§ 7. The Prospects of Solution 

1. What is being done in order to rebuild confidence? 

The idea that, if (or when) 51 per cent of the people of Ulster vote for union with the Republic, the problem will be solved, is simplistic. If the remaining 49 per cent, or a large enough number of them, are determined to fight to prevent this happening, the problem will not be solved. More important, therefore, is the far harder task of building confidence between the two communities themselves. In 1968 there were a number of mixed areas as well as strongly Protestant areas (e.g. Shankhill, Belfast) and Catholic areas (e.g. the Falls Road, Belfast). But within a year of the outbreak of the troubles, wall and wire-mesh fences were erected to separate the warring communities. Many mixed communities separated as the pressures to demonstrate sectarian loyalty outweighed individual neighbourliness between Catholics and Protestants. In any case, the mixed areas became the battlegrounds for the youths of both groups.

Here is another major problem. Most of those who fight and throw stones are young men and teenagers who cannot remember a time before the troubles. With little for youngsters to do, there is strong pressure to join the junior branch of a paramilitary force. As one young man admitted to a reporter in 1989, ‘In riots, people say you're a coward if you wouldn't throw a brick’. As another explained: ‘If all your mates start throwing stones, you feel left out’. 

2. What is the immediate task of government? 

The immediate task of government is to contain violence and eliminate terrorism. Until that time the army's 10,000 troops are like­ly to stay. The presence of the army may not be liked by Catholics, but the majority of them probably accept it as an unpleasant necessity. However, the army is likely to remain a target for bricks - and worse.

Governing Northern Ireland has tended to bring out the least attractive qualities in the British conduct of affairs. For more than twenty years the IRA has committed many outrages in which many innocent bystanders have been killed, but government always have the responsibility of upholding high ethical standards and the rule of law. Such standards have not always been upheld. In 1974 the Prevention of Terrorism Act allowed the security forces to hold suspects without charge for up to seven days. Between 1974 and 1987 6.430 were detained under this Act, of whom 5,586 were released without any charge.

Inevitably there has been disquiet at the excessive force sometimes used in searching homes, interrogating suspects and in guarding convicted terrorists. In the early 1980s six IRA suspects were shot dead although they were unarmed, giving rise to the suspicion that British security forces had adopted a shoot-to-kill policy. In 1988 another three IRA members were shot dead in Gibraltar. They, too, although clearly planning a terrorist act, were unarmed. The way in which enquiries were handled in both cases reinforced the suspicion that security forces were operating without regard for law. 

3. Were there any judicial mistakes in anti-terrorist struggle in Ulster? 

A number of outrages committed by the IRA encouraged the authorities to neglect the  full requirements of law. In 1989 the convictions of four Catholics for the bombing of a pub in Guildford in 1974 were quashed and the prisoners freed. It was re­vealed that all four had been forced to make ‘confessions’ at the tune. In 1990, the convictions of the ‘Maguire Seven’, imprisoned for running a bomb factory in the 1970s, were quashed and the remaining prisoners released. Then, in 1991, the Birmingham Six, accused of bombing a Birmingham pub in the 1970s, were also released when their convictions were found unsound. How does a government make amends for such wrongful convictions?

In 1989 the government reduced civil rights in Ulster in two ways. It banned direct broadcasts by Sinn Fein or other ‘terrorist’ spokesmen, thus reducing the level of democracy. It also abolished the right to silence in court in Ulster, a right which defendants in the UK have traditionally en­joyed.

The problem for any British government is to balance short-term in­terests, which may require tough measures, against the long-term interest of persuading everyone in Ulster that Britain is determined to ensure and pro­tect full democratic rights as well as the rule of law in all parts of the United Kingdom. The British government is caught in a dilemma. Violence frus­trates any political initiative and the lack of such an initiative increases the danger of violence. A progressive reduction in civil liberties in Ulster also threatens civil liberties in all Britain.

One long-term problem is that Catholics and Protestants live apart far more than they did before 1968. It is very difficult to rebuild trust. One way might be to insist on mixed schools, so that children can learn about the other community at an early age. But the Roman Catholic Church particularly wishes Catholic children to be educated in a Catholic environment. Protes­tants, on the other hand, are deeply suspicious of the power of the Catholic Church in Ireland. 

4. What is to be improved in the economic sphere? 

 It is also vitally important to end the economic discrimination from which many Catholics have suffered. For one aspect of the conflict is the problem for both Catholic and Protestant people who have low incomes, suffer from high unemployment and are too poor to escape the conflict.

So far, successive governments have failed to eliminate these eco­nomic aspects. In the past twenty years the economic gap between Catho­lics and Protestants has hardly closed at all. In 1984 Catholic unemployment was 35 per cent compared with 15 per cent for Protestants. Although the government has encouraged an end to employment discrimination, employ­ers have preferred to recruit solely within one community to avoid conflict in the workplace. This has worked decisively against the Catholics. For exam­ple, even at the main university, Queen's University, Belfast, which is pub­licly committed to a policy of non-discrimination, it was found in 1989 that Catholics made up only 18 per cent of locally recruited academic staff, 11 per cent of administrative and executive staff, and only 7 per cent of blue-collar employees.

