchised from our families while we were in prison. Your visits were heavily populated by prisoner officers. You weren’t allowed to talk about prison. So you lied to each other. And then when you come out after fifteen years of telling lies, that you believed the other side is telling you the truth even though you knew you were telling them lies, because there’s this idea in their head: They don’t want to tell you something that you’re going to take back to your cell that’s going to worry you and you think: I’m not going to tell them anything about this prison that’s bad because I don’t want them taking it home and worrying. So the relationship fractures. I’ve been in treatment for nearly seven years – seeing a psychiatrist, a trauma counselor, twice a week, and for the first three years all I did was cry. I couldn’t get over when he mentioned my father or a certain prison I would just burst into tears – the trauma was so deep.
Miriam: Gerry, are you still getting therapy now?
Gerry: Yeah.
Miriam: Because listening to you you sound in a very good place at the moment.
Gerry: I am in a very good place, Miriam. I’ve been very lucky and I’ve had to fight very hard and I’ve had to go through – I mean, for a long time I wanted to kill myself. It’s only the last year that my life is, for some reason, the therapy has kicked in. I never thought I’d get to this position, Miriam, where I would be able to feel relatively happy, able to deal with what had happened in a positive way – but I’m going to be doing this for the rest of my life.
Miriam: Your mum and dad would be very pleased to hear you say that – to know you’re in a good place.
Gerry: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well you know, the healing started when my mother got cancer in 2005 and she asked me would I come home to look after her and it was a traumatic experience looking after her. It was always – it was crazy. But after nine months of living together, you know, I started to have this empathy again with her. I started to feel this paternal love. And she started to trust me and started to engage with me and we became not only a loving mother and son we became best friends. And I got enormous pleasure out of getting up every morning and going into the town and buying some food and cooking her different meals that she’d never tasted before and getting her to watch programmes she’d’ve never had watched and becoming good friends.
Miriam: In terms of how you are, Paddy, right now – I know because you have, of course, children and you were missing from their lives for seventeen years. Is it possible to heal those fractured relationships after such a long time?
Paddy: No. Definitely not. I’m still a stranger to my kids. I spent more time here this morning talking to you than I’ve done with my kids, some of them for years. I hardly ever see them. And when I go I get such – I don’t know what it is – for the want of a better word you get this sort of guilt feeling and I know we’ve got nothing to feel guilty about but, when you’re there, you feel like an intruder. There’s nothing there. I don’t know what it is. Prison kills you a little bit every day particularly for innocent people. One day you’ll waken up and you won’t feel nothing because one thing you can’t afford to have in prison is emotion. Emotions will get you killed in prison. So you bury your emotions so deep. And after a while it comes to the point in prison where you don’t even want to have visits because they’re too traumatic. And you don’t get visits – instead of having a visit every month you may get two visits a year – and you’re thankful for them but even at the time you don’t want them. Gerry will tell you the same things and so will most people in prison and when they come out trying to re-build relationships – it just doesn’t work. The money, the first fifty thousand pound they gave me interim payment, I was going out buying my kids and grand kids things. And what I was actually doing was just trying to buy love and affection and I realised after a year: You can’t do that. It’s an impossibility. But more importantly I realised, and had to be honest with myself and my kids, I didn’t feel nothing for them. Even today, I’ve been out twenty-three years now last week, and I feel sorry for my kids for the simple reason is that none of them is ever, ever going to have a father and daughter or father and son relationship with me like we should’ve have. And that’s just the way it is. It’s the only way I can handle it.
Gerry: See you become dependent, you become institutionalised after that length of time. Whether you want to admit it or not. And the only people that you’re really comfortable around are people who have had a shared experience with you. So you gravitate to people who’d been in prison because there’s no need to qualify how you’re feeling. You know, I’ve often thought that they did ‘silent lobotomies’ on us when we were in prison – clip the emotion and clip the love – and it’s something that’s very hard to get back once it’s gone.
Miriam: Paddy, obviously listening to Gerry he has said he’s been going to therapy, going to see a psychiatrist, still is and it has clearly worked a lot for him. Have you gone to therapy and do you think you’re in as good a place as say Gerry is psychologically at the moment?
Paddy: No. I’m not in the same place as Gerry. And as far as treatment is concerned I’ve never had any.
Miriam: Gerry and Paddy, you’re both very involved now in helping other people who are victims of miscarriages of justice, aren’t you?
Paddy: Yes. I’ve been doing this ever since I got out. And I’m still doing it.
Miriam: Do you find that in itself is almost therapeutic, Paddy? That you can work to try and help other people?
Paddy: Yeah, yeah. It’s therapeutic in the simple fact that if I wasn’t doing it I’d probably be sitting at home and just thinking, thinking, thinking and that’s the worst thing for people coming out of jail, innocent people coming out. It’s having nothing to do and just sitting, hiding away in a room. It kept me going. I made a promise to certain people when I got out – the Bridgewater 4, the Tottenham 3, etc, John McGranahan and a number of other people and I gave them the first year of my life.
Miriam: Also Paddy, I mentioned at the beginning it’s forty years since the Birmingham bombings themselves and you work also today, don’t you, with the families of the victims of those bombings? I mean, nobody’s ever been put away for those bombings.
Paddy: No, no, no. I got involved with this just over a year ago in relation to a petition that was up by Brian and Julie Hambleton. This is a brother and sister whose other sister was killed in the bombs. And of course since we got out these people have been a thorn in the side of the Birmingham Police. And I must say, in Birmingham, I thought they would’ve got a hundred thousand signatures in no time. And all I can say, particularly to the Irish people in Birmingham: Shame on you for not joining this! If anyone should want to know the truth it should be the people of Birmingham, particularly the Irish people. And when I met Brian and Julie I think they were more nervous of meeting me, we had been the figures of hate and the police have made them hate us. And I sat with them for about two and a half three hours.
Miriam: Gerry, I know the organisation, MOJO, Miscarriages of Justice Organisation, is the one that you and Paddy do a lot with. Are there any particular cases you’d like to mention this morning?
Gerry: Oh, well I certainly would like to mention the case of Brendan Dixon who’s a Doire man who’s been in prison in a Scottish jail for ten years for a crime we think he’s absolutely innocent of. And how he came to be a suspect was someone said that they seen ‘Irish Brendan’ near the house where the pensioner was murdered. And the evidence that we have checked out, you know, shows that Brendan Dixon was in another place. He was living an intransient type of life and he was involved in drugs and alcohol but because you’re involved in drugs and alcohol doesn’t necessarily mean you’re a killer. And of course there’s the case of the Craigavon Two. And the things that I heard there started to disturb me and you spoke to the family and you spoke to witnesses and stuff like that – you seen that here was a high profile case that need a conviction. But in the Brendan McConville – John Paul Wootten case I firmly believe that they’re innocent.
MOJO’s Latest Campaign
#SayImInnocent
Follow MOJO on Twitter and Facebook
Miriam: Well we’re going to put a link on our website as well, Paddy and Gerry, to that organisation you’re both really involved in, Miscarriages of Justice Organisation, anyone who wants to find out about it or about those cases can get in touch with you. Final question for you, Gerry: You seem in a good place. I’m so happy to see that. Do you wake up, by and large, content?
Gerry: I still have the nightmares. I still have the nightmares. I don’t think they’ll ever go. The trauma people don’t think they’ll ever go. They’re so deep. They’re so brutal. And they lasted for so long in prison. But it’s something that’s now manageable, Miriam. It’s something within a short space of time of getting out of bed I’ve learned techniques how to not disassociate and how to focus on other things. So yeah, life is better than it’s ever been at the moment.
Miriam: And you, Paddy?
Paddy: No, I’m not there yet. I still have bad times, you know? But of course, I’ve never had any help. The only help, I learned a long time ago that the only help I’m going to get is the help that I give myself. They come up with this old cliché, Miriam, that time’s a great healer. That’s a load of garbage. Time doesn’t heal nothing. The only thing that you can do with time is hopefully, with time, you’ll learn to handle it a little bit better than you did.
Gerry: Just to interject there: The guy who’s treating me and treats me twice a week has offered to help Paddy and Paddy’s met him but the government won’t pay for Paddy’s fares to come from Scotland two or three times a month to have that treatment. I think that would be very little for them to pay in order to give Paddy Joe Hill a quality of life that he so richly deserves and that his family deserves. I think we all should be getting it without having to go cap in hand.
Paddy: Exactly.
Miriam: Okay, listen Gerry, Paddy, it’s been a real pleasure and privilege for me to chat to you both today – delighted you’re in a great place, Gerry. And Paddy, I hope you get there one day very soon, too.
Gerry: Miriam, thank you for your support down the years in highlighting the injustice that happens to people in life. Thank you!
Miriam: Thanks, Gerry.
Paddy: It’s been a pleasure and thanks for keeping other people aware of what is actually going on in miscarriage of justice cases.
Miriam: Thank you, Paddy. Thank you, Gerry. Take good care of yourselves.
