Politics

Ireland's Forensic experts

Dr Garret Fitzgerald is thought to be an honest Irish politician, a rarity which is very exciting to Englishmen. He is widely regarded as a green version of Mrs Shirley Williams or Dr Helmut Schmidt or any of the social democratic stars who are a by-word for integrity across the Continent of Europe. Nothing that he has done disproves this theory, and so one must believe that in launching and managing the New Ireland Forum, Dr Fitzgerald is acting from an altruistic desire to find a `solution' to the Irish Question.

But honesty is not the same as frankness, and Dr Fitzgerald has not been wholly frank about the Forum's aims or its conclu- sions. In his view, the purpose of the Forum has been 'facing reality', which involves ad- mitting that the unionist case, however mistaken, exists. His attempt to face this reality seems genuine enough, but the Forum is not organised by his party, Fine Gael, but by Fine Gael, Fianna Fail, the Irish Labour Party and the SDLP. At its very first session last May, Mr Charles Haughey, the leader of Fianna Fail, declared his view of the enterprise: `The present situation in Northern Ireland is not primarily the fault of anyone living there. It is the cumulative effect of British policy in Ireland over many hundreds of years.' And he also said: 'Our purpose is to construct a basic condition . . . as a prelude to British withdrawal.' Since the publication of the Forum's report, Dr Fitzgerald has been assuring Brian Walden and the Sunday Times and as many of the great and the good as he can get round in one weekend that the Forum is open-minded — it would be possible, he suggests, to have joint authority without prejudicing the question of sovereignty.

Which is all very well, but ignores what the Forum is and says. The whole point of the show was first to unite all anti-violent parties in the island of Ireland. This failed because the unionists refused to join. The second was to achieve common ground between the democratic nationalist parties. This has failed too. All four parties signed, but none of them means the same thing by their signature. So if Dr Fitzgerald is offer- ing to bury, for the present at least, the question of sovereignty over Northern Ireland, he is doing so without authority, and without the power to produce what he wants. The Forum likes to pretend that it is setting Britain an example, so now it is up to us. But why, it might be worth asking, have the nationalist parties felt the need to produce such a report at all?

The challenge to which the Irish parties are responding is that thrown down by the IRA. Terrorism has caused many deaths and sponsored hundreds of robberies in the Republic. In the North, Provisional Sinn Fein has undermined the supremacy of the SDLP. The next set of elections, a year from now, are expected to bring the defeat of constitutional nationalism. Mr Prior's Assembly has encouraged the ,traditional Irish habit of absenteeism and so the tendency to vote for the most unashamedly absentee candidate against his more moderate rival. The IRA is gaining the right to speak for nationalists, and in doing so threatens the security of the Irish state much more than it threatens Britain. The Republic is acting to defend herself and her influence in the North, which is understand- able, but need not call forth any response from London.

For the Forum's chapters on the 'origin of the problem' and its 'assessment of the present problem' do not fundamentally dif- fer from the version of events favoured by the IRA. Partition in 1920 was 'arbitrary', it says, and so the unionist majority is 'ar- tificial'. Unionists would have been catered for by the tolerant constitutional arrangements of the Free State. The blame for the rise of the IRA lies solely with the British and the Stormont government which they tolerated: 'The present crisis in the North arose when non-violent campaigns in the late 1960s for basic civil rights and for an end to systematic discrimination . . . were met with violence and repression.' • If you accept this picture, it follows that you also think that the heart of the matter is the 'unionist veto'. This is the right of Nor- thern Ireland, guaranteed by the House of Commons in 1973, to remain part of the United Kingdom until a majority of its elec- torate wishes otherwise. According to the Forum, this veto is immoral or, at least, obstructive. It 'inhibits the dialogue necessary for political progress.' Because the Forum is supposed to be good-hearted, open-minded and so on, it twists and turns to accept the principle of unionist consent and yet to bypass it. The 'shared aim of a united Ireland will be pursued only by democratic political means and on the basis of agreement'. The 'solution' proposed is that 'new structures' will accommodate together two sets of legitimate rights: — the right of the nationalists to effective . . .ex- pression of their identity; and — the right of the unionists to effective . . . expression of their identity, their ethos and their way of life'. But, as the Forum points out elsewhere, that effective expression for the nationalists is a united Ireland. For the unionists, as it does not emphasise with equal force, that expression is to remain within the United Kingdom. The two aims are exact opposities. To say that both can be fulfilled is to talk gibberish; and since Irish politicians are clever, we can be sure

that it is not gibberish — it is a way of em- barrassing Britain and playing on the ig- norance and indecisiveness of British policy' It would be so much easier for Mr Prior if the Forum were right in thinking that the unionists only object to a united Ireland because they fear oppression from bog- trotting papists who want to take away their condoms, that he must be tempted to believe it. The truth is that unionism is something a bit bigger — allegiance to the crown and the institutions established under the crown. It is not a sentiment that can be negotiated away. The more emotional argument for a British response is that the Forum's report marks a great sacrifice by Irish politicians. They have publicly abandoned their in' sistence, undeviating during the 60 years' existence of the Republic, that Northern Ireland belongs to them. Now they arc, merely asking politely that Britain sboul° start to hand it over. Dr Fitzgerald s holding out whatever is the Gaelic equivalent of an olive branch — s° Prior should grasp it. It is an urgent call by

`men of violence'.

the 'men of goodwill' to unite against th Despite all that, the British Government would be perfectly within its rights to ignore

the Republic's heroism. It could hardly be expected to agree with the Forum's 1

veyi Irish history in which every ill is attributable; to British rape, pillage or neglect. Nor nee—

it, and then get out without having.o. to do something Powers to try

it accept the right of foreign to sort out the destiny of its own peoP1 But the difficulty 'is that Mr Prior is stueeli with an assembly that is doing nothing, alin, with a job which he wants to leave sai.°11e but on a note of confidence and hope' ,as preside over whatever he sets in°fInfileitilinc:s1 major change in his period in been the rise of Sinn Fein as a Polit`

force. He must try

about

Could he make something of the RePllu overtures?

There is nothing for Mr Prior, or for n the Ulster, in trying to act directly LIP°-_.,en Forum's suggestions. All of therm even with Dr Fitzgerald's kindly glosses, are "re. tionalist propositions, and so Will be Mr jetted in the North. No unionist trusts Prior, and so he is the last man to Persu,ave them out of the last ditch which they ha occupied for so long. But the Gove,r,r1,.„ rot — it would need Mrs Thatcher as well Prior — could answer the Forum " try helpful suggestions of its own. it could to bring British and Irish to cooperatecrsti. in all areas which do not raise . to n°w tutional questions. And it could trycanting make something of the idea, from the Official Unionists, that the to bund assembly could alter its wand in attend solely to local government: nor doing so form committees in which With a was shared with the SDLP. The trick _el'iLa"ily man like Dr Fitzgerald is to respond g,c to his good intentions and PolitelY - firmly to his desire to interfere.

Charles