Do parties put the state/country’s interests above the interests of their particular party? We’ve been famously told that one party did once: the SDLP. According to this version of events, John Hume and Seamus Mallon sacrificed the welfare of their party so that they could bring about peace. Certainly the SDLP has suffered monumentally since the turn of the century. But now they seem determined to turn back again and put the welfare of their party before…no, not before: in a happy tandem with the welfare of the state.
At least that’s the impression you’re given in the SDLP party political broadcast the other night. Perhaps modeling themselves on the British royal family, the SDLP have chosen to jump a generation, which is hard on the likes of Alex Attwood but good news for Colum Eastwood. He was the striding colossus of the party political broadcast, doing his best to appear a leader of men and women rather than a young fellah heading for a night out with his mates. We’ll know if New-Younger-Bouncier SDLP line has worked in a month’s time; but we don’t have to wait that long to know that the SDLP is doing all it conceivably can to stop their life-blood oozing down the electoral drain.
So will the SDLP be Sinn Féin’s main rival for votes? In normal circumstances the answer would be yes, but things on the nationalist front have changed a bit. Gerry Carroll of People Before Profit holds a Belfast City Council seat for West Belfast and has been eating into Sinn Féin’s majority each time he’s run in a general election. With Fiona Ferguson in North Belfast, he’s hoping to cash in on discontent over the Casement Park development and the state of the Royal Victoria Hospital and other local matters. Like the Workers’ Party (are they still around?), he’s dismissing green/orange loyalties along with the capitalist system. Who does that sound like? Why, my old (and I mean old) classmate in Derry, Eamonn McCann. The Derryman is running for People Before Profit there, and if you hunt a bit you’ll see a video where the actor Stephen Rae gives his blessing and backing to McCann. And to make it all even more like several decades ago, Bernadette McAliskey has been pictured with People Before Profit figures like Richard Boyd-Barrett.
I was talking to a man last night who appeared quite excited. When I asked him what was up, he told me that Gerry Carroll was 6-1 to take a seat in the Assembly election. He couldn’t wait to get to the bookie’s.
But before you join him, remember this: Sinn Féin over the last twenty years has fought off electoral attacks from just about every source to become the biggest political party in the country. By now, I suspect, they’ve worked out a way to counter the rise of People Before Profit. And if they haven’t, they should have.
I empathise with PBFand have subscribed them. SF use left rhetoric when it suits them but are too cosy with their Irish American constituency to confront for example the issue of American Forces’ use of Shannon.Martin Mcguinness was happy to be photographed smiirking over George Bushes shoulder at a La fheile Phadraig junket at a time when Bush’s name was mud throughout the world. They are also anxious to be patted on the head and have their tummy’s tickled by businessmen and “entrepreneurs”. Several high profile Shinners were at the funeral of billionaire Unionist and unon basher Eddie Haughey. They were less in evidence at the funeral of his employee Declan Small killed in the same helicopter crash. he other hand if PBP do not confront the national question and the British presence in ireland they will go down the path of William Walker and the NILP and be consigned to an opportunistic footnote in history.
apologies for awful typos e.g “tummy’s tickled”
Dunno why they just don’t call themselves the Socialist Workers Movement, as that’s what they most certainly are. Does Trotsky get the odd mention in their manifesto?
Personally myself , and a lot of other people that I’ve spoken to , are quite exasperated by SF’s seemingly ineffectual countering of Unionist negativity bullying and brinkmanship. Unionism has efficaciously vetoed the Irish Language Act , they have held meetings in Orange Halls to countermand house building for nationalists , we had contracts for the bhoys ( Red Sky etc )…..I could go on and on . We want to see strong and strident leadership from SF , we want them to confront and tackle Unionism head on at every opportunity , appeasement doesn’t work —–they see it as weakness , they are your political opponents , treat them as such and then perhaps then we might end voter apathy. As for Colum Eastwood and the SDLP , I don’t see any point in trying to steer a parked car….they are going nowhere , they’re lost , unsure whether they’re lukewarm Nationalist or tepid Unionist and if you are in the middle of the road ,you tend to get knocked down or killed off ! People Before Profit are an enigma…..is their vote a protest vote at the lethargy professedly creeping into SF or are they a new phenomenon ….presently they are small and confined so I don’t see any imminent threat.
