Opinion

Tom Kelly: Political unionism continues to lack generosity

Tom Kelly

Tom Kelly

Tom Kelly is an Irish News columnist with a background in politics and public relations. He is also a former member of the Policing Board.

Daíthí Mac Gabhann and his parents, pictured at Stormont last week, have led the campaign on organ and tissue donation. DUP intransigence means new legislation can't be passed by the Assembly. Picture by Hugh Russell
Daíthí Mac Gabhann and his parents, pictured at Stormont last week, have led the campaign on organ and tissue donation. DUP intransigence means new legislation can't be passed by the Assembly. Picture by Hugh Russell Daíthí Mac Gabhann and his parents, pictured at Stormont last week, have led the campaign on organ and tissue donation. DUP intransigence means new legislation can't be passed by the Assembly. Picture by Hugh Russell

AS anniversaries go, the Market Place Theatre in Armagh was not a bad venue to celebrate, especially given our first anniversary was at the Dachau concentration camp and our tenth was in what could only be described as the Bates Motel of the North Coast, where the proprietor seemed to lurk in every corner.

The Market Place was hosting The History of the Troubles (Accordin' to my Da). The play was fast paced and laugh out loud funny. The actors were superb. The characterisations were realistic. There was even some poignancy. The central premise was the impact of the Troubles on an ordinary man, Gerry Courtney.

And yet, I left the theatre feeling somewhat uncomfortable with my own ease at accepting (and enjoying) the overall narrative.

Gerry and his colleagues (bar one) were all from the Catholic/nationalist tradition. The storyline never meaningfully crossed over to the other side. The IRA almost seemed benign. The Brits and the loyalists were the bad guys. And although the senselessness of the Omagh Bomb was highlighted, other major atrocities were barely mentioned.

The backdrop to the narrative is Belfast. A city with an edge, case hardened by experience, divided by walls and emboldened by a strong sense of black humour.

The stage set included photos and pictures of some players and the public. The public presented as bystanders.

But while the public may not have been protagonists, they were participants in the narrative of the Troubles: forced to live through and bear witness to the horror of paramilitarism - IRA, UDA, UVF, INLA and Red Hand Commando; let down by security services who colluded with paramilitaries and who often acted outside the law.

Sometimes the public were forced to look away or turn a blind eye.

The play reminded this writer that sometimes we have to challenge the narratives which are easy for us to accept because they are our side of the story.

We must be bigger and better than this if there is to be an new Ireland comprised of equals between and within all communities and identities. There also needs to be a new honesty, especially about the scale and unjust nature of militant republicanism during the Troubles. Victims and their families may never get justice but they are entitled to the truth. That's a nettle yet to be grasped by many.

All that said, last week was a low point for political unionism. In an unedifying way, they played fast and loose with real lives – people on waiting lists for organ donations. The hypocrisy was rank. In the Stormont debate the DUP was strong on tea and sympathy. But as the saying goes, "Fine words butters no parsnips".

Nearly 200 people are agonisingly waiting on organ transplants in Northern Ireland – nine to 15 of them dying each year as they wait. The passing of legislation to which all parties including the DUP agreed should have been a no-brainer. It should have been compassionate politics at its best. Instead it was shameless and cheap bargaining at its worst.

Political unionism has struggled with generosity. Their political intransigence brought about the creation of Northern Ireland, a place which they gerrymandered by abandoning proportional representation. Similar blinkered intransigence reared its head again last week over the non-implementation of Daíthí's Law.

It was beyond ironic that the Assembly Commission (without the consent of Sinn Féin) passed the erection of a Northern Ireland commemorative stone.

No doubt Alliance and the SDLP regarded their consent as a gesture of political goodwill, though their timing was a monumental misjudgment against the backdrop of the DUP blocking tactics to thwart the passing of essential life saving legislation.

The DUP is the gift which keeps on giving to Sinn Féin. Momentary smugness over discomfort within nationalist and Alliance ranks over the Protocol won't last long. Reason will eventually prevail but as the late Seamus Heaney wrote, "The 'voice of sanity' is getting hoarse."