Eamonn McCann
Foyle · People Before Profit Alliance · Northern Ireland
“Every single Member so far has mentioned the financial constraints on the Housing Executive. Does the Member agree with me that there are ways out of this problem of a lack of resources to deal with cavity wall insulation, damp and mould, which affects houses in every constituency?”
“We cannot have it on the basis of a Government in Stormont, Westminster or anywhere else saying, 'We think this is a dangerous person and they should be put into prison'." <BR /> <BR />I am struck by the fact that none of those who have spoken in favour of this motion have even admitted that this might be a difficulty.”
“Thank you very much. When there is such a perception, and it is based on material reality, that is a real problem for law and order in any society. <BR /> <BR />Yesterday, we voted for the motion in relation to the attempted killing on the Crumlin Road.”
“Mr Frew has just referred to people campaigning with placards demanding the release of this one and that one. He characterised it as standing side by side with extremists. It is not standing side by side with extremists to call for the release of anybody — certainly not.”
“When asked what these activities were — "I am not telling you."; "Who gave you to believe that he was involved in these activities?"; "The security services"; "Did they give you the information?"; "Yes, they did"; "Will you tell us?"; "No, we will not tell you".”
“I refer, of course, to internment in 1971. Occasionally, here and outside, we refer to the major atrocities that have taken place. I include, just for the sake of the record and in case anybody suggests I would think otherwise, Enniskillen, Teebane and the dreadful, unjustified and unjustifiable atrocity in Birmingham in December 1974, wh…”
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“I am in favour of liberalising the laws, but I am also —”
“I am a liberal. I believe in having as few restrictions on our behaviour as possible. I support the Bill, but I would go further, as I say. I think we are discussing it in an extremely narrow way. It has to be seen in the context of all sorts of other forms of human behaviour and the use of mind-altering substances, which is what we are talking about. They are all bad for you. It is a fact that, of all the substances mentioned here, particularly alcohol, the younger you are when you start, the more damage they will do to you on a permanent basis. There is a simple reason for that: the brain of a child or an adolescent is not yet fully formed and is going to be more damaged by alcohol or any other such drug than it would be if you began when you were 20, 25 or a much later age. We have to take all that into account.”
“Who has ever seen an advert for Guinness ending with the sight of young people lying on the pavement being sick into the gutter? Who has ever seen that, yet it is not an untypical result of overindulgence in alcohol?”
“Thank you very much. There is an answer, but I will not give it now. In response to the Member, there is a comprehensive answer that I hope to be able to discuss at length in the House. <BR /> <BR />We are talking about dangers. The point has been made previously, and it is worth underlining. I doubt that there is one Member of the Assembly who does not know somebody, either a family member, a neighbour or a friend, who has died from alcohol. I do not believe that there is one Member who does not know families who have been torn apart by alcohol. That is one of the distinctive features of alcohol in our society. <BR /> <BR />If you turn on your television at night, you will see adverts telling you that, if you drink alcohol, you will have a wonderful time, you will be freed from your inhibitions, and no harm will come to you.”
“I will, of course, Madam Principal Deputy Speaker. We might come back to the other subject that I referred to. If there was not a restriction on the introduction of private Member's Bills, there would have been a Bill along the lines that the Member suggested. There will be such a Bill before this session is over.”
“To get your hands on cannabis, you have to go into murky territory outside the law, where all sorts of other substances might be offered to you, particularly by the people who are selling you cannabis. It is absolutely true that there are people whose health is being harmed by cannabis. Any mind-altering substance is bound to do you harm.”
“Absolutely. Fortunately, or unfortunately, in my career as a journalist, and simply because of growing up and living in this society, North and South, I have known quite a number of people who, sadly, were addicted to heroin and many who died from heroin. I had a good friend — a flatmate — who died from heroin. He had wanted to get off the heroin but simply could not. He began on alcohol. I have never known a junkie who did not start on alcohol before going on to heroin; I have never known a junkie who went on to heroin as a result of smoking cannabis. <BR /> <BR />There is a connection between alcohol, which we are discussing here, and harder drugs: unlike alcohol, cannabis is illegal.”