“they are your political opponents”
Except that we’ve got a constitution in the GFA where they’re Sinn Fein’s coalition partner and they have a veto (like Sinn Fein) on all legislation. So all you’re calling for is posturing that won’t make any difference at all.
If you want to be rid of the unionist veto you’ll need to get rid of petitions of concern and start trusting the centre ground of the NI electorate.
“appeasement doesn’t work —–they see it as weakness , they are your political opponents , treat them as such and then perhaps then we might end voter apathy.”
I hear that.
Why is the tricolour not flown from council buildings with nationalist majority control and all signs bilingual?
At least we could see visible changes for the better.
The electorate in the 26 counties will need to put their thinking caps on again. Those who wish to put Fianna Fáil back into power would prefer to forget about the party’s role in the demise of the Celtic Tiger. Prior to the election, many in right wing parties vented their spleen on Mr Adam’s grasp of matters economic. Some of his critics had a firm grasp of suitcases full of cash as they deposited dirty linen in the privacy of off shore accounts.
The electorate was left under no illusion as to who would not go in to coalition with who and much time was given over to what right wing parties would not do after the election. True to form, that is what they are doing, nothing. Those demanding “damascene conversions” for flawed pedigrees have been rendered speechless. The current industrial unrest in Dublin suggests that working people have had enough of promises, broken promises and parties who make false claims about representing people who have to work for a living.
As for life blood oozing down electoral drains, the electorate in the six counties ought to reflect on the demise of the Colossus of Rhodes. Bar Hebraeus recorded that the statue snapped at the knees because of its weight and the scrap was sold to “a certain Jew from Emesa (Homs).
We are reminded on a regular basis that six into twenty six will not go by some in the north of Ireland, however, there is a compelling logic in putting people before profit. Right wing policies and austerity measures result in street protests and industrial unrest. Tax incentives for transnational corporations may help create fast food outlets, call centres, zero hours contracts and off shore accounts, they are no substitute for secure, fair employment and high quality public services. It is time to put people before profit and policies before parties.
As Paul says PBP are the Socialist Workers Party in another guise.
If they can’t be honest in stating who they really are then why should anyone vote for them?
Gerry Carroll has been a member of the SWP and most probably still is.
He states in his election literature that he is a socialist and not a politician so what then is he doing being both a councillor and trying to become an MLA !
The Assembly is what it is. It gets a set amount of money from the UK govt. and has to divi it out as best they can. What is PBP/SWP going to change about that situation?
Fittingly, Esteemed Blogmeister, the proclamation of the Norneverland branch of the People Before Profit party/ movement/ faction / concept/ fiction was unrolled, and declaimed by its (de facto) baldheaded head.
And fittingly, indeed Lord Fittingly it was from the august steps of The Unionist Times that, after the preliminary unrolling, throat-clearing and melodramatic pausing that it was read, oops, declaimed , and in a trademark rapid, machine-gun fire delivery too.
The date too fitted the bill. Just like the non-mandated boyos of Easter 1916 had an eye on the calendar so also with the media-savvy bald headliner of the PBP : December 31, 2015.
The Last Day, as it were, for The First Word.
Boxing clever, the title of the proclamation, which , erm, ticks all the b’s, was:
-Arsene Wenger can teach us all A Lesson in Decency !
Tick.
-We live in desperate times.
Tick.
-The gap between the rich and the wretched has never been so great.
Tick.
-The richest of all operate in a murky region beyond the reach of regulation.
Tick.
-Global institutions which we are instructed to look up to have been brought into being to give their rule a sickly sheen.
Tick.
-Profit is their only law-giver.
Tick.
-Every aspect of art and popular culture is bent to their interests.
-Tick.
-This, and not the individual deficiencies of FIFA bosses, is the cause of football’s ills.
Tick.
-Against a background of major clubs paying non-triers up to a million-a-month, endless hoopla and hype about the aptly titled transfer market, phoney melodrama on the managerial merry-go-round, venerable clubs used as money-laundering operations by oligarchs bearing stolen millions and much else besides along these depressing lines, Arsene Wenger stands out as a beacon of integrity, an indomitable true believer in the spirit of the game.
