I am unable to imagine how this Bill can be made to work in any practical way. In my opinion it is a theoretical legalistic approach to the problem of bringing violence in the North of Ireland to an end. Attempts to operate it can only damage our institutions and possibly bring humiliation upon us. To resolve this problem we, in Fianna Fáil, in a recent statement recommended that a court for the whole island be set up with proper guarantees for the rights of all the people. This can be the first step in the process of bringing about acceptable order and restoring peace in the North.
The first major breach of law in this century occurred in 1912 in north-east Ireland when a minority there prevented the implementation of home rule in Ireland and compelled Britain to give way by inciting a mutiny in the British Army. This was followed in 1914 by the illegal importation of arms into the North of Ireland by the Protestant Volunteers while British law stood by and thus made Britain a party to illegality.
It was this disregard by Britain for any kind of law in Ireland and the injustice of it towards the nationalist population that drove English liberals, like the late Erskine Childers, senior, to engage in similar activities on behalf of the less-favoured Irish. Illegality began under British law in Ireland and can be seen to have continued in the North under British authority after 1921. We have seen repetitions of the same kind of illegality erupting in the North, frequently with the connivance of the forces of law and order in pogroms against the minority there in 1922, 1935 and 1969.
The advent of television exposed the true nature of violence, illegal and institutional, in the North of Ireland. Subsequent events brought about the suspension of Stormont and the negotiations resulting in the Executive experiment in 1974. Unfortunately, as we are only too well aware, violence had taken root on all sides principally because the original illegality permitted in Ireland under British law was never dealt with and exists yet. There have been many efforts to bring about a political settlement in the North but all sides on this House have come to appreciate that militant elements on one side or the other can be most effective in preventing agreement as can political intransigence.
We in Fianna Fáil have called consistently for an end to violence on all sides so that a political settlement can be worked out in an atmosphere of peace. Our record in this respect is both good and consistent but good political efforts have, as in the past, been frustrated and brought to naught. However, positive political endeavour must be pursued despite the setbacks of recent years.
The Sunningdale Agreement, of which this Bill is an unfinished leftover, was a good effort towards creating stable and acceptable political institutions in Northern Ireland. Unfortunately, though, at Sunningdale it was not found possible to reach agreement on security and policing. That problem was sidetracked into a commission in the way that difficult political problems often are. The commission reported in 1974 after extreme loyalists had brought down the Northern Executive. The destruction of the Sunningdale effort after only eight months was another example of British failure to be seen to support the rule of law. In this case illegal action by extremists defined Britain and succeeded. As a result, moderate politicians, both nationalist and unionist, who had had the courage to compromise and attempt a worthwhile experiment were let down by Britain and many of them, especially on the unionist side, have since left public life.
If the Northern Executive had been able to continue its role and if the findings of the Law Commission had been the subject of evaluation by the parties involved directly, I believe that their judgment would have ensured the emergence of a realistic understanding of the basic problem of security and policing. In the event neither the views of the representatives of the minority in the North nor of Fianna Fáil here were sought. Consequently, we have before us now what we regard as an impractical Bill which is taking up the time of the Dáil.
It is inappropriate to try to deal with the problem of violence and security by way of a Bill of this kind, a Bill that cannot be effective. Also, it would be wrong to ask the security institutions of our sovreign State to engage in a legal involvement of this kind. I say this because of the unstable, politically unacceptable position that exists in the North. I consider the Bill to be even more undesirable in a situation where political elements there are refusing to come to terms with one another.
The Government are asking the Dáil to involve our Garda and Defence Forces with British forces which this State is at the moment charging before the International Court on Human Rights. The Government are asking this at a time when the British have admitted that some of their military personnel are being investigated for, allegedly, planting evidence on arrested persons in the North. I submit that such involvement on our part would bring our institutions into disrepute. We have put forward an alternative solution to this problem which, if it were accepted and put into operation, should help to bring to an end violence in Northern Ireland. I appreciate fully some of the arguments that have been put in relation to this question but as I understand the position we are the sovereign authority for the Twenty-six Counties and Britain is the sovereign authority, as recognised internationally, for the area of the United Kingdom. Therefore, it is within the power and the competence of the British Government to enact any legislation they wish relative to the area of the Six Counties of Northern Ireland. It is almost wholly in the North of Ireland that the violence is taking place. While I would support any practical and, of course, constitutional means to help to bring violence to an end, I would submit that so far as the Republic is concerned the means for dealing with illegal elements and subversives, as contained in the Offences Against the State (Amendment) Act, 1972, go further than any democratic conmunity has gone in this regard, certainly than any I know that is as democratic as our State is. I might add that the measures contained in that Act go further than anything that has been adopted in Britain.
