Sir Ninian,

Good morning!

As one who had reservations about your appointment I would like to welcome you as Chairman of Strand 2. Needless to say in our estimation Lord Carrington was never a real contender to you. I am sure your role will not be an easy one but there is always a price to be paid for something that is worth achieving. May I assure you of our goodwill.

In opening the submission of the Ulster Democratic Unionist Party, I would like to answer very briefly the questions "Why are we here"? and "Why was it possible for Strand 2 to commence so suddenly?"

The acceptance of HMG of the sub-Committee report of 10th June, including those aspects at present not universally agreed as the premise upon which they would base their entrance to and participation in Strand 2 cleared the way for us. No doubt you will have gathered that from what Sir Patrick said yesterday.

I want to base this submission by handling those fundamental aspects which I believe must be faced head-on if we are going to have any solution to our problems.

There can be absolutely no way forward until the things which have brought about the present situation in our Province are honestly faced. If both Governments are not prepared to take the necessary actions to deal with them they should at lease have the decency to put it on record so that we might all know where we stand.

There can be no slight of hand; no fudging; no papering over of cracks. Pious statements; affirmations about concern; promises of what we really want to do, are in fact no panacea for this terrifying spectre which confronts us all. I must be frank, brutally frank, for that is what the situation demands.

Issues must be raised even if they cut raw nerves. Dancing around the subject cannot aid us in finding a solution, and it is a solution that my colleagues and I seek.

I want to list those matters which Unionists see lie at the very heart of Ulster's agony and form the obstacle to good relations between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic. Mention has already been made of 1920. The 1920 Government of Ireland Act partitioned Ireland between the Unionist and Nationalist indigenous populations. The programme for ultimate conciliation was the compromise settlement of two Home Rule Parliaments on the Island. Ulster accepted the Act although it was not greeted with enthusiasm. Sinn Fein repudiated the settlement and the conciliation contained therein and demanded the complete withdrawal of Britain from Ireland. The fact of the matter is that successive Irish governments have refused to recognise the settlement. Not only have they refused to recognise it but have launched themselves in a determined campaign to undo it and destroy Northern Ireland as an integral part of the U.K. The Anti-Treaty leadership plummeted the South into Civil war and the scars of that terrible conflict are still to be seen in the body politic of the South. Through the determination of the Free State's Government, law and order was established although Kevin O'Higgins eventually paid with his life's blood for its establishment. The boundary dispute was settled in 1925 between the three heads of government when the Tripartite agreement was signed in an atmosphere of cordiality. The three Governments were and I quote "resolved mutually to aid one another in a spirit of neighbourly comradeship" and although the Council of Ireland, to which only Northern Ireland had appointed its members, was abolished, the Free State and Northern Ireland agreed to meet "together as and when necessary for the purpose of considering matters of common interest". We might well ask ourselves what went wrong? The rise of DeValera's Fianna Fail Party brought about the collapse of any neighbourly comradeship of the two Governments sitting down together to discuss matters of common interest. In office DeValera demonstrated total contempt for mutual respect by repudiating all agreements between the U.K. and the Free State. British-Irish history during this period is littered with Dublin's repudiation of its most solemn obligations. The 1938 Ports Agreement was a last effort to reach an agreement with the South. Once again Dublin turned her back on her obligations by declaring neutrality.

The 1937 Constitution was to be DeValera's crown in Irish politics.

A general election was due to be held before January 1938. Fianna Fail's prospects were not as bright as they had been in 1933 and DeValera decided to hold the general election and the referendum on the Constitution on the same day, in the hope that voters who supported the new Constitution would also vote Fianna Fail. He linked the Constitution closely in the public mind not only with Fianna Fail but with the Church, whose support it was essential to enlist.

The election was held on 1 July 1937. Sixty-five percent of the population voted on the Constitution, and of these 57 percent voted in favour of its enactment. It was approved by 685,105 votes for, to 526,945 against. Only 45 percent of those who voted, however, also cast their vote for Fianna Fail. The Party's strength was reduced to 69 seats out of a 138-strong Dail.

It was still the largest party, and although it had lost its overall majority, it again formed a government, with Labour support. The Constitution came into force on 29 September 1937.

DeValera claimed his Constitution had been passed by a majority of the Irish people. It had not been passed by a majority of Irish people – it had been passed by a narrow majority of Irish people in the South and by nobody in the North. Yet it is that iniquitous Constitution's claim that the present Irish Government and the SDLP want still to fasten around our necks. The Constitution laid claim to territorial jurisdiction over Northern Ireland and still claims territorial jurisdiction over Northern Ireland repudiating all past agreements and obligations. And in the ruling of the Supreme Court in Dublin it is a "constitutional imperative" laid upon whatever government is in power. We have experienced already in this room what that constitutional imperative leads to and no doubt if there is no reform of that constitution we will see it demonstrated over and over again.