Tick, tick, tick, tick, tock.
-He has that very, very rare thing in top-flight football – ordinary decency.
Tick.
-Arsene is among the handful who allow the rest of us to keep the faith.
Tick.
-All true believers in football want this to be Arsene’s Arsenal’s year.
Tick.
(Phew).
All of the above is what is known in another religion (one which the author aka The Man who is Thursday has been known for his, erm, ‘gunning for’, in the past) as Canonisation. In the belief set of People Before Profit’s de facto baldheaded head in Norneverland this is known as (gulp) ‘McCannonisation’.
Just what is it about the fascination of Arsene and Arsenal for a potty-trained Trot?
Due perhaps to space restraints the following insignificant line was surprisingly omitted from the column of Eamonn McCann (for it is he !). It has to do with the pitiful pittance which No Arse in his Trousers Arsene is being compelled to scrape by upon:
-Just south of eleven million squids per annum, making his total worth just north of a meagre forty million squids.
Unless of course the pious People Before Profiteer included this line about his, erm, Prophet in his column in the sister paper of TUT, the Bel Tel. Eyebrows have been dry-arched at the choice of organs which he opts to donate his think-pieces to. Needlessly so. After all if Eamonn has to make,erm, n’s meet, the same as McCann.
E-quality.
The reference to the f-word in the Derryman’s column in The Unionist Times is not camouflaged. It might be said that football (for it is it!) gets a lot of footfall, if that crassly commercial term is not too distasteful in the context.
As ‘football’ is Imperialism for soccer, just as Londonderry is Imperialism for Derry/ Doire perhaps the term ‘Derrryman’ might even to be considered ill-chosen too in the context.
Incidentally, precisely what sort of game where the likes of, say, Jim McKeever, Dermor McNicholl, Henry Downey, Sean Marty Lockhart, Anthony Tohill and Joe Brolly of the Oak Leaf County playing at down through the decades?
And just as the f-word gets a good airing in the colmcille, oops, column so also do unconventional words like (gasp) ‘believer’ and ‘faith’.
Coincidentally, another religion, one which the devout disciple of A.Wenger, OBE, has been known to have differences with (see ‘gunning for’, above) recently announced the deletion of a word and its substitution (off the bench, as it were) by another.
-Our Lady of Perpetual Succour.
To be henceforth known as:
-Our Lady of Perpetual Help.
It would appear that the Papists (for it is they!) took a leaf here out of the Football Sect’s book.
Secularists such as the de facto baldheaded head of the PBP in Norneverland, would have us believe that it is the Papists who have the monopoly of the, erm, suckers.
One wonders.
One wonders too about another non-negotiable tenet of Eamonn McCann’s political belief set: the mortal sin of wearing a tie. Which is not to say he does not know how to tie a, erm, knot, a knot of the mind.
The kinda tie that really binds.
The one with the Windsor Knot.
From what I read from Gerry Carroll/PBP leaflets concerning next months Assembly Elections, they are taking the line that Sinn Fein are implementing tory cuts at Stormont but everyone knows if Carroll/PBP were in Sinn Fein’s position they would be doing exactly the same thing. The alternative is Stormont collapsing, full tory cuts and maybe even a return to full scale violence here due to the political vacuum. Carroll stood in West Belfast in the British General Election and beat the SDLP in votes but came no where near to unseating Maskey but even if he did Carroll sitting in Westminister (which he said he would do) would have made absolutely no difference and we would still be receiving tory cuts. Indeed Sinn Fein got us a better deal than the PBP would’ve got us, regardless of the cuts the North is still getting an far better package than the likes of England or Wales. Carroll, just like the SDLP, needs to put down what alternative they have, a REALISTIC alternative, not one that bleats that they “will oppose tory cuts” because the simple reality is they cant.
I think Carroll is far more of a threat to the SDLP than Sinn Fein. Carroll outpolled the SDLP at the British General Election last year in West Belfast. I see Carroll eating into the SDLP vote more than Sinn Fein’s, therefore hastening the SDLP’s decline. Its all on Colum Eastwood’s shoulders to save this party because if he doesn’t I don’t think there will be another leader of the SDLP after Eastwood’s time is up.