The seeds of violence arise from the undemocratic situation that was created in Northern Ireland and they continue to thrive there. I believe that one of the solutions is to convince intransigent politicians that they must sit down together with their fellow elected representatives and agree to create acceptable institutions. I also believe that this can be done without the surrender by anyone on any side of aspirations or traditions. I believe that there is an obligation on people, politically elected, to represent the Six County area of Northern Ireland, to provide structures that can be, in reason, supported by all elements of the population that live in that area.
Before the adjournment of this debate last Thursday I said—I would like to repeat it now—that the first section of the statement made by my party on Northern Ireland totally rejected the use of force as a means of achieving unity. All of us know that until there is an end to violence there can be little hope of achieving reconciliation on this island. I totally repudiate the violent deeds that are being committed in the name of Ireland. Those who have committed these acts have no mandate. I believe that those who support and encourage them have equal responsibility with the participants. There can be no benefit to Ireland from such brutal and inhuman actions causing similar and even more inhuman actions such as we have seen in recent years.
I should like to repeat something I said before the Adjournment last week, that the statement on the northern situation issued by my party recently has been the subject of misrepresentation and hasty judgment. When Deputy Harte spoke last Thursday he said that Fianna Fáil had called on Britain to withdraw from Northern Ireland. He also said that Fianna Fáil had called for a declaration of intent by Britain to withdraw. If the Deputy was referring to the statement issued by Fianna Fáil, that statement did not call for British withdrawal nor did it call for a declaration of intent. The word "intent" was not used in our statement. In my opinion, having experience of a very deep and personal nature, going back over the past eight or nine years, of the Northern situation and going back much further than that to my childhood, when I was in Belfast during a pogrom in that city, and certainly in the light of my assessment of what can make people react, there can be in certain circumstances connotations of threat in the word "intent", whereas the word "commitment" used in the document issued by my party can be seen by reasonable people as an undertaking or a promise to fulfil a moral obligation.
I believe our recent statement can be seen to be consistent with a statement by Mr. de Valera in this House in 1949. I should like to quote from Volume 115 of the Official Report of the 10th May, 1949, column 813. The debate was on Protest Against Partition. Mr. de Valera, in the course of his speech, said:
If this thing——
meaning partition
——is to be ended peacefully it should be ended by British action to start with. Britain has done this thing and Britain ought to undo it. They have the power to do it. If they really want to, they can tell this minority in our country, that is not a fifth of the population of this country and not a fiftieth of the population of Britain, "We are not going to support you in your claim for privilege. We are not going to permit the small minority of the two peoples to continue to set the two peoples by the ears and to stir up and continue the old antagonisms between them."
Mr. de Valera went on later in his speech to say:
I tried in my time to secure from a British Prime Minister speaking for the British Government and the British people a declaration to the effect that they wanted this Partition of our country to end: that they desired it to end: that they would use all their good offices to bring it to an end, and they would use their influence to bring it to an end. If they were sincere a declaration of that sort would not be too much to expect. We have never got that.
So far, I have heard very few people except within Fianna Fáil discussing our statement in context and on its merits. Coalition spokesmen should study the statement carefully and in an unbiased way before they contribute to the debate on this Bill. If not, I fear they may run the risk of becoming politically irrelevant. They should seek better advice than they appear to be getting from the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs. What has happened in the past few weeks in regard to our statement is that some politicians have been so blinded by their prejudices that they are prepared to use any means to discredit Fianna Fáil. It is prejudice of this kind which perhaps blinds Coalition politicians to the realities of Irish politics.
The Minister for Posts and Telegraphs could not get to the Press quickly enough to say that our statement put Fianna Fáil in line with the Provisional IRA. I read in a newspaper that statement the day after our statement was issued, and in the Dáil last Thursday the Minister said that Deputy Lynch's recent statement, according to Mr. Gerry Fitt, had placed Fianna Fáil in the Provisional camp. The Minister conceded that Mr. Fitt's reaction might have been too emotional. How right the Minister was. Even the best of us can lose our heads at times. When the Minister spoke on Thursday he quoted from the transcript of a radio interview I had with Radio Éireann. The Minister seemed to think that there was something inconsistent about what I had said and what now appears in our statement.
