Photograph by Antrim Lens
I was at the P J McGrory Memorial Lecture in St Mary’s University College a week ago, given by the distinguished English barrister Michael Mansfield. It was the first time I’d seen in the flesh this man whose legal work has woven in and out through the history of the Troubles. He has represented the Birmingham Six and the Guildford Four; the Price sisters; Brian Keenan; the Bloody Sunday famiies; and in England the Orgreave miners and the Hillsborough families. You can see from the list that Mansfield is a man who chooses to devote his talents to work for those who are victims.
At seventy-five and with a new hip, he’s still an elegant figure in a blue shirt, red tie and that trade-mark swoop of elegant hair. He warmed up his talk with ten minutes of reminiscences about nervous coming to Ireland in the early days of the Troubles and a brief meeting Gerry Adams.As they stood at the door for a minute afterwards, Adams mentioned that he’d been there the previous day and pointed to a line of bullet-holes above the door. “Don’t hang about” he advised Mansfield. “I was gone before he was” Mansfield told us.
He was particularly eloquent talking about the past. At one point he read aloud a fairly lengthy statement about the need to seek the truth of past incidents. In cases like the ninety-six deaths at Hillsborough, truth and justice should be available to relatives, because if left unattended, there is a “toxic seepage” from the past that infects the present and the future. The author of the piece read aloud? Tory Prime Minister Theresa May. If the new PM’s actions match her words, there will be radical change.
When a man in the audience asked him about prosecutions, he pointed to roadblocks erected by the state. For the state, full disclosure is often “not in the public interest”. He also drew attention to the common denominator between such cases as Bloody Sunday, Orgreave and Hillsborough: “The buck stops with the guys on the ground”. This contrasts with his firm belief that responsibility for such actions extend to ministerial level.
When someone in the audience asked him if he considered Tony Blair a war criminal, he was unambiguous: Yes. Besides the many dead as a result of the invasion of Iraq, there are the huge amounts of money Blair has made in the wake of the Iraq invasion.
In some ways Mansfield’s talk was depressing, because he pointed to the ways in which the state moves ruthlessly to nip in the bud anything that might lead to radical change. And he recalled meetings of the authorities here where arrangements were quickly made that would protect all British soldiers from prosecution for their actions.
And state forces learn from one suppression to another. One example: the police tactics at Orgreave against the miners in the 1980s were replicated in more recent attacks on protesting students, using largely the same methods as those employed against the miners.
He was witty as well as wise, starting his talk by asking if there were any members of Special Branch present, and referring to another similar occasion where a man had actually raised his hand in response to that question. He also reminded any hecklers who might be present that, as a barrister, he’d been trained to a level which left him well capable of responding to any verbal assaults.
Most of the lecture consisted of points many of us knew already; but it was reassuring to hear them come from this hugely-respected figure, as it was to see how he linked cases from here with cases on the Mainland. (Yes, Virginia, he did say “Mainland”. Twice.) Consistently the state showed its determination to deflect responsibility, regardless of the veracity of the charges made. This was the case no matter which party was in office. Tory and Labour governments consistently reacted in the same self-protective way.
The one positive light identified during the talk was the Jeremy Corbyn- led Labour Party. This he believes looks like a new beginning in British politics. Will it be successful? At least in part. It might not achieve all its stated aims but another bold step will have been taken towards genuine reform of British politics.
And don’t forget he also represented the late Robert Hamill’s family from Portadown.
Robert Hamill’s murder was notorious, a bunch of Loyalists beat him and stamped on him when they found out he was a Catholic, they were screaming “Die Taig, Die!” while doing it. The RUC was sitting in their vehicle watching it all and refused to intervene, as numerous witnesses testified.
Given that it was Michael Mansfield giving the P J M c Grory lecture,was PJs son,the current Director of Public Prosecutions there?
“He was witty as well as wise, starting his talk by asking if there were any members of Special Branch present”
We can be almost certain there probably was. The British Army may have left the North but MI5 haven’t. The Walls have Ears! as the old saying goes. I remember reading a news article about 6 months ago in the Barbers where a West Belfast man was stalked by MI5 who was trying to recruit him, they even followed him on holiday with his family and when he kept refusing to join them they started to harass him and his family constantly. The man came out in public to highlight what MI5 was doing and to warn others.
“The one positive light identified during the talk was the Jeremy Corbyn- led Labour Party”
Corbyn definitely is the change British politics needs and the vast majority of Labour members know it, hence his immense support. Its the corrupt MP’s in the Labour Party who are trying to get rid of him because they know he’s no Tony Blair and that he’s genuine.
Political Unionism fear and despise Corbyn because he is a supporter of Irish Unity, the media here reflect that same fear and hatred. Its OK for numerous British Prime Ministers to openly back Unionism but its not OK if they back Republicanism. The only PM I can think of who supported Irish Unity was Wilson but he certainly didn’t back Republicanism. Wilson knew this problem in the North of Ireland wont go away and will go on and on and on unless the British Government leaves the North.
Wilson will always be remembered by political Unionism for his famous live TV address where he called Unionists “Spongers”.
Ryan most unionists are happy with Corbyn as long as he leads Labour they will never sniff power again which would be very pleasurable for the unionist community.
The fact, Esteemed Blogmeister, that it is an English lawyer – Michael Mansfield – rather than say, a lawyer from the Free Southern Stateen who first comes to mind when justice was being sought and fought for in the courts during the Dirty Thirty Year War, is not without its own significance.
Neither is one of the great anomalies of the naming of the Government Departments of the FSS. That would be, of course, The Department of Justice on St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2. Curiously,this is the translation from the Leprechaun, An Roinn Dli agus Cirt. Whose full version in the Q’s English would be, of course, The Department of Law and Justice.
That this anomaly has NEVER been commented upon in the monomindeded media is hardly surprising and would no doubt be a source of no little glee to the original anonymous shade of whatever impish mind came up with the this linguistic dodge.
The Law, of course, being administered from St. Stephen’s Green, incidentally, is not the original Irish law, The Brehon Law.