Do I think Gerry Carroll will win a seat in the Assembly? No but I think he will come close and poll well but not well enough. I don’t think PBP is going to make much of an impact here in the long run, I think they will make some noise and then disappear and be forgotten. The economics of PBP is obviously Socialist and, of course, standing up for the most vulnerable and needy is very honourable but you have to be realistic. We live in a Capitalist society, I’ve often asked this of socialists: How can you implement socialist policies in a Capitalist society? It simply cant be done. Sure you can make a few changes here and there but nothing substantial. If Ireland turned into a Socialist or a Marxist Republic tomorrow the economy would collapse. Billions that the whole island receives from foreign direct investment would run for the hills, that’s why Sinn Fein even supports a cut in Corporation Tax to entice companies to come here and it works. Of course I don’t agree with any “race to the bottom” in tax and companies should definitely pay their tax, that goes without saying.
I’m not a socialist, my father was socialist minded, though the great irony is him and many other republicans set up businesses in the likes of Dublin and have done very well out of it. Indeed there was a story last year of a former Hunger Striker having made millions in property and 600,000 euros was found hid under his bath. I’m not a Capitalist either though, I’m more centre ground, I’m definitely conservative when it comes to social policies, anti-abortion, Promotion of Family values, etc.
What many Socialists, especially Irish Republican socialists, don’t realize is that Ireland as a whole is a very conservative country. Even Sinn Fein has had to adapt to this. Look at the two largest parties in the 26 counties. Fianna Fail and Fine Gael are two right wing/centre ground political parties and they have ruled the state since its birth, I don’t think there has ever been a government that hasn’t included one of these two parties. I don’t know the history of Irish Labour but they, from my knowledge, have never been anything more than a junior partner when it comes to Government, simply there to make up the numbers and as we’ve seen from 2011 onwards they abandoned many of their policies.
When it comes to the North, Gerry Carroll will do well but I don’t think him or the PBP will come anywhere near to challenging Sinn Fein but they may be the ones who put the SDLP out of their misery…..
Ryan, you state, “Sinn Fein got us a better deal than the PBP would’ve got us” Could you elaborate on your point? An unfair comparison. SF’s consistent position was they would “oppose Tory cuts” and they failed in this regard. They facilitated the implementation of Tory austerity in the end.
I was speaking recently with a SF MLA and his prediction was that Gerry Carroll will take a West Belfast seat. It’s one of the seats SF feel they will loose an MLA. In West Belfast by election in 2011 Carroll gained 1751 votes (7.6%). In 2015 General Election he increased his vote to 6798 (19.2%) (I know it’s a different system of voting). This a constituency where SF’s majority fell from 57.1% to 35.0%. The point is, Carroll’s vote had increased dramatically, whilst SF has decreased. Will the SF vote in West Belfast fall further in the assembly elections? There is a likelihood. Also, The old tactic Unionists voters used in the 1990’s in voting for SDLP’s Joe Hendron to unseat Gerry Adams – will Unionists vote for Gerry Carroll to ensure SF loose a seat? It’s a possibility.
I am not a socialist but I would be including them in my list of who gets my vote
At the moment sinn fein will still first preferences
I would only consider all island parties
Perhaps the rise of pbp would allow sinn fein to move closer to center
The constitutional issue will remain the biggest issue for the majority in the north including myself
Total vote avoidance is the only alternative option
stormonts been tried and failed they must see that it only serves british intrests in ireland.they will end up being sucked in and churned out part of the establishment like the rest its an oul british trick.
I might disagree with your non-voting stance Billy (every nationalist/republican should be voting) but I’m starting to agree with you when it comes to Stormont, it hasn’t worked and it will never work. Obviously I would prefer Irish Unity but I think Joint Rule should be considered.
The only way stormont could work is through devolution from Dublin for each province or council boundaries
Perhaps the empasse in the Dail will help make this a future reality
“stormonts been tried and failed they must see that it only serves british intrests in ireland.they will end up being sucked in and churned out part of the establishment like the rest its an oul british trick.”
What’s the alternative though billy?
I’ll have whatever Perkin is on