THE BOUNDARY COMMISSION , 1921-1925 .......
A British 'sleight-of-hand' which caused a mutiny within British forces in Ireland.......
....... in Ireland in the early 1920's , a 'Sir' Richard Dawson Bates (the Stormont 'Minister for Home Affairs') gave himself unprecedented powers to , for instance , " ... outlaw organisations..to detain or intern people indefinitely without charge or trial ..(and)..to destroy houses and buildings .... " , amongst other things . He was to become the envy of others with a similar mind-set .......
Some 40 years later (ie in [April] 1963) a Mr. Vorster , then South African 'Minister for Justice' , was introducing a new Coercion Bill in the South African Parliament when , no doubt thinking of 'Sir' Bates and his colleagues in Stormont and Westminster , stated that he "... would be willing to exchange all the legislation of that sort for one clause of the Northern Ireland (sic) Special Powers Act . " Birds of a feather indeed ...
'Sir' Richard Dawson Bates was a known bigot , and apparently took it as a compliment when it was said of him in Stormont (by a Senior Civil Servant) - " (He) has such a prejudice against Catholics that he made it clear to his Permanent Secretary that he did not want his most juvenile clerk or typist , if a Papist (Catholic) , assigned for duty to his ministry ." In 1935 , however , he seemed to believe that he could treat everyone like shit (pardon the language) regardless of their religion -
- on 18th June that year (1935) , 'Sir' Bates issued an Order banning all parades , not just those with a Republican/Nationalist 'flavour' : the Orange Order objected and told Bates and his people that it was their intention to hold a parade on the 23rd June (1935) and that said parade would be going ahead . Bates was not pleased - it was one thing to trample over the rights of the 'Papists' , but the Orange Order were his own people .......
(MORE LATER).
THE POLITICS OF H-BLOCK .......
By Vincent Browne .
From 'MAGILL' magazine , December 1980 , pages 26 and 27 .
Re-published here in 10 parts .
[10 of 10].
The State Coalition Government , and recently Garret Fitzgerald (Fine Gael) , have at all times maintained that at no stage did they surrender to a threat of a hunger strike but the facts seem to suggest otherwise ; the fact of the matter is that changes of a kind being demanded by the Republican prisoners during the hunger strike occurred immediately after the protest .
The obvious conclusion must be that the Coalition Government has capitulated to hunger strikes but that the integrity of the prison system was in no way threatened by the nature of the concessions granted . The next big protest in the campaign comes on Saturday , December 6th , when there will be a protest outside the British Embassy ; the National H-Block Committee will be hoping for a demonstration at least as big as that to Leinster House on November 22 last , when as many as 30,000 people marched .
But whatever the outcome , the divide between the Catholic community in the North and the rest of the population on this island is deeper now than ever . The Catholic minority must now bear whatever further tribulations arise very much as an isolated case , ignored and reviled by the rest of Ireland .
[END of ' THE POLITICS OF H-BLOCK '].
(Monday , 31st : 'How The Gay Life Killed Mountbatten' - from 1989).
DE VALERA AND THE AMERICAN CONNECTION .......
By Micheal MacGiolla Phadraig .
From 'NOW' magazine , Volume 1 , Number 4, October 1989 , pages 28 and 29 .
Re-published here in 6 parts .
(2 of 6).
The Irish Press newspaper group wrote a lot about Ralph Ingersoll , the second-generation American newspaper magnate who was to take half-control of the Group , but nothing about the Irish Press Plc company structure .
This was not surprising ; the Irish Press group of companies has been shrouded in secrecy since its formation in the year before Fianna Fail first took power in 1932 . Added to this secretiveness there is now a confusing permutation of company structures involving Irish Press Plc and its subsidiaries - Corduff Investments Ltd , Press Group Ltd , Irish Press Corporation , Irish Press Newspapers Ltd , and Irish Press Publications ; Ralph Ingersoll is to take a 50 per cent stake in the latter .
The Concerned Shareholders Group believes that if all the facts are revealed , the Fianna Fail Party would have a strong legal and moral claim to ownership . Letters concerning this claim have been sent to the Board of Irish Press Plc - so far , no reply has been received . Fianna Fail General Secretary , Frank Wall , has also been informed of the results of research carried out in Ireland and the U.S. for the Concerned Shareholders Group .......
(MORE LATER).
