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BY ANY MEASURE in any democracy, it has been an extraordinary week in Ireland. The leader of one of the largest parties on the island, with some 344 elected representatives north and south, went into police custody to answer questions in relation to the murder of a woman in the 1970s.
Irish politicians from the three main parties have been hammering Gerry Adams over the death of Jean McConville and his wider role in The Troubles since he came into the Dáil in 2011. There is a not entirely facetious joke in politics that Enda Kenny’s standard response to a question on most matters posed by Gerry Adams is “Yeah, well, you were in the IRA.”
It is, perhaps, a good bottling up strategy to use against Sinn Féin. But we may now be seeing Adams’ long tenure coming to an end, and a new generation coming to the fore. For all the schadenfreude felt by those in traditional Irish political parties at seeing Adams sat in a jail cell, there could be bigger political headaches to come from the downfall of its old guard.
The chequered history of Sinn Féin, Gerry Adams and their relationship to the Provisional IRA during a conflict that claimed the lives of over 3,500 people and injured 50,000 more needs no retelling. The tragic story of Jean McConville, a single mother of ten ripped from her children, tortured, murdered and buried on a beach in Louth is a telling microcosm to the brutality of that conflict.
The past is a very difficult place to explore after a conflict in any country. Wounds are difficult to heal, and at best they scab over most of the time; waiting for some irritation to rip them open again. In some senses we were lucky to get the peace that we did in Northern Ireland after much trying and failing. In another way, it is a damn shame that we never got to the stage of agreeing to truth and reconciliation in the much celebrated South African fashion.
It has left too much room for too many mealy mouthed statements and left too many without the closure they deserve, let alone any sense of justice. The truth in Northern Ireland has been left to different communities to interpret as they will, and reconciliation is still one discussion of how many days a flag should fly over a particular building away from a riot.
But, what we got is what we’ve got. Men like Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness and their peers have come from violence to peaceful political construction. Most Irish and British politicians would have welcomed this with open arms as the express intention of the peace process in the late 1990s. About half of Sinn Féin’s representatives in the Northern Ireland Assembly served time in prison for IRA-related activities. A number of their Dáil representatives today share the same republican badge of honour.
With their success, however, has come a major political threat in the Republic. Sinn Féin has been rather good at increasing its footprint on the political landscape, and they look set to increase their share of the local electoral vote from 7.8 per cent in 2009 to over 20 per cent this time out. They are riding in relative close contention to Fianna Fáil and not a million miles behind Fine Gael in the polls of late.
Sinn Féin has been organising and working hard to increase its footprint in the south, and circumstances have conspired to provide them a breakthrough that seemed far-fetched a decade ago. They have been capitalising on the collapse of both Fianna Fáil and Labour, hoovering up traditionally working class and staunchly republican votes that FF in particular kept bottled up.
When Bertie Ahern famously said that he was a socialist, much to the delight of Joe Higgins, he was reflecting the broad church that was Fianna Fáil: A party that rubbed shoulders with the rich and famous, but that came from a republican background that was the bedrock of its early success. Unfortunately, working class republicans don’t have much time for a party that bailed out banks, cut the arse out of public spending to pay for it and then handed the economic keys of the country to foreigners.
The Labour Party claimed to be the shining white knight on the left, but contentions that they’ve lost out on every argument they put forward on their famous Tesco spoof, “Fine Gael: Every Little Hurts”, has killed them. They will be praying for an economic miracle to keep themselves in business after the next election, and it’s likely a lot of the old boys who brought them into government in 2011 will slink off into retirement in a fashion not dissimilar to much of the Fianna Fáil cabinet of Brian Cowen.
For all that 2011 was a landslide election Fine Gael, Labour and Fianna Fáil won about the same combined percentage of the vote overall that they had done in prior elections. We got a Fine Gael-Labour government, which is pretty much how Fine Gael gets into government in recent memory.
Now however, we’re seeing a potential big change as Sinn Féin beds itself down as a popular party with what they hope is a sustainable portion of the vote, at about a fifth to a quarter of ballots that will be cast. Their vote hasn’t always held up from polling to booth, but the theory goes that their hard work on the ground is paying dividends and they are speaking to a constituency on the left that feels abandoned.
The main problem that Sinn Féin has, many in Irish politics believe given how often they repeat it, is that they are led by a pack of former IRA heads who were caught up in nasty, nasty stuff.