In 1938 DeValera said to Neville Chamberlain; the P.M. of HMG. –

"in my view the coercion of Northern Ireland would in all circumstances be justifiable"

The philosophy which DeValera had given his allegiance to, is best spelt out in his own words:–

"All sections and classes within the nation, whatever their political opinions, are entitled to equal rights as citizens and fair play; but no section, north and south, east and west, is entitled to secede from this nation, and secession ought not to be tolerated and, if it can be prevented, ought to be prevented, and on no account whatever should the national consent be given to it."

It is that philosophy of Irish nationalism which has been put forward by the present Irish Government and the SDLP and it is that philosophy that we as Unionists abominate and repudiate.

In 1939 DeValera called Mussolini to his aid in defence of his Nationalism.

"There is a certain amount of truth ... in that contention (that national territories change from time to time); but, as was said by Signor Mussolini in a famous letter which he wrote, I think it was last September or October, that there is something about the boundaries that seem to be drawn by the hand of the Almighty which is very different from the boundaries that are drawn by ink upon a map: frontiers traced with ink ... can be modified. It is quite another thing when the frontiers were traced by Providence."

There can be no peace between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic until this illegal, criminal, and immoral claim is given up. Unilaterally made, it must be unilaterally withdrawn. Dublin must recognise Ulster's right to self-determination. It must be prepared to spell out Northern Ireland's status as an integral part of the U.K. both de facto and de jure – this is the primary pre-requisite for any future to these talks. If the Irish Republic is not prepared to make the necessary changes let them say so in plain language. Let us hear no more about these offensive articles being on the table but let us hear a clear expression of determination to get rid of a claim which continues to inspire Republican violence in Northern Ireland. Let them demonstrate that the people which they lead control their constitution, and that their constitution does not control them. Reform of their constitution in this vital matter must be without pre-condition on the basis of goodwill and respect for the self-determination of Northern Ireland. The prospect of amendments to Articles 2 & 3 is not going to buy Dublin's involvement in some future package of agreement on the internal affairs of Northern Ireland. As I said in the Strand 3 meeting "for a thief to demand compensation for returning his ill-gotten gain is the height of lunacy".

While the short-hand reference for the territorial claim is "Articles 2 & 3" we understand that change may be necessary in the Preamble to the Irish Constitution and Articles 1,2,3,6 and 9. Any changes in the Constitution must

(a) eliminate the Republic's claim to Northern Ireland;

(b) obtain recognition by the Republic of the "people of Northern Ireland";

(c) obtain recognition from the Irish Republic of Northern Ireland's right to self-determination;

(d) formalise the Irish Republic's acknowledgement of two traditions on the Island.

Ultimately such a constitutional change must be the decision of the Government and people of the Irish Republic so the delegation from Dublin has the key to progress. They can continue to live the lie that they have jurisdiction over Northern Ireland or they can open the door to a new chapter in relations between our two peoples. I trust that they can meet this challenge. Unionists stand ready to respond to the new mood that would then be created.

Let me make it perfectly clear that these talks are not and cannot be about any re-negotiation of the Union. Both Secretaries of State have made that crystal clear. The reference to everything on the table has its limitations. Mr Brooke affirmation on 9 January 1989 that the talks were "without dilution of U.K. Sovereignty or the status of Northern Ireland as part of the U.K." and the present Secretary of State's assertion that "HMG. would rise from the table still re-affirming that Northern Ireland would remain part of the U.K. as long as the majority there wished it" clarifies that fact.

In Strand 1 we were not asked to devise a system of government for a Northern Ireland outside the U.K. but rather for a Northern Ireland as an integral part of the U.K. As this strand has for its purpose to discuss what relationships such a structure would have with the Dublin Government the matter of the Union cannot be in question.

The Anglo Irish Agreement is a real obstacle to the establishment of good neighbourliness on the Island of Ireland between North and South. All the platitudes from

Dublin and from the SDLP that the Anglo Irish Agreement is something to be lauded and praised and adhered to, reeks of hypocrisy when the background to, and the production of the Anglo Irish Agreement is studied.

They tell us they are so eager to consult with us yet when the Anglo Irish Agreement was being spawned, the majority population in the North, who were going to be most affected by its operation were deliberately kept in the dark. It was a plan to sell the Unionists of Ulster like cattle on the hoof to their traditional enemies. Both Governments should be utterly ashamed at the disgraceful connivances. One has only to read Garret Fitzgerald's so-called biography to see the blatant perfidy which activated members of both the British and Irish Governments to contrive a way to achieve the doing of a great wrong to the Unionist people.