In 1988 the government requited all companies in Northern Ireland to complete annual statements concerning their employees. The intention is to force companies to employ a proportionately acceptable number of Catho­lics. But this can only be done as job vacancies occur, and must be done in a way that will not lead to increased Protestant unemployment. This is diffi­cult because of the generally poor economic prospects for Northern Ireland. 

5. What are the positions of the Churches in Ulster? 

Can Unionists become less fearful of an eventual integration into the Republic? This is possibly the greatest problem of all. Because of centuries of Protestant oppression, the Catholic Church has an important symbolic and moral role in the Irish Re­public. Unionists would feel less fearful if the Republic began to distance itself from the Church.

It is easy to conceive of false solutions to the conflict. For example, the province could be repartitioned by British withdrawal from the predomi­nantly Catholic areas on the west and southern edges of Ulster. This could reduce the Catholic proportion of Northern Ireland by about half. But it would not really solve anything since it would not remove the siege mentality of Ulster's Protestants, nor would it satisfy Sinn Fein, particularly its most fervent supporters who live in Catholic West Belfast. It would only reduce the scale of the security problem. Modest optimism inspires the progressive political and economic unity of the European Community, which presents the model of cooperation allowing to find a common identity to displace the old tribalisms. 

6. What do ‘Frameworks for the Future’ envisage? 

In February 1995 two documents entitled ‘Frameworks for the Future’ were published in Belfast. Together, they offer the British and Irish governments’ best understand­ing of where agreement might be found on a political settlement for North­ern Ireland.

A ‘New Framework for Agreement’, published by the British and Irish governments, offers proposals for relationships within the island of Ireland and between the two governments. The ‘New Framework for Agreement’ commits the British Government to enshrine, through legislation, the princi­ple that the constitutional future of Northern Ireland should reflect the wishes of a majority of its people. The Irish Government agrees to introduce and support proposals for a change in the Irish Constitution so that no territorial claim contrary to the wishes of the people in Northern Ireland would be asserted.

The document also proposes the creation of a North-South body, com­prising the relevant Heads of Department in an elected Northern Ireland Assembly and representatives from the Irish Parliament, which could, through joint agreement between north and south, carry out a range of consultative, harmonising or executive functions.

In a separate document – ‘A Framework for Accountable Government in Northern Ireland’ - drawn up solely by the British Government the crea­tion of a strong single-chamber legislative Assembly is proposed for Nor­thern Ireland which would be elected by a form of proportional representa­tion. The Assembly would take over responsibility from the Northern Ire­land Office for functions such as education and housing which are the res­ponsibility of local government in the rest of the United Kingdom.

The Assembly would have a system of committees designed to over­see the work of government departments. Where appropriate, Assembly decisions would be taken by a weighted majority. A separate panel, elected by the people, would have a consultative and representational role. Decem­ber 2, 1999 is to become an important date in the history of Northern Ire­land. On this day Elizabeth II gave the Royal assent to the parliamentary bill, which passes political power to a new government and Assembly of Ulster. Representatives of Protestant and Catholic political parties will have equal number of ministerial posts, 6 of 12. British politicians hope that it is to be a significant step towards ceasing the Ulster conflict. But the situation is far from being ideal. The problem of the IRA disarmament is left unsolved. The Assembly would have no taxraising powers since resources would be pro­vided by the British Government, which keeps financial control over the province, and also retains responsibility for security and the police, with 10.000 British soldiers staying in Northern Ireland. 

Questions:

1. Why is it impossible to solve the problem by vote or at referendum?
2. What prevents people from building up new relations?
3. Why is the attitude to the British in Ulster often negative?
4. What are the short-term and long-term tasks of the British Govern­ment?     
5. What document contains British and Irish proposals on a political settlement for Northern Ireland? 

Additional Reading                                          George Bernard Shaw 

George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) was born in Dublin. His childhood was very hard. His father was taken to drink and Shaw's mother left him and went to London where she gave lessons of music to earn her living. At the age of fourteen, after grad­uating from secondary school, Shaw was put into a job as clerk in a land agent's office. Bernard Shaw was rather educated and he was better in­formed in many things than most of his fellow clerks at the office. Shake­speare, Byron, Shelley and many other great poets and writers had been read and re-read by him. He could discuss art, for he had studied the best works at the Ireland national Gallery. In 1876 Shaw went to London where he became a journalist and wrote music, art and dramatic critiques for var­ious periodicals.

Bernard Shaw became a Socialist in 1882 and took an active part in the Socialist movement.

Shaw's most important plays are Widower’s Houses, Mrs. Warren’s Profession, The Apple Cart, Pygmalion, Candida, The Devil Disciple, Caesar and Cleopatra, Man and Superman, John Bull’s Other Island, Too Good to Be True, etc.

In 1925 Bernard Shaw was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature and he gave it all to spreading the Swedish literature in England.

Bernard Shaw spent his last years in a small estate of Ayott St. Law­rence where at the age of 90 he still undertook bicycle rides every morning. He continued to write to the last days of his life. George Bernard Shaw died on November 2, 1950 at the age of 94.