Gerry: Bye.
Paddy: Same to you. Bye.
You can follow The Transcripts on Twitter @RFETranscripts
November 27, 2017
Revolutionary Action in Extraordinary Times
A Statement From E3/E4 Portlaoise Republican Prisoners to this year's Saoradh ard fheis. The statement was read by Ger Devereux.
We would also like to commend our imprisoned comrades in Maghaberry Gaol for their continued resolve and discipline in the face of a sectarian aggressor. The oppressive measures being implemented against our comrades need to be highlighted, but more worrying of late are the increased physical attacks occurring on a weekly base. As a small token of solidarity with our comrades, the Republican Prisoners in Portlaoise will embark on a 72 hour fast commencing this week, to highlight the ongoing sectarian attacks that they face.
Like all emerging Revolutionary organisations we have had our teething problems, but the party’s emphasis on principles rather than personalities has allowed us rise above any attempt to deflect us from our political ideology. Those that do not have the stomach to continue this struggle may just stay at home, while we that remain will continue to move forward regardless of the distracters sniping from behind their screens and enemy forces massed against us. As James Connolly said on establishing the Irish Citizen Army regarding what would be required in the struggle to supplant Capitalism and replace it with Socialism “we know our duties as we know our rights, we shall stand by one another, through thick and thin …”
We commend Saoradh’s outgoing National Executive for the sterling work they have carried out over the past year. The party has gone from strength to strength under the guidance of our National Chairperson Davey Jordan. This is evidenced by the establishment and staffing of three party offices situated in Derry, Tyrone and Belfast, with the prospect of more offices in the coming year, including Dublin. We the Republican Prisoners pledge our unwavering support for the incoming National Chair and National Executive.
We commend Saoradh members and their supporters for their excellent work during this past year and we particularly welcome the establishment of committees and campaigns to fight the extradition of Irish Republicans to British torture camps, to abolish the non-jury Special Criminal Court and to stop supergrass/show trials in Dublin. Ciaran Maguire, Sean Farrell (Dublin) and Damien McLoughlin (Tyrone) all face extradition at this present time, with both Ciaran and Damien being held in Portlaoise Gaol with High Court proceedings imminent. We the Republican Prisoners call on the subservient Minister for Justice and Equality to end the extradition of All Irish Republicans at the request of British crown forces.
Discredited Supergrass witness Dave Cullen, who was already used to incarcerate two Dublin Republicans for life, has recently been re-activated to give evidence in a show trial involving at least five more men, with charges ranging from “membership” to “murder”. This paid perjurer is facilitating the wholesale round up of Irish Republicans, after he spent significant time with his Special Branch handlers, crafting and fabricating his testimony.
Republican Prisoners have on numerous occasions condemned the use of the non-jury “Special Criminal Court” for their use of Gestapo type powers in “political” show trials. This military tribunal, that can best be described as a “factory of lies” continues to enjoy a “low threshold of evidence” necessary for conviction and of course often relies on the “word” of a Chief Superintendent to convict and Gaol Irish Republicans. In this year alone five men have been incarcerated by this kangaroo style court with the “word” of a Garda central to the evidence against them. This draconian out dated non-jury farce, needs to be abolished NOW.
We note the pivotal role played by Saoradh members and activists in support of the “Jobstown 22”, whose trial collapsed under the combined weight of efforts by Saoradh, political activists, Garda lies and conflicting evidence and by the farcical testimony of former Labour party leader and Tánaiste Joan Burton. Had it not been for the presence of some elected representatives amongst the accused, we have no doubt that this trial would have been moved to the “Special Criminal Court”, with the subsequent convictions of all concerned. We have grave concerns for all political activists challenging corruption or abuse of power within this state, who could now face the stark reality of been subjected to so called “special powers” currently been deployed by a corrupt regime desperately clinging to power by using a new style of political policing against any perceived threats to their capitalist cartel.
We acknowledge the Trojan work undertaken by Saoradh activists and their supporters in the effort to tackle Dublin’s Housing Crisis. The necessity for “Soup Runs” and nightly voluntary support services are a damming indictment of the Free State Government’s austerity policies and Dublin City Council Housing Committee’s complete failure to respond in any coherent way to the crisis. We remind this Ard Fhéis that homelessness is, in the main, caused by inequality, social deprivation and poverty. Capitalist Ireland creates and indeed exacerbates inequality and all the ills that flow from it. As James Connolly said” Yes, friends, governments in capitalist society are but committees of the rich to manage the affairs of the capitalist class”.
The Free State partitionist government, made up as it is by an unholy alliance of two far right Capitalist parties, supported by a cabal of self-serving power-hungry independents will never posses the political will or the moral conscience to address the issue of homelessness in this state. With the main opposition party, being former Republican’s who are nothing more than British quislings, moving to the centre-right, there is no prospect of any possible challenge to the status quo. Their greed, reformist ideology and desire for the merest sniff of political power mirrors their “Marriage of Connivance” with Unionists in Stormont, manifests itself in support and implementation of austerity policies and serves without any doubt to copper fasten partition of this island.
The continued need to distribute soup and sandwiches exposes an uncaring, ineffective sterile Capitalist state and while Saoradh’s involvement in “Soup Runs” is a wholly creditable short term emergency response we believe it is time for more “Direct Action” inspired by the events leading up to the occupation of “Apollo House”.
As Republican Prisoner’s we pledge to utilise our incarceration in assisting the building of an educated and politicised activist base. As Irish Republican Political Prisoners it is our view that a legitimate, credible voice is essential to advance our Republican cause. This has led us to develop a Craobh of Saoradh within the walls of the Gaol. This party has been developed from grass root activists up and is the only revolutionary Republican Party we endorse.
We are a Revolutionary party, we will take our Republican Socialist ideology to the streets, As James Connolly once said “We believe in constitutional action in normal times; we believe in Revolutionary action in exceptional times”.
Beir Bua
Republican Political Prisoners
E3/E4
Portlaoise Gaol
We would also like to commend our imprisoned comrades in Maghaberry Gaol for their continued resolve and discipline in the face of a sectarian aggressor. The oppressive measures being implemented against our comrades need to be highlighted, but more worrying of late are the increased physical attacks occurring on a weekly base. As a small token of solidarity with our comrades, the Republican Prisoners in Portlaoise will embark on a 72 hour fast commencing this week, to highlight the ongoing sectarian attacks that they face.
Like all emerging Revolutionary organisations we have had our teething problems, but the party’s emphasis on principles rather than personalities has allowed us rise above any attempt to deflect us from our political ideology. Those that do not have the stomach to continue this struggle may just stay at home, while we that remain will continue to move forward regardless of the distracters sniping from behind their screens and enemy forces massed against us. As James Connolly said on establishing the Irish Citizen Army regarding what would be required in the struggle to supplant Capitalism and replace it with Socialism “we know our duties as we know our rights, we shall stand by one another, through thick and thin …”
We commend Saoradh’s outgoing National Executive for the sterling work they have carried out over the past year. The party has gone from strength to strength under the guidance of our National Chairperson Davey Jordan. This is evidenced by the establishment and staffing of three party offices situated in Derry, Tyrone and Belfast, with the prospect of more offices in the coming year, including Dublin. We the Republican Prisoners pledge our unwavering support for the incoming National Chair and National Executive.
We commend Saoradh members and their supporters for their excellent work during this past year and we particularly welcome the establishment of committees and campaigns to fight the extradition of Irish Republicans to British torture camps, to abolish the non-jury Special Criminal Court and to stop supergrass/show trials in Dublin. Ciaran Maguire, Sean Farrell (Dublin) and Damien McLoughlin (Tyrone) all face extradition at this present time, with both Ciaran and Damien being held in Portlaoise Gaol with High Court proceedings imminent. We the Republican Prisoners call on the subservient Minister for Justice and Equality to end the extradition of All Irish Republicans at the request of British crown forces.
Discredited Supergrass witness Dave Cullen, who was already used to incarcerate two Dublin Republicans for life, has recently been re-activated to give evidence in a show trial involving at least five more men, with charges ranging from “membership” to “murder”. This paid perjurer is facilitating the wholesale round up of Irish Republicans, after he spent significant time with his Special Branch handlers, crafting and fabricating his testimony.
Republican Prisoners have on numerous occasions condemned the use of the non-jury “Special Criminal Court” for their use of Gestapo type powers in “political” show trials. This military tribunal, that can best be described as a “factory of lies” continues to enjoy a “low threshold of evidence” necessary for conviction and of course often relies on the “word” of a Chief Superintendent to convict and Gaol Irish Republicans. In this year alone five men have been incarcerated by this kangaroo style court with the “word” of a Garda central to the evidence against them. This draconian out dated non-jury farce, needs to be abolished NOW.