Those of us who have any experience of being interviewed know that it is the practice of radio interviewers to put difficult questions to the interviewee and, of course, it is the duty of any person being interviewed to behave with prudence and not to allow himself to be trapped into saying something he ought not to say, especially if it happens to relate to anything like the tension-filled atmosphere of the North of Ireland. On that occasion, as the Minister quoted, I was asked if I favoured a British statement of intent to withdraw from Northern Ireland. Apart from the obvious fact that off the cuff, out of context statements can do damage, the date of that interview was 9th September last. As I am sure anyone who reflects will recall, during the previous three days there had been very crucial meetings between paramilitary groups and the Loyalist Convention parties in the North of Ireland. The possible, though only faintly possible, success of the Convention was at stake. An irresponsible or foolish remark could have done harm in the emotion-filled atmosphere of that time.
In addition, some months before, I had advised, and if my recollection is correct I had stated publicly, that the Convention parties should be left to themselves to see if they could come to agreement. I had also recommended the end of October as the best time to issue an up-dated statement of Fianna Fáil's attitude towards the Northern situation.
We all know, goodness knows we have had to learn the hard way, that foolish talk engaged in here and outside this House in different parts of the country can do damage. I have side on a number of occasions that it is very easy to talk if you are far from the North, perhaps to talk at the expense of some unfortunate person's life. On the other hand, a time comes when a serious obligation rests on people, particularly those elected. Many of us in the past few years have done everything we could and have talked to as many people as were willing to talk to us in order to try to calm the situation in the North of Ireland and bring people to agreement, have made efforts, not entirely because we here may happen to speak frequently of an ideal, but because of common humanity, because of the injustice to people on both sides of the Northern divide, those who do not want to be engaged in and dragged into conflict, who do not want to lose their lives, as lives are being lost there—it is because of that situation that at times it is necessary to speak in the hope that someone will listen and in the hope that those listening will believe one is trying to be responsible and trying to fulfil a serious obligation. When the attitudes in the Convention were clear and before the issue was sent to the British Parliament, we believed that the Opposition here should make known their attitude and views quite clearly; sometimes the Government are not free to talk.
The drafting of our statement commenced much earlier than people think and on the occasion of the interview on 9th September last I was not prepared to allow the interview to lead me into premature statements regarding the attitude of Fianna Fáil towards the Northern situation. To me the Fianna Fáil document is a clearly thought-out statement, consistent with the aims and ideals of our party. It represents a general consensus of the thinking of the front bench and of our parliamentary party. A good deal of time was given to discussing it and, while there was healthy discussion, there was no basic or fundamental disagreement on our statement. There was complete agreement on the need for clarification of our attitude, particularly in the light of the serious disagreement emerging from the Convention—because that disagreement I believe—and most of my colleagues share this belief—can have very serious consequences not alone for the minority and the majority in the Six Counties but also for ourselves and for the people of Britain.
There was agreement in our front bench that Britain, with whom the final decision rests because she has the authority with regard to the North of Ireland—whether we like it or not —should be left under no illusion regarding our attitude towards the Northern problem. I do not wish to take up too much time in the House over a statement issued by us but sometimes one finds oneself in a situation where it is necessary to clear up confusion. There was some difficulty due to a by-election in Mayo. The timing of our statement related to the Convention and was intended to be issued at that time. If I remember correctly, that tentative decision was taken long before a vacancy arose in the constituency of West Mayo. However, the by-election made it difficult to communicate in advance, which one likes to do, and in this case the final draft was not passed until the afternoon on which the statement was made public. Perhaps because of those circumstances, some of those who spoke too hastily on radio or to the Press may be excused. Others tried to make as much mischief and confusion as possible for political motives.
My party leader has referred to efforts to compare this party— which represents almost the entire Opposition here at the present time—as being, as some foolish people have suggested, on the side of or in line with the so-called Provisional IRA. Deputy Lynch has said that this should be treated with the contempt it deserves. I have lived in Ireland for a long time and I know the foolish things people can believe.
To me it is inconceivable that anybody would attempt, as has been done in the past few weeks by some elements in the community, to equate this party with any of the militant elements who are preventing political agreement and progress, not alone in the Six Counties but throughout the land. It is those violent elements, who believe they have the right to be a law unto themselves, who are blocking the progress of this nation, that is of all the people of Ireland. Whatever may be the political fortunes of the various political parties, for the sake of the people who live in the whole of Ireland, I hope at least those who are involved in constitutional politics in the Twenty-six Counties will refrain from mischief-making which could have very serious consequences for other people who live in the North, because if people began to believe that a huge constitutional party like the present Opposition party had anything to do with the sort of thing that is going on, not only in Northern Ireland but in Britain, the consequences could be serious.
