First published in Socialist Voice, paper of the Socialist Party, June 2003
A RECENT opinion poll demonstrates that a significant minority of voters in Northern Ireland are sick of the sectarian parties and are looking for an alternative. Up to seventeen per cent declared their intention to vote for smaller parties outside the sectarian circus.
Many trade union and community activists have been stunned by the anti-working-class policies of the Assembly and the Executive. Many young people reject sectarianism, and because of their experiences of opposing the war in Iraq and globalisation are beginning to question the entire system.
A Review of “The Provisional IRA: from insurrection to parliament”, author Tommy McKearney. Published by Pluto Press, 2011
Review first published by Socialist Party, 2013
Tommy McKearney’s “The Provisional IRA, From Insurrection to Parliament” is a serious attempts to explain the genesis of the Provisional IRA and its subsequent trajectory over four decades. The author is not a bystander or commentator from afar but was a key Irish Republican Army activist in the 1970s and a participant in the 1980 hunger-strike. Since that time he has emerged as an articulate critic of the mainstream republican movement. Recently he spoke at the Socialist Party’s Socialism 2012 event in Belfast.
This week, we republish a review of the book The Provisional IRA: from Guns to Government, which was written by ex-IRA prisoner and hunger striker. McKearney is a left critic of Sinn Fein today but continues to hold that the IRA campaign was the only way forward in the early 1970s.
THE PUBLICATION of the Cory Report into the deaths of Pat Finucane, Rosemary Nelson, Billy Wright and Robert Hamill, and of the Dail report into the Dublin and Monaghan bombings, has provided further evidence of the nefarious role played by the British State in the conflict in Northern Ireland.
British Government policy during the last 30 years has been by and large one of pragmatism. Over the first two decades of the Troubles, it relied on a policy of repression, overwhelmingly directed against Catholic areas, allied with repeated attempts to create political solutions based on the “constitutional” parties. All attempts at a political solution failed.
The publication of an interim report by the Kenova Inquiry into the activities of the IRA informer known as Stakeknife” on March 8th, has told us little new. The Inquiry has now lasted seven years, cost £40 million but has struggled to uncover basic facts. Even the most uncontroversial information about what happened has been withheld from families.
We do know that Stakeknife, real name Freddy Scapattici, was a state agent within the IRA for decades. In this role he was head of the IRA Internal Security Unit, also known as the “nutting squad”, which sought out and executed alleged informers. He was involved in the murder of 20 or more individuals who were accused of betraying IRA secrets. Some of his victims may well have been working for the British state, but some were certainly innocent. There is ample evidence that his British Army handlers allowed some to go to their deaths to protect his identity.
Police raid on Sinn Fein office at Stormont in search for evidence of intelligence gathering in October 2002 caused a collapse of the Executive which lasted for five years.
First published by Socialist Party 11th October, 2002
AS WE go to press, it seems almost certain that Northern Ireland’s Executive and Assembly will collapse this week. New Labour’s Northern Ireland Secretary John Reid will probably suspend the institutions in the hope that they can one day be resuscitated
A general election must be held before January 2025. Most commentators expect this to take place in October or November 2024. There is a widespread acceptance that Keir Starmer, and the Labour Party will form the next government.
As before all elections serious socialists in Northern Ireland are examining the possibility of standing to provide an alternative for working class people. With only months to go, decisions will need to be taken soon as contesting general elections is a major undertaking for small groupings. First past the post elections are not at first sight, viable territory for new parties or movements, but we should not lose sight of the fact that 1/3 of workers and young people do not vote. We also know that many of those who cast a vote for parties outside the mainstream are still in search of a viable cross-community, anti-sectarian, left alternative.
Bill Webster, Chair of the Labour and Trade Union Group, speaking at the Stop the Tories Conference, Belfast, Europa Hotel, 1983. Ciaran Crossey in chair.
In 1979 the Tories returned to power and under Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher began to implement a programme of privatisation and deregulation which was to have a major impact on the lives of working-class people.
From the start there was resistance and a magnificent half-day general strike in April 1980 brought out both public and private sector workers across the North. The ruling class were on the offensive however, and sought conflict, determined to defeat the strongest trade unions, one by one. In 1979, they took on and defeated the steelworkers in a major dispute. Behind the scenes they were preparing for a battle with the National Union of Mineworkers and in the great miners’ strike of 1984-1985 they threw the full weight of the state against organised labour.
Peter Hadden speaking at 1983 Stop the Tories Conference, Europa Hotel, Belfast. Bill Webster on right.