We note the pivotal role played by Saoradh members and activists in support of the “Jobstown 22”, whose trial collapsed under the combined weight of efforts by Saoradh, political activists, Garda lies and conflicting evidence and by the farcical testimony of former Labour party leader and Tánaiste Joan Burton. Had it not been for the presence of some elected representatives amongst the accused, we have no doubt that this trial would have been moved to the “Special Criminal Court”, with the subsequent convictions of all concerned. We have grave concerns for all political activists challenging corruption or abuse of power within this state, who could now face the stark reality of been subjected to so called “special powers” currently been deployed by a corrupt regime desperately clinging to power by using a new style of political policing against any perceived threats to their capitalist cartel.
We acknowledge the Trojan work undertaken by Saoradh activists and their supporters in the effort to tackle Dublin’s Housing Crisis. The necessity for “Soup Runs” and nightly voluntary support services are a damming indictment of the Free State Government’s austerity policies and Dublin City Council Housing Committee’s complete failure to respond in any coherent way to the crisis. We remind this Ard Fhéis that homelessness is, in the main, caused by inequality, social deprivation and poverty. Capitalist Ireland creates and indeed exacerbates inequality and all the ills that flow from it. As James Connolly said” Yes, friends, governments in capitalist society are but committees of the rich to manage the affairs of the capitalist class”.
The Free State partitionist government, made up as it is by an unholy alliance of two far right Capitalist parties, supported by a cabal of self-serving power-hungry independents will never posses the political will or the moral conscience to address the issue of homelessness in this state. With the main opposition party, being former Republican’s who are nothing more than British quislings, moving to the centre-right, there is no prospect of any possible challenge to the status quo. Their greed, reformist ideology and desire for the merest sniff of political power mirrors their “Marriage of Connivance” with Unionists in Stormont, manifests itself in support and implementation of austerity policies and serves without any doubt to copper fasten partition of this island.
The continued need to distribute soup and sandwiches exposes an uncaring, ineffective sterile Capitalist state and while Saoradh’s involvement in “Soup Runs” is a wholly creditable short term emergency response we believe it is time for more “Direct Action” inspired by the events leading up to the occupation of “Apollo House”.
As Republican Prisoner’s we pledge to utilise our incarceration in assisting the building of an educated and politicised activist base. As Irish Republican Political Prisoners it is our view that a legitimate, credible voice is essential to advance our Republican cause. This has led us to develop a Craobh of Saoradh within the walls of the Gaol. This party has been developed from grass root activists up and is the only revolutionary Republican Party we endorse.
We are a Revolutionary party, we will take our Republican Socialist ideology to the streets, As James Connolly once said “We believe in constitutional action in normal times; we believe in Revolutionary action in exceptional times”.
Beir Bua
Republican Political Prisoners
E3/E4
Portlaoise Gaol
Keep The Army Council
Dr John Coulter is an unrepentant Unionist with a staunch background in Ulster Unionism, mainstream Irish Presbyterianism, the Protestant Loyal Orders and is a Bible-believing Christian from the Church’s overtly Salvationist wing. Yet in his latest Fearless Flying Column, the controversial commentator sets out his firm conviction that the Provisional IRA’s ruling Army Council must remain in place.
What’s the future for the Provisional IRA’s Army Council now that Sinn Fein President and Louth TD Gerry Adams has announced he is stepping down from his prominent role (political I mean!) in the republican movement’s political wing?
Anyone who thinks the Provos’ ruling Army Council has, or will, go away you know, is living in ‘cloud cuckoo land’ politically. Here’s the reality – without the IRA’s Army Council Ireland will never be at peace.
That last sentence might have many readers thinking that I’ve been glugging too much of the Devil’s Buttermilk, given that I’m also viewed in many circles as a Radical Right-wing Unionist, a closet Communist, secret Liberal, Tory activist, SNP campaigner, Protestant dissident republican, KGB agent, Hamas organiser and Mossad mole … to name but a few of the posts I’m supposed to have held as a result of my writings during almost 40 years in journalism.
It’s not direction which a post-Adams republican movement lacks as the agenda is the same as the 1916 Proclamation – a 32-county democratic socialist republic (whatever mythical political creature that is?).
The real problem – and challenge – facing the new President of Sinn Fein will be party discipline. If we should learn one thing from Irish history, it’s that history will repeat itself! There will always be an element in republicanism which will see armed conflict as a way forward, just as there will always be an element within the pro-British culture which views counter-terrorism as the solution to ‘returning the serve’ to republican violence.
Let’s set the historical foundations. In 1641, the Catholic rebellion was met with the Puritan Cromwellian military might; in 1688, the Jacobite cause was crushed by King Billy’s Glorious Revolution; in 1798, the United Irishmen’s coup was eliminated by the combined forces of the Church of Ireland, English troops and the fledgling Orange movement; in the 1840s, the Fenian Movement was obliterated by British Army muscle; in 1912 and 1913, the Irish Volunteers and Irish Citizens Army were ‘squared up to’ by Carson and Craig’s Ulster Volunteers.
Then we have 1916 when the Easter Rising was smashed by Bloody Maxwell and his soldiers. The War of Independence in 1919 saw the IRA go head to head with the Black and Tans; in the 1940s, the IRA’s bid to enlist the help of Hitler to stab Britain in the back during World War Two ended in disaster. The 1956-62 Irish Border campaign was wrecked by the counter-intelligence activities of the B Specials … and then we have the Troubles which spawned the Provos, Stickies, INLA, and IPLO, countered by the UVF, UDA/UFF, PAF, Orange Volunteers, and so the lists go on.
Next year sees the 20th anniversary of the Belfast Agreement, which gave birth to the Northern Ireland Assembly. The key question is not how to breathe life back into both, namely get back to the basics of the Good Friday Agreement and kick-start the devolution process.
The challenge facing a post-Adams Sinn Fein is that there is a generation of young republican emerging for whom the 1994 Provo ceasefire, Belfast Agreement, and even the Trimble/Mallon Assembly are merely facts in history books.
True, Adams has managed to cultivate a generation of so-called ‘draft dodgers’ within the republican movement, namely young elected representatives who have never served a political apprenticeship in the IRA. However, that does not mean the Army Council has no role in modern-day republicanism. Sinn Fein the party is still the Army Council’s pet poodle.
Dissident republicans have never been able to mount the type of ‘long war’ terror campaign which the Provos engaged in. The various dissident factions – Real IRA, Continuity IRA, New IRA, Republican Action Against Drugs - could only organise short bursts of start/stop terror.
The role of the IRA’s Army Council is to prevent further defections to dissident groups, or indeed a new generation of young republican believing that armed conflict will finally ‘drive the Brits out’ in a post-Brexit Ireland.
Likewise, the republican movement should not make the mistake of thinking militant loyalism is solely represented by the UVF and UDA. Could a generation of loyalists be emerging which are not interested in drug dealing or racketeering, but are preparing for the eventuality that some type of unofficial Irish unity might develop in post-Brexit Ireland?
Financially, the Republic could not afford the cost of 1.8 million citizens in Northern Ireland. Economically, the South could not cope with a bombing blitz on a scale which the IRA unleashed on mainland Britain.
Gossip that there is no stomach in the loyalist community for such a terror campaign is infantile as terrorism has changed since the days of the companies and battalions structures of the early IRA and UVF. Just as in fundamentalist Islam, the concept of the ‘lone wolf’ attacker, or ‘single cell terrorist’ is becoming a major threat to society.
Loyalist terrorism has largely been reactionary – reacting to a perceived threat from republicanism. If the IRA’s Army Council can keep a firm disciplinary gauntlet on so-called hawks and young turks within the movement, loyalists will not respond in kind – hence the ironic need for the Army Council to remain in existence.
In the past, I have penned a number of articles in which I suggest that to help with this disciplinary process, the Provisional IRA should transform itself into an Irish Republican Association of old comrades which can keep a lid on those within the movement who might be tempted to return to violence if they perceived the political process towards Irish unity was not progressing at a pace acceptable to militants.
Simply because I suggest an Irish Republican Association replaces the current Provisional IRA does not mean I’m calling for the disbanding of the IRA’s Army Council. Quite the reverse must be the practical situation as I am firmly convinced the current crop of ‘draft dodgers’ in Sinn Fein lacks the clout to maintain political discipline within the broad republican movement.
Indeed, Sinn Fein post-Adams and post-Brexit could find itself becoming nothing more than a dark green version of Fianna Fail almost leading to the same situation as developed within Unionism when many asked – what’s the difference between the DUP and the Ulster Unionists? In terms of Unionist unity, the pro-Union voters selected the DUP. Could a similar situation emerge in the republican community?
Could a political dilemma emerge as the centenary of partition in Ireland is marked whereby nationalist voters ask – what’s the difference between heavy Fianna Fail and light Sinn Fein? Which republican party will voters then select?
Could another unthinkable take place – that Fianna Fail and Sinn Fein become such politically bosom buddies in the next Dail that the two parties eventually merge? Don’t talk nonsense Coulter, I hear you say, as all the chat is Fianna Fail and Fine Gael having to merger to keep out the Shinners.