I have said that we believe there would be an obligation on us to make things clear in relation to the situation in the North in the light of the experience since August, 1969, to go back reasonably far. So far as we in Fianna Fáil are concerned, the position as we see it now is as follows: during this present year, tremendous efforts to reach political agreement have been made by the hard-pressed representatives of the minority within the Six Counties; intransigence and fear—unwarranted fear but fear nevertheless— amongst the majority in Northern Ireland have frustrated the best efforts of those elected politicians who were trying to reach agreement. Now we see what amounts to total intransigence emerging from what is described as the loyalist or UUUC side of the Northern Convention. The issue is now going from the Convention parties to the Westminster Parliament and it is at that point that we have felt obliged to make our attitude towards the Northern problem clear, to all British political parties, to the British Government and to British politicians who are elected on the island of Britain. If continuing intransigence means that there can be no hope of a political settlement between Northern political elements, then we have the right and the obligation, I believe, to bring the original infringement of democratic rights in Ireland into open debate, not in order to frighten anybody but in order to make some effort to break this log-jam which is preventing the sanity of political agreement.
The problem of Northern Ireland itself stems from the original wrong to which Britain was and is a party. In that sense, it is obvious where the solution lies, and I am not talking about sudden withdrawals or any of the kind of things that people try to frighten people with. The reason an open debate on this question is necessary and can be useful at this point is that things have changed since 1921. In 1914 and subsequently, I believe that it suited British interests, and probably her strategic position, to be a party to the unnatural and undemocratic division of Ireland which gave permanent electoral power to Unionists in the north-east. I have said before and I have made no secret of my views, even in talking to Northerners of all points of view, that it is a fallacy to talk about majority right and democratic right in a situation in which the original majority was created by drawing a border around the Six Counties, instead of nine, ten, 12 or 15, and I have said on occasions to some of these people that if they had had the sense of discipline and the common sense to have treated the national minority which is part of the national majority within the Six Counties in the same way as they themselves would have liked to have been treated in a united Ireland, if such a thing existed, the Northern problem would have ceased to have been a problem long ago.
Unfortunately, that sort of action was not taken and we still have the problem to which speakers on both sides of the House referred, of unreasonable fear and suspicion. We still have the situation in which there is a vested interest virtually, a political vested interest, amongst Northern Unionists and Loyalist politicians to persuade their following that there is a threat of some kind from what they call the South. All of us know that no elected representative of this part of Ireland supports violence or is prepared to support violence. Yet one finds oneself from time to time in the situation in which it can take literally hours on end to persuade somebody that things are as they are here and not as they believe them to be.
However, I am speaking mainly of the change that has taken place since 1921. I believe that today in the mid-seventies it no longer suits Britain to bear responsibility for the Partition of Ireland. On the contrary, her immediate and long-term interests would be much better served by encouraging an end to division. We believe that if Britain does that it will help people who are in entrenched positions in the Six Counties, particularly heavily populated loyalist areas and the politicians representing people in those areas, to take a fresh and more normal look at the situation in what, after all, is for them and for us a native land.
At this point I believe we are right to make our attitude clear, not in any forceful way but in the normal, political democratic way. If we were to deny our own aims and aspirations which are peaceful ones because elements that have no right to engage in physical force are doing so we would be guilty of cowardice. We must try to get Britain to make it clear to northern politicians that she no longer needs to have people in the northern part of Ireland claiming that part of Ireland for Britain. We are trying to look a little ahead and get some intelligent political thinking and planning going and get into a dialogue, if possible, with politicians, elected personnel of the Unionist tradition.
One can talk indefinitely and make condemnations of violence. It does not seem to make much difference: perhaps some of us are listened to. From experience we have seen that violence begets violence and if people take the right to kill into their own hands they are automatically causing other deaths because each action leads to a reaction. We have seen inhumanity and barbarism. All I can say to these people is: you cannot support inhuman action and then hope to be human again next week, or next year.
Of the Bill itself I would say that attempting to patch up the rule of British law in Northern Ireland without a quid pro quo which would put the problem where it has always belonged, namely, in the context of the whole island of Ireland, will not only fail for the same reasons that Stormont failed but I believe it will further confuse the political process necessary to reconciliation. I think it would thus aggravate the festering wound of political instability that exists in the North. This Bill may in the long run risk increasing terrorism possibly including a spill over into the South because of its unworkability and its failure to come to terms with the need for a realistic, legal solution for the whole of this island.
The Leader of our party has put forward an alternative. I think that alternative should be explored if only in the light of the fact that this Opposition Party has said that it genuinely believes that this Bill is not the way to go about the job. The alternative should be considered by the Government despite the fact that the suggestion has come from the Opposition side of the House.