The workers’ movement in Northern Ireland were without a political voice, as we still are. There has been no mass independent working-class political party in the North since the demise of the Northern Ireland Labour Party (NILP) in the early 1970s. It is largely forgotten now just how successful the NILP was. In 1962, it gained 62,175 votes in Belfast compared to 67,350 for the Unionist candidates. This vote represented 26% of the votes cast. The total left vote was 32.8% if other left parties are added. It won 105,759 votes across Northern Ireland in the 1970 general election. However, this base was squandered as the NILP adopted a one-sided unionist position, and it gained only 18,675 votes in the 1973 Assembly election.
In the early 1970s Militant supporters worked to push the NILP to the left and argued that it should take up issues of repression and discrimination. Furthermore, we argued that the NILP could not deal with the national question by ignoring it but instead must pose a class-based alternative to the sectarian parties on either side. Militant and others on the left, formed the Labour and Trade Union Coordinating Committee (later the Labour and Trade Union Group) to keep alive the idea of a mass party.
In the late 1970’s and into the 1980s we campaigned vigorously for a Conference of Labour, to bring together trade unions, trade union branches, trades councils, other workers organisations such as tenants’ groups, and left political parties with an anti-sectarian position. Such a conference would provide a springboard for the creation of a new working-class party.
We called upon the Irish Congress of Trade Unions to act, or sections of the movement to act if the umbrella would not. By 1982 the call for a conference of labour was backed by the National Union of Mineworkers and the Furniture, Timber and Allied Trades Union. Executive members of the FBU, SOGAT, the Boilermakers, NUPE and the Bakers Union had given individual support.
The 1981 British Labour Party Conference (with almost every trade union delegation in favour) overwhelmingly endorsed the call for a Conference of Labour. The Irish Labour Party, also by Conference decision, came out for a Conference of Labour. Derry, Ballymena and Meath Trades Councils were in support. In Derry significant union branches, from NIPSA to the AUEW, backed the call. In Belfast it was also the policy of many union branches.
We didn’t wait on developments but sought to create momentum and to show by example. In 1979 comrades worked in Paddy Devlin’s “Give a Straight Left to Europe” campaign when he stood in the first European election campaign (winning over 6000 votes). In the 1981 local elections we supported several candidates standing on a ticket of workers unity and socialist politics, including the Derry Labour Party and the Antrim Labour League.
As the 1983 general election approached, discussions around the idea of an alternative to the Tories and the sectarian parties intensified. In the spring of 1983, the LTUG convened the “Stop the Tories” conference. This event, held in the Europa Hotel in Belfast, provided a platform for the arguments for a new party our movement to unite working people. We argued for a slate of candidates standing on a common programme. Unfortunately, whist the conference was a success on the day, the desired result of a united party or movement, did not emerge. The LTUG stood one candidate only in the election, Muriel Tang in East Belfast.
The Stop the Tories conference, an open forum for those committed to the idea of change is an illustration of the initiatives that are necessary if we are to build a new party of movement for the working class. In the coming weeks all activists should consider whether the time is now for a new initiative.
Switch of Jeffrey Donaldson and Arlene Foster from Ulster Unionist Party to Democratic Unionist Party in 2004 was a key moment in process which lead to eclipse of latter as unionism's largest party, a position it had held since 1921.
First published Socialist Voice, Newspaper of Socialist Party Ireland, Jan 5th 2004
ON 5 JANUARY Jeffrey Donaldson, Norah Beare and Arlene Foster announced that they were joining the DUP. Their move underlined the results of the recent elections. The DUP are now the largest unionist party and Sinn Fein the largest nationalist party
Despite this some commentators are arguing that the forthcoming review of the Agreement will achieve a deal and re-establish an Executive. Some even argue that the outcome of the election will result in greater long term stability as a deal reached between the extremes will be more likely to stick.
Their logic largely rests on the argument that the leading members of Sinn Fein and the DUP are competent and ambitious administrators who are keen to once again get their hands on the levers of power. For this reason the DUP will abandon their position of refusing to talk to and share power with Sinn Fein. Whilst there is some truth in this it is a minor factor and will not determine the course of events in the next period.
Of vital importance is the fact that three more elections are due in the next 18 months-the European poll in June of this year and the local and Westminster elections next year. Both Sinn Fein and the DUP will see these contests as opportunities to emphasise their dominance over their rivals.
This article is based on an article first published in Socialist Voice, paper of Socialist Party, 9th April 2004
Forty years ago on March 6th the great miners’ strike began. For a year 140,000 members of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) were engaged in a titanic battle with Margaret Thatcher’s Tory government and the full force of the state.
Ultimately, they went down to defeat but it was an honourable defeat. It was a dispute that would have been won were it not for the betrayal of the right wing trade union and the Labour Party leaderships.