Let me remind you of some sayings I’ve heard in my almost four decades in journalism. ‘Sinn Fein will never take part in a partitionist parliament’ … former senior IRA commander the late Martin McGuinness became Deputy First Minister of the Northern Ireland Assembly.
'Sinn Fein regards the police as part of the British war machine in Ireland’ … Sinn Fein now encourages the community to give information to the PSNI in matters of anti-social behaviour.
Rev Ian Paisley boomed ‘Never, never, never, never’ at the 1985 Belfast City Hall Ulster Says No rally against the Anglo-Irish Agreement … in 2006 he signed up to the St Andrews Agreement, entering a power-sharing Executive at Stormont with Sinn Fein the following year.
One lesson I have learned covering Irish politics over the past 39 years – Irish politics is the art of the impossible, so don’t be too hasty to laugh off any of my suggestions in this latest Fearless Flying Column.
John Coulter is a unionist political commentator and former Blanket columnist. Follow John Coulter on Twitter @JohnAHCoulter
What’s the future for the Provisional IRA’s Army Council now that Sinn Fein President and Louth TD Gerry Adams has announced he is stepping down from his prominent role (political I mean!) in the republican movement’s political wing?
Anyone who thinks the Provos’ ruling Army Council has, or will, go away you know, is living in ‘cloud cuckoo land’ politically. Here’s the reality – without the IRA’s Army Council Ireland will never be at peace.
That last sentence might have many readers thinking that I’ve been glugging too much of the Devil’s Buttermilk, given that I’m also viewed in many circles as a Radical Right-wing Unionist, a closet Communist, secret Liberal, Tory activist, SNP campaigner, Protestant dissident republican, KGB agent, Hamas organiser and Mossad mole … to name but a few of the posts I’m supposed to have held as a result of my writings during almost 40 years in journalism.
It’s not direction which a post-Adams republican movement lacks as the agenda is the same as the 1916 Proclamation – a 32-county democratic socialist republic (whatever mythical political creature that is?).
The real problem – and challenge – facing the new President of Sinn Fein will be party discipline. If we should learn one thing from Irish history, it’s that history will repeat itself! There will always be an element in republicanism which will see armed conflict as a way forward, just as there will always be an element within the pro-British culture which views counter-terrorism as the solution to ‘returning the serve’ to republican violence.
Let’s set the historical foundations. In 1641, the Catholic rebellion was met with the Puritan Cromwellian military might; in 1688, the Jacobite cause was crushed by King Billy’s Glorious Revolution; in 1798, the United Irishmen’s coup was eliminated by the combined forces of the Church of Ireland, English troops and the fledgling Orange movement; in the 1840s, the Fenian Movement was obliterated by British Army muscle; in 1912 and 1913, the Irish Volunteers and Irish Citizens Army were ‘squared up to’ by Carson and Craig’s Ulster Volunteers.
Then we have 1916 when the Easter Rising was smashed by Bloody Maxwell and his soldiers. The War of Independence in 1919 saw the IRA go head to head with the Black and Tans; in the 1940s, the IRA’s bid to enlist the help of Hitler to stab Britain in the back during World War Two ended in disaster. The 1956-62 Irish Border campaign was wrecked by the counter-intelligence activities of the B Specials … and then we have the Troubles which spawned the Provos, Stickies, INLA, and IPLO, countered by the UVF, UDA/UFF, PAF, Orange Volunteers, and so the lists go on.
Next year sees the 20th anniversary of the Belfast Agreement, which gave birth to the Northern Ireland Assembly. The key question is not how to breathe life back into both, namely get back to the basics of the Good Friday Agreement and kick-start the devolution process.
The challenge facing a post-Adams Sinn Fein is that there is a generation of young republican emerging for whom the 1994 Provo ceasefire, Belfast Agreement, and even the Trimble/Mallon Assembly are merely facts in history books.
True, Adams has managed to cultivate a generation of so-called ‘draft dodgers’ within the republican movement, namely young elected representatives who have never served a political apprenticeship in the IRA. However, that does not mean the Army Council has no role in modern-day republicanism. Sinn Fein the party is still the Army Council’s pet poodle.
Dissident republicans have never been able to mount the type of ‘long war’ terror campaign which the Provos engaged in. The various dissident factions – Real IRA, Continuity IRA, New IRA, Republican Action Against Drugs - could only organise short bursts of start/stop terror.
The role of the IRA’s Army Council is to prevent further defections to dissident groups, or indeed a new generation of young republican believing that armed conflict will finally ‘drive the Brits out’ in a post-Brexit Ireland.
Likewise, the republican movement should not make the mistake of thinking militant loyalism is solely represented by the UVF and UDA. Could a generation of loyalists be emerging which are not interested in drug dealing or racketeering, but are preparing for the eventuality that some type of unofficial Irish unity might develop in post-Brexit Ireland?
Financially, the Republic could not afford the cost of 1.8 million citizens in Northern Ireland. Economically, the South could not cope with a bombing blitz on a scale which the IRA unleashed on mainland Britain.
Gossip that there is no stomach in the loyalist community for such a terror campaign is infantile as terrorism has changed since the days of the companies and battalions structures of the early IRA and UVF. Just as in fundamentalist Islam, the concept of the ‘lone wolf’ attacker, or ‘single cell terrorist’ is becoming a major threat to society.
Loyalist terrorism has largely been reactionary – reacting to a perceived threat from republicanism. If the IRA’s Army Council can keep a firm disciplinary gauntlet on so-called hawks and young turks within the movement, loyalists will not respond in kind – hence the ironic need for the Army Council to remain in existence.
In the past, I have penned a number of articles in which I suggest that to help with this disciplinary process, the Provisional IRA should transform itself into an Irish Republican Association of old comrades which can keep a lid on those within the movement who might be tempted to return to violence if they perceived the political process towards Irish unity was not progressing at a pace acceptable to militants.
Simply because I suggest an Irish Republican Association replaces the current Provisional IRA does not mean I’m calling for the disbanding of the IRA’s Army Council. Quite the reverse must be the practical situation as I am firmly convinced the current crop of ‘draft dodgers’ in Sinn Fein lacks the clout to maintain political discipline within the broad republican movement.
Indeed, Sinn Fein post-Adams and post-Brexit could find itself becoming nothing more than a dark green version of Fianna Fail almost leading to the same situation as developed within Unionism when many asked – what’s the difference between the DUP and the Ulster Unionists? In terms of Unionist unity, the pro-Union voters selected the DUP. Could a similar situation emerge in the republican community?
Could a political dilemma emerge as the centenary of partition in Ireland is marked whereby nationalist voters ask – what’s the difference between heavy Fianna Fail and light Sinn Fein? Which republican party will voters then select?
Could another unthinkable take place – that Fianna Fail and Sinn Fein become such politically bosom buddies in the next Dail that the two parties eventually merge? Don’t talk nonsense Coulter, I hear you say, as all the chat is Fianna Fail and Fine Gael having to merger to keep out the Shinners.
Let me remind you of some sayings I’ve heard in my almost four decades in journalism. ‘Sinn Fein will never take part in a partitionist parliament’ … former senior IRA commander the late Martin McGuinness became Deputy First Minister of the Northern Ireland Assembly.
'Sinn Fein regards the police as part of the British war machine in Ireland’ … Sinn Fein now encourages the community to give information to the PSNI in matters of anti-social behaviour.
Rev Ian Paisley boomed ‘Never, never, never, never’ at the 1985 Belfast City Hall Ulster Says No rally against the Anglo-Irish Agreement … in 2006 he signed up to the St Andrews Agreement, entering a power-sharing Executive at Stormont with Sinn Fein the following year.
One lesson I have learned covering Irish politics over the past 39 years – Irish politics is the art of the impossible, so don’t be too hasty to laugh off any of my suggestions in this latest Fearless Flying Column.
John Coulter is a unionist political commentator and former Blanket columnist. Follow John Coulter on Twitter @JohnAHCoulter
November 26, 2017
Redbreast
Anthony McIntyre reviews a Jo Nesbo book.
The third Harry Hole based novel: only on this occasion the reader finds the man of the moment on home territory. Scandinavian crime fiction no matter how entertaining tends to feel more authentic when rooted in the likes of Oslo rather than Bangkok. The feeling was never far away that had this script been applied to foreign climes it would not have worked quite so well. Although The historical contextualisation is played out on the Eastern Front during World War 2, the real meat of the story is in Norway.
That said, the background has its own power of pull for a reader like myself still fascinated by the Soviet thwarting of Operation Barbarossa. Citizens of Norway had signed up to the Waffen SS and duly took their position on the front line close to Leningrad. Images of that readily jump up in my mind courtesy of having in the past year read Alexander Wurth’s book on the siege of the city.
Once voted as the “Best Norwegian Crime Novel Ever Written” I would hope this is not so. It would mean the remaining Nesbo books will not be as good. That would be a shame given the number still to be got through.
