In the wake of the republican and loyalist ceasefires in Northern Ireland the British and Irish governments finally produced their long awaited Framework document. The buzz phrase contained in the document is “parity of esteem” — but they don’t mean between the rich and the poor!
Some years ago, when the so-called constitutional parties in Northern Ireland failed yet again to work out a formula for their participation in the government of the province, some of the parties invited the British government, in concert with the government of the Republic of Ireland, to offer guidelines for a system of acceptable government.
The period since then has seen a number of summit meetings between the Prime Ministers of both countries and between the Northern Ireland Secretary of State, Patrick Mayhew, and Dick Spring, the Irish Deputy Prime Minister. In the background, advising, and being advised by their chiefs, a bevy of senior civil servants, constitutional lawyers and experts in political draughtsmanship laboured away over a very hot potato.
In early February, against the encouraging background of months of relative peace following the republican and loyalist cease-fires, the public waited expectantly for the promised Framework document. Peace, or at least the ending of slaughter on the streets, had created an atmosphere which younger people in places like Belfast had never experienced before, a marked drop in tension and fear brought people out at night; news was about a new-hoped-for prosperity as money appeared on the commercial horizon to underwrite the “peace dividend”.
Most surprising of all was the apparent transformation in the attitudes of the paramilitaries. Being the harbingers of peace, the republican and loyalist paramilitaries were given centre stage and, remarkably, the apologists for yesterday’s killers showed more understanding of the situation, and more tolerance of their opponents, than the allegedly pragmatic politicians had ever displayed. The big names in local politics, the political ratbags whose words built barricades, were pushed into the wings as it seemed yesterday’s hard-men could make the dream of peace a reality. Impatiently, people waited while the media speculated on the date for the eagerly-awaited Framework document.
It was at that point that the Murdoch newspaper, the Times (which, in pursuit of Murdoch's devious ambitions, has, over the least few years, played a sinister role in trying to undermine what passes for democracy in Britain) threw a bomb into the peace process.
Low-grade bible-basher
This took the form of selective leakings of the Framework document and was calculated to ensure that the latter was stillborn. That it was a malicious act of treachery against the British government by a well-placed Unionist in Britain became quickly clear, as did the identity of the person concerned. What was not commented on was the recklessness of the act which, if the less-pragmatic mob had acted predictably, could have resulted in an explosion of loyalist violence. But the streets in loyalist Ulster remained quiet while Paisley vied with his competitor colleague, Trimble, in an orgy of ignorance and bigotry that clearly repudiated their claim that they could work out a formula for coexistence with the nationalists.
Ironically, loyalism’s erstwhile hard-men urged reflection and restraint and the Lord Mayor of Belfast, Hugh Smyth, politically associated with the hard-men, displayed more dignity in his overtly working class demeanour and more realism in his comments than the respectable scions of Ulster Unionism and the holy hypocrites of the misnamed “Democratic” Unionist Party.
The Unionists had to make a rapid deployment into rank bigotry to avoid being outflanked by “Doctor” Paisley. He, of course, was bellowing “No!” and “Never!” at John Major and the Irish Prime Minister without leaving Belfast. With the purblind aggression and violent bigotry that has marked his rise from low-grade bible-bashing to gauleiter of his own Ku Klux Klan, he again backed himself into a corner of immovable intransigence, dragging the competing Unionist Party with him. The media had a field day and Gerry Adams probably dusted his portrait of Paisley, who has done more for Republicanism than a dozen IRA battalions.
When the Framework document finally did appear it wrapped a morsel of political comfort for everyone in complex but conciliatory prose. It did, however, spell out in clear and unequivocal language what the British government called “various political realities”. These include:
" the present reality, in fact and in international law, of the Union of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, affirmed in the Northern Ireland Constitution Act 1973. It is the clear position, as set out in the 1973 Act and the Anglo-Irish Agreement, that the current constitutional status of Northern Ireland as part of the United Kingdom will not change, save with the consent of a majority of the people of Northern Ireland clearly expressed. This guarantee is reaffirmed in the Joint Declaration ” (Frameworks for the Future, page 14).
Further guarantees from the British government and from the government of the Republic regarding Northern Ireland’s future as part of the United Kingdom are to be found throughout the document—indeed, the undertaking is repeated over and over again as it has been ad nauseam by successive British governments over the past quarter of a century—a guarantee accepted by the Irish government, the SDLP and even now, albeit indirectly and grudgingly, by Sinn Fein. But even as the British Prime Minister was handing out the document to the press. Paisley’s “democratic” Unionist Party was condemning it and challenging the probity of yet another British government. After quite a remarkable bout of speed reading, spokespersons for the Unionist Party were boxing themselves into the same corner as the DUP and, as the day wore on, the character of John Major was diminishing by the minute.
The Framework document does not, nor is it intended to, address any working class problems. When Thatcher and Fitzgerald signed the 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement, Thatcher said, with an honesty bordering on contempt for the people of Northern Ireland, that it was not concerned with facts but only with perceptions. Similarly, the complex and torturously repetitive language in this latest document is meant to soothe Unionist fears while assuring “parity of esteem” to nationalists.
Not indifferent
Normally, the day-to-day schemes for the political administration of capitalism are only of passing interest to socialists whose task remains the same in any nominally democratic organisation of the system. On the other hand, we can not be indifferent to the slaughter of our fellow-workers nor does political terrorism create the best climate for rational consideration of democratic change. Hence our interest in the Framework document and our hope that it will succeed in ending permanently the division and hatred which has plagued Northern Ireland since the inception of the state.
Clearly and unequivocally the Framework paper says its proposals are not going to be imposed on the province. It makes clear, also, that the local politicians are free to find among their own deliberations an alternative formula for government, always providing that such a formula meets the provisions for “parity of esteem” for all citizens set out in the Framework document. This latter provision is, in fact, the only matter that the document insists on and, in the light of this, the refusal of the Unionist parties even to discuss it implies that their objection is to this single inflexible obligation.
Even though its language is coaxing and reasonable, in its entirety, it seemed to us, there is a note of finality and Unionist politicians certainly have the right to feel apprehensive. It is their own behaviour, however, that could well trigger off the exasperation of the British government. We believe that whereas the Unionist political leaders seem to have learnt little, the small political parties that now speak for the loyalist paramilitaries are getting the message. Not only that but, unlike Paisley, Trimble and their political ilk, they see that message as the need to reach an acceptable accommodation with Nationalists and the southern government and they know that, if this is achieved, the northern state will endure for the foreseeable future and the concept of a unitary state will be overridden by reciprocal arrangements between north and south.
In such a situation it is easy to discern the possibility of those workers who support Ulster nationalism, as well as those who support Irish nationalism, coming to the realisation that nationalism does not offer any solution to our common working class problems and that, while you can have “parity of esteem” between catholics and protestants, or unionists and nationalists, there can be no parity of esteem between the capitalist class, who own wealth, and the wage workers who produce that wealth.
Richard Montague
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