Better Life for All Campaign has attracted 300000 signatures North. But there is all the difference between getting people to sign a piece of paper and getting them to do When campaign brought onto the streets the tens of thousands who have marched on H Block, for "Brits out', or even behind Orange banners? It never has. Even in Britain, where the campaign is officially backed by the TUC, only 200 took part in the last march.
Or we can look at this question way. elections the party standing 'Better Life' ticket - Official Sinn Fein - received 4,000 votes for two candidates; the single *Brits candidate, Bernadette McAliskey, got 34,000 votes.
The reason for this is illustrated by a conversation I had when Socialis 'Better unlike marches, had been given permission to march in Trafalgar Square. press officer at the Department of the Environment said to me: they to do with Northern Ireland, that lot?" And then said that permission had been given because the march was 'non-controversial'.
But if something in the North of Ireland is non-controversial it is also irrelevant. And 'Better Life' demands for civil rights irrelevant because the answer to thos. demands has been given. It was giyen in August 1969 when the Loyalists attacked Catholic areas in Belfast, in European the Out' The 'Oh, are - the - are intro"THE greatest the North of Ireland immediately! That was the of the debate. for national independence? True, the IRA is very Westminster would suggest that there has been IRA and activity - in particular its campaign of bombing commercial targets and its tit-for-tat response to the sectarian and killings by the right-wing Unionist organisations helped to re-establish night-wing Unionism very political force working class.
The IRA, in my opinion, would do more to further the cause of the Irish people by ending its campaign than by continuing it. At the present it is a cover which military, the RUC and the Unionist right wing are able violence.
In condemning the policy of the IRA I am in no military repression which is place there. opposed that since the very start. But just to withdraw the Army and leave all else as it is will not constructive change whole. conditions in Northern Ireland by which the working drawn together in unity, in action, in struggle for common objectives and common demands. has There is no other basis on which we is can create the kind of mass movement which will be required in Ireland as a It whole if we are to end British rule there.
Northern Ireland can struggles building up from below in the context of the social and economic crisis which bedevils all the people of Northern Ireland.
The issue in the last ten years ha en how much effort the right win and the British behind them had to put in to keep that unity from growing and developing. us is how we can get involved in action alongside Irish workers in that real class.
North of Ireland.
It is my firm belief that the working class in the North of Ireland, as a whole; in its majority, can be won for freedom. of len it is ende united freedom. When lt 15 working class will be Ireland's surest weapon; far more important for the much. stronger than likes to admit. But even a dead.
sectarian may that has and cement as the main in the Protestant continue against Britain the that to hide their Ireland now.
democracy in. • way supporting the taking That's Communists have means of lead to any in Ireland as a Our first task must be to win the people can be for that altering the those independence shifted And even a casual visitor to broken putting The issue for working class struggle in the that united have to be.
Socialist Challenge 9 August 1979 struggle against British imperialism than a few hundred members of the Provisional IRA few shops blown up in the centre of Belfast, few hundred soldiers shot Significant though those figures appear to be it is a cost imperialism is perfectly happy to bear if it means the Irish people remain disunited and if it means the same exploitation of the labour • power of workers in the North of Ireland can And it is this reason — the view that the working class as a united political force can be Ireland's surest weapon - which is why the Communist Party doesn't simply say •Britain must withdraw To say we want the troops out means you also have to say, right at the beginning, we want no magical formula to solve the problem. Rather it is a providing the people of Northern Ireland, and through them the people of Ireland as a whole, with capacity by which they cal struggle effectively for that change, independence and unity. balance power Northern Ireland in favour of those forces urging unity and through that forces urging national When it is achieved, when we have • that balance opinion gly: of Unionist right-wing ideas over the mass of the working class in Northern Ireland, then we will be able to achieve the objective which we all want - the troops out. In that we are not merely saying that the Irish people have a right to rule themselves, we are also forward policies and programme of action which will enable them to exercise that right.
don't say that when sectarianism ends then the British Army can be withdrawn. What we say only when we begin to overcome sectarian divisions in the working class, only then will we be able to build - the workers of Ireland and the workers of Britain together the kind of force which will throw the troops out. For thrown out they will Page?