The plot is considerably less complex than on the two previous outings. Harry Hole, through circumstances beyond his control, is left less in control of the detail than the reader is accustomed to. And there is always the concern that Hole is made the hero when there is no need to. It did not have to be him to intervene to arrest an attack on the President of the US during a visit to Norway in the opening pages. Hole’s brilliance lies in his flawed ordinariness rather than a Superman type character. He could have played a cameo role in that incident and the narrative from there on would have remained unaffected.
Much of the investigation he is tasked with is in pursuit of a Maerklin hunting rifle that had been brought into Norway. There was only one purpose for the possession of such a powerful weapon: assassination. The downside is that there is too much of an overlap with Frederick Forsyth’s Day Of The Jackal.
At the end the reader is left with the knowledge that the target of Hole’s pursuit has been dealt with but disconcertingly a more sinister killer goes free: a persona who at first stirs memories of a thoroughly unlikeable character from a book by Leif GW Persson who down the line has to emerge again: his victim much too likeable to allow justice to slip into the abyss along with the life stolen. Then an even more likely contender for comparison with the Perrson character emerges: Bernt Brandhaug, Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs, whose antediluvian take on women is like something straight out of the biography of Harvey Weinstein.
The investigation takes Hole into the circles of neo-Nazis where he meets an old adversary he had once sent away for having bashed the head of a Vietnamese living in Norway. The historical lineage is there with the Eastern front but in terms of ideology there is little from Leningrad that resembles the Norwegians lounging around the bars. The Norwegians of the Waffen SS emerge in better light than the racist thugs, one of whom comically sports a Hitler-like moustache to emphasize his Aryan purity. The citizens of Leningrad might have avoided death by starvation had the thugs rather than the SS been tasked with laying siege to their city.
Compelling without being overly complex, Redbreast sets the scene for a conflict and just retribution to come.
Jo Nesbo, 2010. Redbreast. Publisher: Vintage Digital. ASIN: B003SNJYSK.
Anthony McIntyre blogs @ The Pensive Quill.
Follow Anthony McIntyre on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre
The third Harry Hole based novel: only on this occasion the reader finds the man of the moment on home territory. Scandinavian crime fiction no matter how entertaining tends to feel more authentic when rooted in the likes of Oslo rather than Bangkok. The feeling was never far away that had this script been applied to foreign climes it would not have worked quite so well. Although The historical contextualisation is played out on the Eastern Front during World War 2, the real meat of the story is in Norway.
That said, the background has its own power of pull for a reader like myself still fascinated by the Soviet thwarting of Operation Barbarossa. Citizens of Norway had signed up to the Waffen SS and duly took their position on the front line close to Leningrad. Images of that readily jump up in my mind courtesy of having in the past year read Alexander Wurth’s book on the siege of the city.
Once voted as the “Best Norwegian Crime Novel Ever Written” I would hope this is not so. It would mean the remaining Nesbo books will not be as good. That would be a shame given the number still to be got through.
The plot is considerably less complex than on the two previous outings. Harry Hole, through circumstances beyond his control, is left less in control of the detail than the reader is accustomed to. And there is always the concern that Hole is made the hero when there is no need to. It did not have to be him to intervene to arrest an attack on the President of the US during a visit to Norway in the opening pages. Hole’s brilliance lies in his flawed ordinariness rather than a Superman type character. He could have played a cameo role in that incident and the narrative from there on would have remained unaffected.
Much of the investigation he is tasked with is in pursuit of a Maerklin hunting rifle that had been brought into Norway. There was only one purpose for the possession of such a powerful weapon: assassination. The downside is that there is too much of an overlap with Frederick Forsyth’s Day Of The Jackal.
At the end the reader is left with the knowledge that the target of Hole’s pursuit has been dealt with but disconcertingly a more sinister killer goes free: a persona who at first stirs memories of a thoroughly unlikeable character from a book by Leif GW Persson who down the line has to emerge again: his victim much too likeable to allow justice to slip into the abyss along with the life stolen. Then an even more likely contender for comparison with the Perrson character emerges: Bernt Brandhaug, Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs, whose antediluvian take on women is like something straight out of the biography of Harvey Weinstein.
The investigation takes Hole into the circles of neo-Nazis where he meets an old adversary he had once sent away for having bashed the head of a Vietnamese living in Norway. The historical lineage is there with the Eastern front but in terms of ideology there is little from Leningrad that resembles the Norwegians lounging around the bars. The Norwegians of the Waffen SS emerge in better light than the racist thugs, one of whom comically sports a Hitler-like moustache to emphasize his Aryan purity. The citizens of Leningrad might have avoided death by starvation had the thugs rather than the SS been tasked with laying siege to their city.
Compelling without being overly complex, Redbreast sets the scene for a conflict and just retribution to come.
Jo Nesbo, 2010. Redbreast. Publisher: Vintage Digital. ASIN: B003SNJYSK.
Anthony McIntyre blogs @ The Pensive Quill.Follow Anthony McIntyre on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre
Interview With Allie Jackson – CEO, Atheist Republic Part 2
From Atheist Republic Scott Jabobsen with the second part of an interview conducted with Allie Jackson, the group's CEO.
If you haven't read it yet, go back to see the article "Interview with Allie Jackson – CEO, Atheist Republic Part 1" by clicking here.
Jacobsen: If we’re looking at Atheist Republic, what are we looking at in terms of demographics?
Jackson: Not surprisingly, mostly male, I do look at the demographics that follow our page. We have ~70% men to ~30% women. It is uneven there. What I find is most of our followers are probably ex-Muslim, we have a huge American, Canadian, European following.
Jacobsen: Since they are mostly men, younger, and ex-Muslim, are these the countries that the ex-Muslim men, not necessarily flee to but, get away from the dominant Islamic culture?
Jackson: It always starts off with that is what they think is going to happen. However, it’s something very emotional for me. A family, an entire family, had to flee Pakistan over a man saying, “Atheists might not be that bad,” on social media. People ransacked his house.
They had to take his children and flee to an island north of Australia, which they got to them. Their asylum there. Then they had to go to the Philippines. Mostly, it is what you can afford. If you look at the atheist community, there are not a lot of groups that help with asylum.
Asylum costs money. People need to get to these countries. They need lawyers. If no lawyers, they are taken advantage of. There was an Iranian atheist I was helping. He got a lawyer that had no idea. He had no clue about these kinds of processes.
One of the letters he wrote cost this man his asylum. The wording he used cost him his asylum. When it was all submitted and the lawyer said, “I am sure it will be fine. He is scared to go back home,” no there was a video of an Islamic video describing the beheading they were going to give him when he returned to Iran.
That is not scared to go home. That is not, “I am scared someone might hurt me.” There are people actively trying to kill him. You must be so careful about what you say in these cases. People take advantage of these cases, take their money.
The Atheist Alliance International is one of the few atheist groups that they do help with this. So, everything I know about asylum, everything that I gather is from experience. I learn from one case at a time.
When I am constantly bombarded with people saying, “I need asylum. These people are going to kill me. These people found a letter I wrote. These people saw a text message I sent to somebody. They are going to kill me. My dad and family are going to kill me,” you can only sit there and listen to that as an emotional shoulder for so long.
After that, you must get your hands into this. You must start mapping out ideas for asylum. So, I hit the books. I mean non-literally [Laughing]. I hit Google. I started getting contacts and figuring out: What is the process? What can help?
Jacobsen: Who can help them?
Jackson: That is a hard question.
Jacobsen: Let’s say, within North America, if not necessarily help, then give guidance. Should they contact some branch of Amnesty International or another organization like that?
Jackson: The UNHCR, I have worked with them the past couple of months. We have been dealing with a couple reports on what they will do for asylum seekers, and for people from Islamic countries that are atheists seeking help, because many will not talk to me.
They won’t tell me what is going on. Although, I have sent letters to one of their clients, but they will not respond to me. Finally, I got letters from their legal department, reminding me that they won’t talk to me.
I have been considering them, asking, “What will you do for these people?” The Pakistani family – that I told you about – that after he had been denied, after I sent in a letter from Atheist Republic describing what this person was going through, and that it was a verified story.
The person called them and said that they had to leave and had 90 days. I began to cry. He said, “I can’t bring my family back to Pakistan. They are going to kill me. I committed blasphemy.” If they are going to work for ex-Muslims, or for people who are seeking refuge in another country because atheism is deadly in Islamic countries, they need to know this is an issue.
I said:
Who can I talk to so I can file a report, to help you guys help people? Do you know what atheists face in Islamic countries?” I have been getting little help by the legal department. It is difficult to tell people, “You can go to this or that person because they can help you.
I feel as if I am doing that I am passing the buck. In this case, it is somebody’s life. I can’t live with that. It has been hard. We get so many cases flowing in. Once they contact this or that organization, often, they get denied. Those organizations have 50 people coming to them per day.