“I ask them to produce the evidence and to examine the situation in Portugal between alcohol, which is sold on a non-restrictive basis —”
“Let me make it clear: I am not saying this in any killjoy sense. I support the Bill and see no reason for restrictions on the sale of alcohol or, indeed, of anything else. If it is already legal in some circumstances, I can think of no argument why the hours should not be expanded or people prevented from exercising their choice. However, I do say this: when we are discussing the availability of mind-altering substances — that is what alcohol is — we must see it in the round. I see no point at all in isolating alcohol from other drugs. Incidentally, it was said during the debate that cannabis is a gateway drug to more dangerous drugs. No, it is not. There is no evidence — none whatsoever — for this proposition, despite the fact that it is trotted out over and over again by people who claim to be experts.”
“One of the issues that arises from the debate is this: what is it about our society that causes so many people, and particularly young people, to want to get out of their heads over weekends and, indeed, on weekdays? The point has already been made, but it is worth underlining. You cannot walk through many of our city centres late at night or early in the morning at weekends without seeing squares and streets in city centres carpeted with young people out of their heads on drink. There is a very interesting question as to why that happens. What is it about alcohol that leads that to happen? That needs investigation. It needs medical and social evidence to be brought before us before we can make a determination as to what conclusion shall be drawn from that.”
“In light of the Member's accurate remarks about the dreadful effect that overconsumption of alcohol can have in certain places, would he agree that there is a contradiction and anomaly lurking in the Chamber in that we are discussing during what hours alcohol can legally be sold while at the same time in our society there is an absolute restriction on the possession, much less the sale, of the relatively benign, harmless, non-existent drug cannabis? Should not that be resolved at the same time as we decide on the opening hours for pubs and clubs?”
“My question is this: does the Member agree that, in the light of the extremely serious and profoundly disturbing matters we are discussing today, it would be appropriate now to invite Mr Conall McDevitt to return to the House and resume his career?”
“Yes, I am, sorry. They were confronted, they believe, not only with a large company able to employ vast resources compared to their own, but with a thicket of environmental and planning regulations and with a number of agencies spread over a number of Departments, so that they found it impossible to process their complaint. We want a bit of fairness here so that the environment can be defended against people whose only concern is profit.”
“I was also encouraged to raise the question by the shenanigans at Woodburn forest, where environmental campaigners did not want to see drilling in that splendid area of natural beauty —”
“I thank the Minister for that. The concern that prompted my question arose not simply from Mobuoy Road and the fish kill in the Faughan, which are events that happened in the Foyle constituency.”
“Will the Minister agree that, in order to be effective, the legislation that she refers to would have to include the introduction of a stalkers register in the manner of the sex offenders register; that stalking cases should be kept open; and that, given recent experience, it ought to be easier for the women victims of stalking — this is largely a gender-specific crime — to obtain legal aid?”
“— and that can only be remedied by us rising up and fighting? In or out, the fight goes on.”
“— rather than the subject of this debate —”
“Does the Minister agree that we ought to return very soon to the broad question of the effect — economic, constitutional etc — of withdrawal from the EU? When that happens, I will have an awful lot to say on the subject, drawing attention to the phoney arguments still being used on both sides this time after the referendum. My direct question, very briefly, to the Minister is this: does he not agree that the factors over the next few years that will most affect and most impact on the well-being, economic security and hopes for the future of the mass of our people have to do with downward pressure on wages, loss of jobs in the private and public sectors, cuts to benefits and the imminent catastrophe — I mean "imminent" and I mean "catastrophe" — in home-care services? Are those not the issues —”
“OK, I will leave it, but I have more to say in some other place.”
“I will end with this, on the question of Scotland and Northern Ireland —”
“You did give me that extra minute, you know.”
“Lord Hill was the man. How many people are aware of Lord Hill?”
“One hundred years after 1916, national independence, how are you? The European Union will not stand for national independence in any sense at all. It is an oppressive body. <BR /> <BR />Who is the European Commission answerable to? Does anybody here know? I will tell you: it is answerable to the bankers; that is in whose interests it has operated throughout the period of austerity. It is answerable to the more belligerent sections of the European bourgeoisie; it is not answerable to anybody else. Nobody elected it. <BR /> <BR />Of course, the British Commissioner resigned on Friday. Anybody know who he was?”
“There were times over the past few days watching the football when I thought that I was transferring my allegiance from one day to another from the occupied Six Counties to the occupied Twenty-six Counties.”