Some extracts of Fitzgerald's are very revealing:

(a) "Our initiative might founder very quickly if we did not at least indicate a possibility of movement on Articles 2 and 3 in return for a major package involving movement in the direction of joint authority."

(b) "We had to change the police and judicial systems in Northern Ireland if we were to deal with this spreading alienation problem."

(c) "November 18, Fitzgerald/Thatcher meeting at Chequers. There Fitzgerald warned the Prime Minister that an, "agreement would enable me to achieve amendments to Articles 2 and 3". Agreement on Fitzgerald's programme that would produce a, "system of government in Northern Ireland in which we would be playing a part." Joint authority was explicitly the basis for Irish government involvement in any negotiations. The British response was to limit the Republic of Ireland to contributions, and consultations on a institutionalised base. If the Irish government would agree to limited form of joint authority the British government would drop the devolution element."

(d) "Peter Barry warned of the consequences for the survival of the SDLP and thus for stability throughout Ireland"

(e) "January 15, John Hume and Garrett Fitzgerald met, before John Hume was to meet Mrs Thatcher in London.

"He had recently become more confident that the SDLP could hold its own against Sinn Fein in the May elections, but we urged him not to present himself as over-confident about this and thus seeming to write off the Sinn Fein threat, for it was the perceived menace of the SDLP losing ground to Sinn Fein that had provided in the first instance the underlying logic of the agreement we were seeking with the British government."

(f) "Eighteen days after the signing of the Agreement he met Mrs Thatcher at a European Council meeting. She was visibly distressed at the accusations of treachery and the resignation of Ian Gow. Fitzgerald attempted to assure her that the purpose of the Agreement was being achieved. He said:

"The Agreement had already caused a visible swing from Sinn Fein towards SDLP, after all it had been one of its main purposes."

So much for the Anglo Irish Agreement's high flying objectives as paraded by Dublin, the SDLP and others. It was according to one of its principle architects in the main a plan to buttress up the SDLP and to try to buy off Sinn Fein at the price of betrayal of the Unionists. Such a scheme could never work and it is not working and will not work. If it were working the Dublin government and the British government would never have had us at the table today. But the plan to face down the Unionists did not and cannot succeed. You may sow your dragons teeth but you will reap a dire and indescribable harvest: coercion cannot succeed. The claims of the Agreement to bring peace, stability and reconciliation have been hurled back in your teeth by a multitude of voices – The voices of the spilt blood of the murdered – The voices of bereaved souls in their unending night of agony – The voices of fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, husbands and wives and children torn from their loved ones. The voices of the legless, armless, eyeless, hearingless maimed who are pushed about in their wheel chairs or lie in unresting beds mere vegetables as far as real living is concerned. Surely the time has come for us to heed these voices and turn from this path which cannot ever achieve its boasted ends. It is a delusion. It is a mad nightmare and its end is too horrible and hideous to even contemplate, let alone describe.

Those who have in their power the ability to stop it ought to stop it now. There can be a new beginning but only if we face up to the wrongs which this agreement has multiplied.

The Article No. 1 of the Agreement states:–

The Two Governments:

(a) affirm that any change in the status of Northern Ireland would only come about with the consent of a majority of the people of Northern Ireland:

(b) recognise that the present wish of a majority of the people of Northern Ireland is for no change in the status of Northern Ireland;

(c) declare that, if in the future a majority of the people of Northern Ireland clearly wish for, and formally consent to, the establishment of a united Ireland, they will introduce and support in the respective parliaments legislation to give effect to that wish.

The Article does not define the status of Northern Ireland as an integral part of the United Kingdom.

Neither does it define what size of a majority can put Northern Ireland forever under Dublin Rule.

Nor does it balance in terms of equality the power of say the Protestant majority if it were to seek a new arrangement for the constitutional position of Northern Ireland.

It discriminates in favour of a Roman Catholic majority only and promises both governments haste to give in to their wishes.

This is undemocratic, unfair and unsafe and indicates bias against the majority because of its religious beliefs.

It states a principle which has been guiding the conduct of Northern Ireland affairs under the Anglo Irish Agreement. What's good for a Roman Catholic majority is not good for a Protestant majority.

For eg. a Roman Catholic majority can take us into a United Ireland – a majority of one! but yet Northern Ireland cannot have majority rule. In this very building majority rule was handed over to Rhodesia and yet here today at the tables there are those who would forbid it to Northern Ireland.

There is much talk about the protection of the minority of Roman Catholics in Northern Ireland but not a word about the protection there would be for Protestants if a majority could be found to vote the North under Dublin rule. 80% of the Protestant population since the 26 Counties left the U.K. has gone. Is it any wonder that the Protestants of Northern Ireland rightly dread Dublin rule?