It is not that they don’t care. They do. But finding an organization that is big enough and can handle the load that needs help, I don’t think it exists.
Jacobsen: I think of two cases or themes. We both know women especially in religiously dominated countries – where religion and government are one and the same – that women are functionally or effectively second-class citizens.
Bearing in mind, the religion is mixed with the government. So, if it is costing money, as you noted, to take on these cases or to travel to another country and then pay for the legal assistance, if you’re a woman that is poor, it doesn’t even come out as an option.
It might explain some of the first waves of this, into more secular societies, being men, possibly. Men will have the finances to do so. I think of another case, not from that perspective, but internal to North America.
There are issues for non-believing women who – it is a sensibility, so it is not a firm argument – must work through the arts over decades to get some manner of influence. I think of Margaret Atwood.
Where she takes real cases, in parts, compiles them into a narrative, in some near-future dystopia, with the most famous example being The Handmaid’s Tale, which is coming out, I guess, in some television series, do these seem like possible trends – not from argument, but more from sensibilities and so very loose perceptions of things?
Jackson: It is hard for me. I think of women who are trapped in religion. I think of women who break out of religion, and why. In my time of doing what I do, I am not talking about the Atheist Republic work; I am talking about the one-on-one support group.
I met three women in two years, who have come out wanting help. People ask, “Why? Why is that?” I can only speak by what those few have told me. They understood that they were a slave. They understood where they were.
They said that their dream of becoming free was too great. To know there is a way to get out, and not pursue that dream, they would rather kill themselves. One woman was being abused by her husband.
Our communication didn’t get far. She said she lost faith in Islam. She had two children. Her husband beat her and her kids, and treated her terribly. The last communication I got from her said, “He found our communications. I have to say, ‘Goodbye.’”
I don’t know what happened to her. I don’t know if she ever got out. More than likely, she was probably killed trying to leave her husband, leave Islam. It is not a kind world to women. It is frustrating because, on the one hand, everyone has a right to an opinion. But on the other hand, I think people should want to become more educated on topics to hold the right opinion because when it comes to women in countries, it is heartbreaking. It is so heartbreaking what they must go through.
There are women who have taken Stockholm Syndrome. We know women who are captured by men. People who are captured by other people will begin to identify with their captors. But, I’m sorry.
When I see some women get up and say, “This is freedom for me,” I can’t help thinking of the women who felt that was slavery for them.
So, it is one of the things we were talking about earlier. We can’t block people. We can’t say, ‘All Muslims. All Christians.” I can’t say, “All women.” But I can say, ‘One woman’s freedom is another woman’s slavery.’
I think people who want to speak out against women being forced to wear a burqa. They don’t want to wear a burqa. I think that is perfectly valid. I think that we in America, and the West, need to stop looking at the burqa as a form of liberation.
It may be a form of liberation for some women, but let’s not block women. Let’s not put them into a block and say, “This is freedom for you. Take it.” It makes no sense. It is a contradictory statement [Laughing].
“You wearing that is a signal of your freedom.” It is hard.
Jacobsen: Going back to some of your Baptist roots, when you were in interaction as a very strong believer – Fox News, Baptist with father from an Abrahamic tradition, what was your perception of those that were out-and-out atheists – who were outspoken, articulate, and bold?
Jackson: I didn’t feel they existed. I didn’t believe. My dad would tell me about these people who didn’t believe in God. I though they may live in the jungle in a tribe, so that was why they didn’t believe. I didn’t think they existed.
Who wouldn’t want the love of God? I couldn’t even comprehend it.
Jacobsen: If you look at statistics, America has a prominent level of belief in angels, efficacy of prayer, demons, heaven, and so on. Did you see what you deemed “evil” behavior as influenced by a real devil, a real Satan?
Jackson: Absolutely, I thoroughly believed in demons and Satan. I thought that, maybe, I had been possessed by a demon, who was taking over my thoughts or allowing me to focus on ungodly things and wants and desires.
I thought that could happen. When I was a child, my mother constantly talked about demons and hell. She put a huge fear of demons in us. I remember not being able to sleep because I was praying to God to keep me safe. I thought I did something bad, and so a demon would come.
My mom said we were possessed when I was a baby. She was recording babble when I was a baby. Obviously, it showed she wanted to hear the recording for some reason. It said, “Come with me mama, the baby wants you to go to hell.”
So, she had our preacher come by and exorcise the house, bless the house, if you will. Now, that I look back at the story and all the things she claimed would happen, such as doors opening and closing shut all at once in the house – cabinets would open and close all the time.
When I look back at what had to have happened because she gave the tape to my dad and her pastor, who said that to the recording? Demons aren’t real. I know that. I know demons aren’t real. It is amazing when you stop believing in demons how all that fear goes away.
No more possession and fear of possession. What lengths do people go to keep their beliefs? Is it really to the point of faking a tape, so that your preacher will come to the house and bless it? I looked at the things I did as well, to keep my faith.
The various positions I would take and try to rationalize how God allow rape and slavery. I would rationalize these things in my head, to make it okay for me to keep my belief. People will go through very strange rituals to prove what they believe is real. Scary.
Jacobsen: Thank you for your time, and the openness to express sensitive issues.
Jackson: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to talk about the issues and get a chance to tell people what we do at the Atheist Republic.
Follow Atheist Republic on Twitter @AtheistRepublic
November 25, 2017
One Era Ends As Another Begins – Where To For Irish Republicanism?
Developing his theme on new opportunities towards the realising of a United Ireland, Sean Bresnahan, reflecting on the announcement that Gerry Adams is to stand down as Sinn Féin leader, argues that Republicans must countenance emerging realities.
After his announcement last weekend that he is to step down as Sinn Féin leader, love him or loathe him, Gerry Adams will be a huge loss for the party without question. His pending departure will also have a bearing on the wider Republican struggle. For notwithstanding the timeless adage, ‘follow the cause and not the man’, what the Adams leadership helped disguise was that Sinn Féin the party – with its role in the peace process – rather than a mere ‘one man show’ was in reality an Army project.
How far this remains the case today is difficult to quantify. No matter, last Saturday’s announcement portends not just the end of the Adams era but with it any remaining vestige of the Army within the Movement. There could be consequences in a broader sense as, absent this vanguard and in the context of its displacement, a further drift from core objectives might soon be on the cards. Given Sinn Féin’s role in the public mind as the primary Republican vehicle, this is of concern to us all — whether supporters of the party or not.
What this demands of those of us outside Sinn Féin, in terms of the role we must set toward and assume, is that we become ourselves a vanguard of Republicanism, seeking to influence the constitutional environment and the political actors therein. Our role in this regard is to advocate the inalienable rights of the Irish Nation — rights which exist in their own space and time, beyond and impervious to current or future constitutional realities.
What Sinn Féin must address, and it is our role to try and have them do so, is the vagueness of their so-called Agreed Ireland. The key point where clarity is required is on the constitutional lineage of this same supposed arrangement. Should a border poll be held and passed will it speed the reconstitution of the Irish Republic or will it instead give form to a revised continuum of the Good Friday Agreement? This is now at the core of the matter in terms of where our struggle is headed.
Just in terms of Adams himself, while there is a tendency to do so, we cannot just blame him for the past 30 years. The reality is that the Republican Movement chose the course that it did. Many of us played our part in this and have our own responsibilities accruing — which most prefer to forget. Yes he was a pivotal figure but the rank and file were hardly mere dupes. It was widely understood that a political vehicle to ‘broaden the front’ could ease the pressure ‘in the field’.
To put this down to one man’s scheming is a mistake, even if he carried an inordinate influence on and over the process. Ultimately things are now where they are for a reason — a war weary nationalist community, who seen the possibility of developing new forms of struggle, being central. What is incumbent on ourselves is that we work out together how best to develop these same ‘new forms’ — seeking out the best way forward in regard to the Ireland of today.
On the bigger picture is where our focus must be. If there is a pathway to the Republic once thought ‘strategically redundant’ but since impacted by changing circumstances then we must be big enough to adapt. This will bring difficulties for many. It may even seem an admission that ‘Adams was right’. But Adams or Sinn Féin don’t own demographic change. Nor do they own the rising sentiment found in the youth of the nation. These are forces which we too should seek to harness.
While the political process is British designed and is clearly an internal arrangement, it is this, perversely, that can prove its undoing. With Britain having set her conditions for withdrawal and with those same conditions now something that can be realised, a United Ireland is closer to hand than before. Acknowledging this does not require that we internalise British constitutional constraints. Britain’s ‘democratic stick’, no matter, can ironically seal her demise. This reflects shifting demographics and is unrelated to any particular Republican strategy. It should not, then, be mistaken for a legacy of Adams and need not present issue for ourselves.
While it is not automatic that unity will follow should a nationalist majority emerge in the North, a critical consideration will still have been birthed. Currently, nationalism requires that a section of unionism find merit in a United Ireland if one is to come into being — this of course in accord with Britain’s conditions and not our own. When nationalism arrives at a majority, however, the opposite will be true. Unionists will require that a section of nationalism find merit in the Union in order that it be maintained. This is of huge significance.