What of Sinn Féin that is led by someone like Mary Lou McDonald? She has shown herself well able to be as mealy mouthed as her old guard counterparts, referring to the death of Jean McConville as a ‘killing’ rather than a ‘murder’; but at the end of the day, she was not involved in the troubles the way McGuinness or Adams or any of their lot were.
If Sinn Féin managed to turn their 20-25 per cent poll ratings into actual results, given their politics we could actually see a proper left wing appear. The Labour Party is not a proper left wing party, or at least it has not been able to deliver on the goals of working class people whilst having such a middle class base to try and pander to at the same time. Fianna Fáil is a broad church for the left to centre, as Fine Gael is for the centre to right; and both parties have swung between left and right wing policies as it has suited over the past decades.
Adams might be the last roadblock to Sinn Féin managing to uncork their potential to conquer the left wing, working class and republican ground in Irish politics. For many politicians who rely on this constituency to prop themselves up, they might stop ribbing Adams and wish that he stick around a bit longer so they can try and win back some of those votes for themselves.
Then again, perhaps a proper left-right divide in Irish politics wouldn’t be such a bad thing to get, rather than auction politics between a bunch of populists.
Aaron McKenna is a businessman and a columnist for TheJournal.ie. He is also involved in activism in his local area. You can find out more about him at aaronmckenna.com or follow him on Twitter @aaronmckenna. To read more columns by Aaron click here.
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Fair play to voxpro.
True but what are the two grinning idiots doing there?
Everywhere they seem to go there is a massive jobs announcement. They must be the luckiest lads in the world.
Yes Ted – they’re like the opposite of Jessica Fletcher …
Joseph they are the taoiseach and minister for jobs. They helped facilitate the new jobs and are no doubt enjoying the positive limelight that stories like this bring.
@seb.
I’d be pretty sure that they had feck all to do with it. Just jumping on the pre election bandwagon.
Bruton is the Minister for Gobs not Jobs.
How did they help facilitate the new jobs?
Kenny is saying let them eat cake the peasants.
@Joseph
Company is supported by Enterprise Ireland..Government run body. That’s how they helped facilitate the new jobs…
How exactly is it supported ? Who is looking after the Irish Water call center ? any ideas about that?
350 new jobs means a nice bit of extra tax revenue coming soon why else would the grinning idiots be there…
Would you ever cop on the only jobs they create is jobs for the boys
@Joseph
Enterprise Ireland have a number of funding mechanisms, potentially investing hundreds of thousands in the company and taking an equity stake in it. I’m not sure exactly what funding they are getting.
Honestly dude though, stick to the point. What has the Irish water call center got to do with this?
Any chance of a bit of balance Joseph? If you complain about the Govt not creating enough jobs, and then they are created through Govt-supported money then credit where it’s due.
Michael have you taken notice of what has been going on and reveled over the last 6 – 8 weeks. You want “balance”, I want these filthy corrupt parasites jailed.
@Joseph
But you have to admit you are being a bit biased on your argument here? I can understand your dislike of the current government but that shouldn’t come into this argument.
Chris in all honesty do you consider it “fair” what these people are doing to the general population in this country?
We are talking about one specific story hear. I don’t see any reason why need to bring up what “these people” are doing in general. My whole argument is that you look at this extremely positive piece of news for Cork and Ireland as a whole and try and see only the negatives. Regardless of you disagreeing with what the government are doing you have to at least recognise that this is a positive story and that like it or not a government body had a positive part to play in it.
To be honest Joe it worries me that there are people like you out there, probably trying to get into politics. I would happily endure another 10 years of austerity than have someone as narrowminded as you anywhere close to running the country
Yes Joseph, I follow all of that too. Today’s news though is fantastic for hundreds of families and there will be ancillary benefits to many others accruing from these job announcements. It’s annoying that every bloody positive news story has to be followed by endless negative comments on the present Govt. There are many other stories where you can give your opinion and it will be respected. But this news should only be commented on with optimism at the difference it will make to people. And a balanced agreement that yes, sometimes, this Govt. gets things right. It’s Friday, cheer up man.
Chris telling the truth is not always the most popular thing to do. I’d be far more worried about the people that are in politics now and what is being planned for our kids by these parasites.
The truth? Just out of interest, do you think the government should have more involvement in jobs creation or less? By the sounds of it you don’t think they do enough. What would you have them do differently? In general what would you do differently with regards to other issues?
We need a new constitution that reflects the needs of a modern secular democratic republic.
We need accountability and transparency in all public affairs.
Yippie, more jobs for Cork. You’ll all be moving down here soon!