There are other matters which I will but mention which are obstacles to good neighbourliness between North and South.

There is the vexed question of extradition which the Dublin government has failed to grasp.

Cross border relationships have been constantly soiled by the Irish Government's deliberate refusal to extradite those people who are wanted in Northern Ireland and the United Kingdom for terrorist offences. The list of IRA men freed in the Irish Republic, yet wanted in the United Kingdom, continually grows despite claims and promises that the law will be reformed.

1. February 1990 Dermot Finucane and James Pious Clarke, convicted IRA murderers who escaped from the Maze Prison were released by the Irish Supreme Court on the spurious judgment that if returned to the Maze they would be "assaulted or injured". Such allegations do much to destroy any hope of good cross-community and cross-border relations.

2. 1990 Owen Carron. Refused extradition for political offences of possession of firearms.

3. December 1988. Patrick Ryan. Most notorious case in recent Irish history of extradition. Irish Attorney General permitted this deadly priest to go free on the basis that he would not receive a fair trial.

4. June 1988. Patrick McVeigh. Wanted for charges of bombings in the United Kingdom had his warrant refused by the Irish court on the basis it was faulty.

5. August 1986. John Gerard O'Reilly. Wanted in Belfast on charges of conspiracy to murder was released in Dublin because the warrants were defective. It was believed the warrants were signed by a Belfast Crown Court official instead of a judge, as required by 'Irish' law.

6. March 1986. Evelyn Glenholmes. Triple IRA murder suspect released in Dublin because of alleged faulty warrants.

7. December 1985. Brendan Burns. Wanted for killing soldiers in Northern Ireland was released because warrants were declared invalid. No warrants were immediately issued but Burns subsequently went to ground.

8. December 1982 Dominic McGlinchy Wanted for murdering an elderly post-mistress. The Irish Supreme Court ruled such a murder was not a political offence and he was the first suspect to be extradited to Northern Ireland for trial.

At his 'fair trial' he was acquitted and re-extradited to the Republic where he was jailed for other offences.

Claims that suspects will receive an unfair hearing in United Kingdom courts are purely fictional. Two years after the McGlinchy episode Seamus Shannon was returned for trial in Belfast in connection with the murder of Sir Norman Stronge. Shannon was acquitted.

Other cases where suspects have been extradited.

1. Gerard Harte: Extradited in 1988 and jailed.

2. Robert Russell: Extradited in August 1989 and re-jailed.

3. Paul Kane: Extradited in April 1988 and re-jailed.

The extradition figures show the absolute failure by the Republic to keep faith with their claims of wanting to be good neighbours. If the IRA can so openly abuse the border as a safe-haven, and the Irish Supreme Court openly sanction these claims it is little wonder the Northern majority refuse to participate in any proposed cross-border relations

In 50% of those extradition cases where the British government have been successful in extraditing a suspect the accused has been acquitted thus invalidating the Irish Supreme Court's claim that those extradited to Northern Ireland for political offences will not receive a fair trial.

Unsubstantiated charges concerning Northern Ireland's history like those continually reiterated by Dublin and SDLP spokesmen for example:–

"The Unionists exclusion of the Nationalist population from any say whatsoever at any level under Stormont" are so blatantly untrue that they need no refutation here. The peddling of such falsehoods cannot lead to a good neighbourly relationship and in fact only leads to a deepening enmity and an enlarging of the gulf between us.

The persistent attacks on the security forces by Southern government Ministers and especially the campaign of vilification against the UDR again fuels the fires of antagonism and enmity. Matters such as the attitude to the Crown, flags and emblems of the Union and symbols relating to Ulster's history display for all to see the apparent antagonism fostered against everything British.

Ulster Unionists have no objection to the Irish Republic developing in the way its people choose. We would not deny them their right either religiously or politically to shape their destiny. I for one have made it a practice not to either make comments or to interfere in the internal affairs of the Republic. What I freely give to them I have the right to ask for myself and my people. There can be and there must be, if we would escape an even darker day, a new beginning. A beginning of real freedom for both parts of Ireland to develop as good neighbours with neither part threatening the other, dictating to the other, coercing the other nor claiming jurisdiction over the other. It is on that foundation we alone can build peace. Without it we build on sinking sand.

• DUP: Opening Statement to Strand 2 (introduced on 1992-07-07 09:45:00 - CREATE - e797937) [This document]

• DUP: Opening Statement to Strand 2 (introduced on 1992-07-07 09:45:00 - CREATE - e797937) [This document] [view current proposal at this moment]
  • None (introduced on 1992-07-22 10:30:00 - DEBATE_PROPOSAL - e798298) [view current proposal at this moment]
  • None (introduced on 1992-07-23 10:30:00 - DEBATE_PROPOSAL - e798327) [view current proposal at this moment]