The efforts to conceal demographic reality can hold out no longer. Those who have tried cannot disguise the inevitable — that the days of the Union are numbered. With change comes new opportunities and with them responsibilities on our part. While Adams steps down with a United Ireland still to be achieved, the failure belongs to us all. Regardless, with a new era before us, the time to push on is now. The dead generations demand it; their sacrifice – for the Republic – must not be in vain.
That Republic is still the objective and it is our role, at this critical time, to ensure this remains the case.
Sean Bresnahan is a member of the 1916 Societies and TPQ columnist writing in a personal capacity.
Follow Sean Bresnahan on Twitter @bres79
After his announcement last weekend that he is to step down as Sinn Féin leader, love him or loathe him, Gerry Adams will be a huge loss for the party without question. His pending departure will also have a bearing on the wider Republican struggle. For notwithstanding the timeless adage, ‘follow the cause and not the man’, what the Adams leadership helped disguise was that Sinn Féin the party – with its role in the peace process – rather than a mere ‘one man show’ was in reality an Army project.
How far this remains the case today is difficult to quantify. No matter, last Saturday’s announcement portends not just the end of the Adams era but with it any remaining vestige of the Army within the Movement. There could be consequences in a broader sense as, absent this vanguard and in the context of its displacement, a further drift from core objectives might soon be on the cards. Given Sinn Féin’s role in the public mind as the primary Republican vehicle, this is of concern to us all — whether supporters of the party or not.
What this demands of those of us outside Sinn Féin, in terms of the role we must set toward and assume, is that we become ourselves a vanguard of Republicanism, seeking to influence the constitutional environment and the political actors therein. Our role in this regard is to advocate the inalienable rights of the Irish Nation — rights which exist in their own space and time, beyond and impervious to current or future constitutional realities.
What Sinn Féin must address, and it is our role to try and have them do so, is the vagueness of their so-called Agreed Ireland. The key point where clarity is required is on the constitutional lineage of this same supposed arrangement. Should a border poll be held and passed will it speed the reconstitution of the Irish Republic or will it instead give form to a revised continuum of the Good Friday Agreement? This is now at the core of the matter in terms of where our struggle is headed.
Just in terms of Adams himself, while there is a tendency to do so, we cannot just blame him for the past 30 years. The reality is that the Republican Movement chose the course that it did. Many of us played our part in this and have our own responsibilities accruing — which most prefer to forget. Yes he was a pivotal figure but the rank and file were hardly mere dupes. It was widely understood that a political vehicle to ‘broaden the front’ could ease the pressure ‘in the field’.
To put this down to one man’s scheming is a mistake, even if he carried an inordinate influence on and over the process. Ultimately things are now where they are for a reason — a war weary nationalist community, who seen the possibility of developing new forms of struggle, being central. What is incumbent on ourselves is that we work out together how best to develop these same ‘new forms’ — seeking out the best way forward in regard to the Ireland of today.
On the bigger picture is where our focus must be. If there is a pathway to the Republic once thought ‘strategically redundant’ but since impacted by changing circumstances then we must be big enough to adapt. This will bring difficulties for many. It may even seem an admission that ‘Adams was right’. But Adams or Sinn Féin don’t own demographic change. Nor do they own the rising sentiment found in the youth of the nation. These are forces which we too should seek to harness.
While the political process is British designed and is clearly an internal arrangement, it is this, perversely, that can prove its undoing. With Britain having set her conditions for withdrawal and with those same conditions now something that can be realised, a United Ireland is closer to hand than before. Acknowledging this does not require that we internalise British constitutional constraints. Britain’s ‘democratic stick’, no matter, can ironically seal her demise. This reflects shifting demographics and is unrelated to any particular Republican strategy. It should not, then, be mistaken for a legacy of Adams and need not present issue for ourselves.
While it is not automatic that unity will follow should a nationalist majority emerge in the North, a critical consideration will still have been birthed. Currently, nationalism requires that a section of unionism find merit in a United Ireland if one is to come into being — this of course in accord with Britain’s conditions and not our own. When nationalism arrives at a majority, however, the opposite will be true. Unionists will require that a section of nationalism find merit in the Union in order that it be maintained. This is of huge significance.
The efforts to conceal demographic reality can hold out no longer. Those who have tried cannot disguise the inevitable — that the days of the Union are numbered. With change comes new opportunities and with them responsibilities on our part. While Adams steps down with a United Ireland still to be achieved, the failure belongs to us all. Regardless, with a new era before us, the time to push on is now. The dead generations demand it; their sacrifice – for the Republic – must not be in vain.
That Republic is still the objective and it is our role, at this critical time, to ensure this remains the case.
Sean Bresnahan is a member of the 1916 Societies and TPQ columnist writing in a personal capacity.
Follow Sean Bresnahan on Twitter @bres79
Getting Carter: Ted Lewis And The Birth Of Brit Noir
Christopher Owens examines the relationship between the novel and the movie in a review of a book by Nick Triplow.
The cover says it all: a scruffy, backward looking type with bad sideburns and a new leather jacket standing beside the man helping to bring his creation to life. Author Ted Lewis stands with a content look on his face and a self satisfied pose. He knows he's "made it." Michael Caine, on the other hand, looks like he's obliging a drunken local with a photograph on the provision that he leaves him alone.
Inadvertently, this cover sums up the career trajectory of Ted Lewis.
Although responsible for writing the 1970 novel Jack's Return Home (filmed a year later as 'Get Carter'), Lewis fell into obscurity after his death in 1982. While 'Get Carter' became an example of "Cool Britannia" in the mid 90's, this was purely down to Michael Caine's performance as the ruthless gangster. Lewis' role was barely (if at all) mentioned.
Thankfully, a pool of writers (such as Max Allen Collins, Stuart Neville, Derek Raymond and Jake Arnott) have been citing Lewis as an influence on their own works and, in recent years, his novels have come back in print.
So it's the perfect time for an overdue appraisal of the man's life, and Nick Triplow is to be commended for this task.
The early years of Lewis' life in Barton-upon-Humber, Lincolnshire are covered in surprisingly concise and lucid detail. A humiliating tale involving the headmaster on his first day of secondary school not only serves as a reason for Lewis' hatred of authority figures throughout his life, but also as a time capsule: Britain was a very different place in the 1950's and it's impossible to imagine such a thing happening today.
His time in Hull art school is depicted as a whirlwind of drink, new wave films playing in jazz bands and designing. Going from the early years in Lincolnshire, the school comes across as an alien world, encouraging and nurturing open mindedness creativity and individuality and was clearly crucial in shaping Lewis' fascination with surface and veneer. No wonder British art schools produced people like Gee Vaucher and Pete Townshend around the same time.
When the narrative moves onto the writing (after a spell working on the 'Yellow Submarine' movie), Triplow does a great job deconstructing the works, the inspirations behind certain characters and even controversies (his 1973 novel Billy Rags heavily borrowed from John McVicker's then unpublished memoir).
These chapters show Triplow has a genuine appreciation for Lewis' work, but isn't afraid to point out flaws (his work on 'Z-Cars' and an aborted episode of 'Doctor Who' is discussed sympathetically, but critically) and even openly slate some of his writings, all while providing appropriate context.
However, where the book comes up short in is it's struggles to get to the heart of Lewis and what made him drink heavily and burn bridges. There's no doubt that he was a complex character, coming from a solid working class background (with a Masonry father) who devoured American pulp fiction and comics while befriending English teachers friendly with Dylan Thomas. He was a cocky bastard, but also painfully shy. He hung about with gangsters, but was never a criminal himself.
Understandably, a lot of this is down to lack of resources to draw upon (Triplow claims that most of his personal papers have been destroyed), but more importantly, Lewis seems to have been an aloof type, rarely allowing anyone a look behind the veneer.
As a result of this, he comes across as an increasing boorish, loudmouthed alcoholic, with little reason to pity or understand him. Interviews with his family and acquaintances cast little light on him, only highlighting that his behaviour could jump from one extreme to the other (which we know already).
One segment dealing with a stream of conscience piece of his that muses on death seems to suggest he was all too aware of his flaws and that he'd had sex with a male at some point (a turn-up for the womanizing Lewis), but it's not examined enough for greater clues. This is a shame.
It's even stated that Lewis was bitter that Get Carter became more associated with Caine (apparently he even bemoaned that The Sweeney ripped off Get Carter), contemporary sources suggest he was happy enough with it at the time. So where and when did this pride turn into animosity? And was this the sole reason he blew all his money and ended up spending the final years of his life living with his parents? We never find out.
In many ways, it can be said that Lewis was the archetypical noir writer: boozy, repellent personality but with a cutting ability to see beyond veneers of respectability. So it's no wonder his writings were full of characters with such traits. And, thinking along such lines, it's no surprise his life ended the way it did.