Well done cork
Well done.Very good news.
Except for people living in countries that the outsourcing is taking jobs from of course. Remember the outcry when Aviva did the same thing? Nothing like good old fashioned hypocrisy
I was with Voxpro in the early years when they had a small office with a small team. Dan and Linda built that business from a small office with a handful if dedicated employees to what it is today. A true success in the current climate.
I take my hat off to them.
Good news on the economy/jobs and Adams arrested. Shinners must be ready to explode.
Very true tom. I often think that when I hear good news on the economy, shinners and populist socialists must be tearing their hair out because good news for Ireland is bad news for them.
Btw “explode” was an unintentional pun.
Sebastian – have you not heard? – all of these jobs are to scambridgers in Australia.
Hmm. If these jobs were not outsourced then better paid jobs would be created or maintained elsewhere. What is outsourcing really only taking higher paid jobs from somewhere else in the economy?
If they weren’t outsourced to an Irish company them they would be outsourced to Asia somewhere – so it’s still a good announcement.
L connors. That’s capitalism. Get over it.
Many companies will outsource particular aspects of their business for many reasons. Maybe they don’t have the skills, or the demand for a particular service would be infrequent and it wouldn’t be worth doing it in-house.
I’m not disputing that it’s not capitalism. Hardly a great jobs announcement though as outsourcing is just to replace other jobs. And these jobs would not be outsourced to Asia – as if that’s the case why is it not happening? It would be cheaper to do so and that option still exists.
Yes, but the option also exists to outsource to an Irish firm which is obviously well regarded and successful. The work could well be outsourced from overseas and would be new work coming into the country. It could also facilitate cost effective expansion for irish firms.
Stop being so negative.
L connors. Im not sure about the inner workings of this Company and how and what it outsources. However it is great news and for every one high end job created 4 or 5 other jobs are also created. They call it trickle down employment.
And minister Bruton and An Taoiseach can pop up in front of the cameras all they want and put on as many cheesy smiles as they want so long as big announcements like this keep happening.
L Connnors – the fact that Voxpro is creating 300 outsourcing jobs does not mean that 300 jobs are being lost elsewhere in Ireland.
The clients could be outside of Ireland
The services could be a result of increased demand that internal resources are unable to fulfill
I’ve tried saying this over and over in my head and it’s not intended as offensive…but how many of these jobs will go to the Irish? I know of a lot of similar companies in Ireland employing 75%+ foreign nationals
I’m sure that if an Irish person has the required language skills and qualifications they have as much chance as getting the job as the next person. Do you think there should be a quota?
They will go to who applies for them and so what if 75% go to them, irish people are probably above the jobs and won’t apply.
Not at all, a person should be qualified. As I said, I didn’t want it to be offensive. But when we see ’350 jobs created’ I just would like to know how many actually go to Irish nationals
I find that offensive tbh…I also don’t think its an issue and I’m surprised you think it is one
But why, the taxes go to irish people anyway. It’s not companies fault that Irish people are so thick and can’t speak other languages. Thousands of jobs would be filled if people got off there arses and learned a second language.
And by the way if you were in Australia or Europe would u liked to be viewed in the same man or you are summing up non irish nations.
I know u don’t mean it but…..
Same way you (what was meant)
I posted my response in the wrong place, it’s floating around somewhere here
Fair play boi’s .. Jobs for the boi’s
I’d say the taylors dummy on the right edged it. The suit on the left is a bit tight in the middle
At the rate they’re going we’ll have full employment by May 23rd. Amazing!
Wahoo, more call centre jobs for Cork
I realise how this might come across as offensive, was just a thought. Ted Crilly’s ‘not a racist’ video comes to mind. I’M SORRY INTERNET
Drop in the ocean to the 450 thousand unemployed.
Where’s Christopher with the negative spin on 350 new jobs? Ah, there you are, my little ray of sunshine.
If I said it was sunny outside, your next comment would be ‘They say it’ll rain tomorrow’.
Go out, get some air, see something beautiful, and then come back to us. There’s a good boy.
Job announcements like this sound great until you realize that the vast majority of the call center jobs are for native foreign language speakers only.
I don’t think job announcements should even make the headlines if 99% of Irish ”need not apply’.
These are ‘government’ created jobs.
Answering calls for irish water.
Electioneering at its finest.
350 new jobs and why am I reading lots and list of negative comments and bickering? This could have been 350,000 new jobs and some journal readers would still find something negative and have a moan.
have your say