By Kieran McDaid


A FOUR-year-old girl on her way to school clung to her mother as the Holy Cross dispute entered a second week.

Other little girls wore earphones to block out any noise which may have accompanied loyalist protests as they passed through the Glenbryn estate yesterday morning.

In the event, loyalist residents turned their backs in a silent protest as the girls made their way to school.

At the school, principal Anne Tanney greeted parents and children. “I am very relieved the children have been able to come in today without the same trauma as last week,” she said.

Mrs Tanney also appealed to anyone with influence in the community to help try to bring the protest at the school to an end.

Denise Donnelly, taking her daughter Paulette to school, also appealed for an end to the “blockade of the school”..

“We don’t mind verbal abuse but hopefully they will wise up and just stop this now,” she said.

Fr Aidan Troy, chairman of the school’s board of governors, said he was relieved to see a repetition of Friday’s peaceful protest but said he feared the protest would continue for a long time.

“I am worried we may be settling into a long haul of this and it will begin to resemble some kind of normality but I am not going to accept this as the norm,” he said.

“It will take a compromise , I don’t see any other way. Because the longer it goes on, the worse it will get.”

The loyalist protestors erupted into noise as the parents returned down the Ardoyne Road after leaving their children at school.

A cacophony of noise greeted them as loyalists blew klaxon horns, whistles, car horns and sirens. One group held up a huge banner at Hesketh Park reading ‘Walk of Shame’.

The same pattern occurred in the afternoon when protestors made noise and shouted abuse as the parents made their way to the school but fell silent as the children returned home.

Jim Potts, a key figure among the loyalist protesters insisted the protests would continue for the foreseeable future.

The Concerned Residents of Upper Ardoyne spokesman also indicated his group has called for a meeting with representatives at Holy Cross.

“We are trying to meet the board of governors at Holy Cross and we are waiting for an answer from them,” he claimed.

“We need to find out their views on this issue.”

Turning to yesterday’s tactics, Mr Potts said: “Anytime children are walking past from now on, we will be remaining quiet so they are not being traumatised. We will just focus on the parents rather than children and the protest will continue until such times as there is a resolution.”

Gerry Kelly, the Sinn Fein assembly member for north Belfast, insisted the law was against the loyalist residents.

“The European Convention of Human Rights puts the rights of children above the right to protest,” he said.

He also attacked the protesters for hurling abuse at parents as they returned from Holy Cross. “It’s all about not having a Catholic about the place,” he said.

SDLP north Belfast assembly member Alban Maginness said the stand-off had been scaled down but claimed a “belligerent” attitude still existed among loyalists.

Meanwhile, the secretary of state John Reid is expected to meet with two facilitators appointed by the loyalist residents of Glenbryn tonight to try to negotiate a solution to the impasse.

North Belfast MP Nigel Dodds today launched an initiative aimed at addressing the alienation felt by the unionist community.

His aim is to bring together unionist politicians, members of the Protestant churches and community workers in a forum to discuss problems such as poor housing, health and education.

“This initiative is designed to be inclusive and to draw together the various strands of unionism in a coherent way,” he said.

The situation was later debated in the assembly where a motion to respect the education rights of all schoolchildren in north Belfast was passed unanimously.

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