Will we ever get to find out any more about Ted Lewis? Unlikely, so Getting Carter is to be commended for it's research and insightfulness.
Will it attract newcomers to check out Jack's Return Home or GBH ? Here's hoping.
Nick Triplow, 2017, Getting Carter: Ted Lewis and the Birth of Brit Noir , No Exit Press, ISBN-13: 978-1901033601
Christopher Owens reviews for Metal Ireland and finds time to study the history and inherent contradictions of Ireland.
Follow Christopher Owens on Twitter @MrOwens212
The cover says it all: a scruffy, backward looking type with bad sideburns and a new leather jacket standing beside the man helping to bring his creation to life. Author Ted Lewis stands with a content look on his face and a self satisfied pose. He knows he's "made it." Michael Caine, on the other hand, looks like he's obliging a drunken local with a photograph on the provision that he leaves him alone.
Inadvertently, this cover sums up the career trajectory of Ted Lewis.
Although responsible for writing the 1970 novel Jack's Return Home (filmed a year later as 'Get Carter'), Lewis fell into obscurity after his death in 1982. While 'Get Carter' became an example of "Cool Britannia" in the mid 90's, this was purely down to Michael Caine's performance as the ruthless gangster. Lewis' role was barely (if at all) mentioned.
Thankfully, a pool of writers (such as Max Allen Collins, Stuart Neville, Derek Raymond and Jake Arnott) have been citing Lewis as an influence on their own works and, in recent years, his novels have come back in print.
So it's the perfect time for an overdue appraisal of the man's life, and Nick Triplow is to be commended for this task.
The early years of Lewis' life in Barton-upon-Humber, Lincolnshire are covered in surprisingly concise and lucid detail. A humiliating tale involving the headmaster on his first day of secondary school not only serves as a reason for Lewis' hatred of authority figures throughout his life, but also as a time capsule: Britain was a very different place in the 1950's and it's impossible to imagine such a thing happening today.
His time in Hull art school is depicted as a whirlwind of drink, new wave films playing in jazz bands and designing. Going from the early years in Lincolnshire, the school comes across as an alien world, encouraging and nurturing open mindedness creativity and individuality and was clearly crucial in shaping Lewis' fascination with surface and veneer. No wonder British art schools produced people like Gee Vaucher and Pete Townshend around the same time.
When the narrative moves onto the writing (after a spell working on the 'Yellow Submarine' movie), Triplow does a great job deconstructing the works, the inspirations behind certain characters and even controversies (his 1973 novel Billy Rags heavily borrowed from John McVicker's then unpublished memoir).
These chapters show Triplow has a genuine appreciation for Lewis' work, but isn't afraid to point out flaws (his work on 'Z-Cars' and an aborted episode of 'Doctor Who' is discussed sympathetically, but critically) and even openly slate some of his writings, all while providing appropriate context.
However, where the book comes up short in is it's struggles to get to the heart of Lewis and what made him drink heavily and burn bridges. There's no doubt that he was a complex character, coming from a solid working class background (with a Masonry father) who devoured American pulp fiction and comics while befriending English teachers friendly with Dylan Thomas. He was a cocky bastard, but also painfully shy. He hung about with gangsters, but was never a criminal himself.
Understandably, a lot of this is down to lack of resources to draw upon (Triplow claims that most of his personal papers have been destroyed), but more importantly, Lewis seems to have been an aloof type, rarely allowing anyone a look behind the veneer.
As a result of this, he comes across as an increasing boorish, loudmouthed alcoholic, with little reason to pity or understand him. Interviews with his family and acquaintances cast little light on him, only highlighting that his behaviour could jump from one extreme to the other (which we know already).
One segment dealing with a stream of conscience piece of his that muses on death seems to suggest he was all too aware of his flaws and that he'd had sex with a male at some point (a turn-up for the womanizing Lewis), but it's not examined enough for greater clues. This is a shame.
It's even stated that Lewis was bitter that Get Carter became more associated with Caine (apparently he even bemoaned that The Sweeney ripped off Get Carter), contemporary sources suggest he was happy enough with it at the time. So where and when did this pride turn into animosity? And was this the sole reason he blew all his money and ended up spending the final years of his life living with his parents? We never find out.
In many ways, it can be said that Lewis was the archetypical noir writer: boozy, repellent personality but with a cutting ability to see beyond veneers of respectability. So it's no wonder his writings were full of characters with such traits. And, thinking along such lines, it's no surprise his life ended the way it did.
Will we ever get to find out any more about Ted Lewis? Unlikely, so Getting Carter is to be commended for it's research and insightfulness.
Will it attract newcomers to check out Jack's Return Home or GBH ? Here's hoping.
Nick Triplow, 2017, Getting Carter: Ted Lewis and the Birth of Brit Noir , No Exit Press, ISBN-13: 978-1901033601
Christopher Owens reviews for Metal Ireland and finds time to study the history and inherent contradictions of Ireland.
Follow Christopher Owens on Twitter @MrOwens212
November 24, 2017
Radio Free Eireann Broadcasting 25 November 2017
Martin Galvin
with details of this weekend's broadcast from
Radio Free Eireann.
Radio Free Eireann will broadcast this Saturday November 25th on wbai 99.5 FM and wbai.org. at 12 noon - 1pm New York time or 5pm-6pm Irish time or anytime after the program on wbai.org/archives.
Des Dalton, President of Republican Sinn Fein, will present his analysis of where Irish Republicanism stands today and comment on last week's Sinn Fein Ard Fheis including the announcement that Gerry Adams would be standing down as party president.
With the release of the Paradise Papers on the global elite and tax shelters, Harry Browne, Lecturer in the School of Media,Dublin Institute of Technology, will discuss U2'S iconic frontman Bono, true name Paul Hewson, whose image as a philanthropist is belied by his moves to dodge Irish taxes, and his exploitative multinational business interests.
Radio Free Eireann also wishes listeners a Happy Thanksgiving, and also a Happy Evacuation day, November 25TH being the anniversary of the day in 1783 when British troops left New York and America. It was celebrated as a holiday until Thanksgiving was marked as a national holiday during the Civil War.
John McDonagh and Martin Galvin co- host.
Radio Free Eireann is heard Saturdays at 12 Noon New York time on wbai 99.5 FM and wbai.org.
It can be heard at wbai.org in Ireland from 5pm to 6pm or anytime after the program concludes on wbai.org/archives.
Radio Free Eireann will broadcast this Saturday November 25th on wbai 99.5 FM and wbai.org. at 12 noon - 1pm New York time or 5pm-6pm Irish time or anytime after the program on wbai.org/archives.
Des Dalton, President of Republican Sinn Fein, will present his analysis of where Irish Republicanism stands today and comment on last week's Sinn Fein Ard Fheis including the announcement that Gerry Adams would be standing down as party president.
With the release of the Paradise Papers on the global elite and tax shelters, Harry Browne, Lecturer in the School of Media,Dublin Institute of Technology, will discuss U2'S iconic frontman Bono, true name Paul Hewson, whose image as a philanthropist is belied by his moves to dodge Irish taxes, and his exploitative multinational business interests.
Radio Free Eireann also wishes listeners a Happy Thanksgiving, and also a Happy Evacuation day, November 25TH being the anniversary of the day in 1783 when British troops left New York and America. It was celebrated as a holiday until Thanksgiving was marked as a national holiday during the Civil War.
John McDonagh and Martin Galvin co- host.
Radio Free Eireann is heard Saturdays at 12 Noon New York time on wbai 99.5 FM and wbai.org.
It can be heard at wbai.org in Ireland from 5pm to 6pm or anytime after the program concludes on wbai.org/archives.
72 Hour Fast
A statement from E3/E4 republican Prisoners, Portlaoise pertaining to a solidarity fast they embarked upon yesterday morning.
We would also like to commend our imprisoned comrades in Maghaberry Gaol for their continued resolve and discipline in the face of a sectarian aggressor.
The oppressive measures being implemented against our comrades needs to be highlighted, but more worrying of late are the increased physical attacks occurring on a weekly base.
As a small token of solidarity with our comrades, the Republican Prisoners in Portlaoise will embark on a 72 hour fast commencing this morning at 10am, to highlight the ongoing sectarian attacks that they face.
We would also like to commend our imprisoned comrades in Maghaberry Gaol for their continued resolve and discipline in the face of a sectarian aggressor.
The oppressive measures being implemented against our comrades needs to be highlighted, but more worrying of late are the increased physical attacks occurring on a weekly base.
As a small token of solidarity with our comrades, the Republican Prisoners in Portlaoise will embark on a 72 hour fast commencing this morning at 10am, to highlight the ongoing sectarian attacks that they face.
Anthony McIntyre's Blog
- Anthony McIntyre's profile
- 2 followers
Anthony McIntyre isn't a Goodreads Author
(yet),
but they
do have a blog,
so here are some recent posts imported from
their feed.