“Why is it that not a mention of that has been made? <BR /> <BR />People here talk about the EU and give the impression that it is a benign organisation that has the interests of ordinary people in this country or anywhere else at heart. They are out talking, rightly so, about the need to go to Dublin and talk to the Dublin Government. Anybody remember what happened in the South of Ireland when the European Commission disapproved of what the elected Irish Government were doing? They were told by the European Commission, "Do what you're told or — the quote was — 'a bomb will go off in Dublin'". That is what they were told. Not an explosive device, presumably, but a financial and economic bomb threatened them. <BR /> <BR />Now, so many people in Dublin are praising the EU that they seem to be suffering from Stockholm syndrome.”
“I will start at the end: the EU saving refugees? It has erected barbed wire barricades around fortress Europe. Somebody referred to fortress UK and immigrants. The main fortress being erected in Europe is in the European Union. Not only do we have barbed wire fences around the edges of it, we have barbed wire fences within it to stop the movement of people who do not qualify. Around the borders of Hungary and in Serbia and Slovenia, you see barbed wire fences. <BR /> <BR />This is not an organisation that is pulling people together in a benign way. It is dividing people; it is racist. The agreement made between the EU and Turkey was, "You take one back, and we'll send one over". That is treating human beings like commodities to be swapped in a barter market. What a disgusting and disgraceful thing to do.”
“And they were deceiving. So was the "Remain" camp, and the "Out" camp across the border.”
“They should consider the words of Walter Scott:”
“No, thanks. <BR /> <BR />In other words, they wanted to do all of the things that some people in this House are now claiming that we could not do if we left the EU.”
“So much for the lady's commitment to democracy. Do I agree that the Greek people voted in a stupid way? That is what she is asking. It does not matter how the people in the cradle of democracy voted. That was the clear implication of your question; of course it was. <BR /> <BR />The EU rejected that referendum result precisely because it wanted to impose austerity, it wanted the Greek Government to cut social spending and it wanted funding withdrawn from all sorts of community groups.”
“Thank you very much. That is great. <BR /> <BR />People Before Profit has always rejected — I have always rejected — the European Union. We reject it now because we reject the rottenness that the EU represents. If you want to know the true nature of the EU, just look back a year. We heard an awful lot of the argument that leaving the EU will threaten spending on community projects, destroy jobs, destroy wages, destroy infrastructure and all the rest of it. Will it, indeed? If you worried about that in the referendum, look back to what the EU did to Greece, when the Greek people in a referendum voted to reject the austerity policies of the European Union.”
“I fully intended to do that. Yes, I will. It is an obvious question, and it is in my mind too. You do not have to invite me to do it.”
“I will articulate it now and explain how we propose to deliver it. If you had waited a few minutes, you would not have had to jump to your feet and ask the question.”
“Let me deal first with the nonsense that was talked earlier today in the Chamber about people on the left who advised a vote to leave — that such people must be in alignment with and supporting Boris Johnson, Nigel Farage and the rest of that crew across the water. That is absolutely untrue. People Before Profit is quite able to articulate its own particular position, which is different from that of Boris Johnson and is also different from that of the leadership of the "Remain" side. Some years ago, I was active in a referendum in the South —”
“Does the Minister agree that, while the matters we are talking about are commonly presented in this Chamber and in this part of the world as difficulties arising from two hostile communities with grievances going back a number of years, when representatives of the state murder its citizens, the truth should be told without recourse to concepts such as national security and that this is not a nationalist issue but a democratic issue? The state must be held to account when it kills its citizens.”
“Does the Member agree that a one-off opportunity for the Electoral Office workers to press home their point with the British authorities will arise this Thursday and Friday, when they will be expected to work late into the night to deliver the verdict on the European referendum? Were they to decide — I urge them from this place so to decide — to take industrial action on that day, would that not do more to bring attention to the validity of their case than anything that might be said or done in the House? A nil-all result in the European referendum would be a big win for the Electoral Office workers and for all of us.”
“I just want to reassure the Minister that there are people on the opposition side of the House who would not accuse him of Marxism.”
“I tell you what, if that happened and there was a constitutional crisis because of the refusal of the Executive to implement austerity, among the other outcomes would be this: it would electrify millions of people across the water in Scotland, in Wales and in England — in the industrial heartlands of England — that we had taken on that fight. <BR /> <BR />We can give a lead; we have done it before. People in Ireland, and in the North of Ireland, can give a lead and light a beacon for others to follow in the fight against austerity instead of — Alex Attwood is right about this — introducing and implementing an austerity Budget in ways that we cannot precisely measure but which we know will disproportionately affect, and affect badly, the people least able to take the hit that is coming their way. Thanks very much.”
“When they talk about imposing austerity, and the Treasury says, "There is not another penny", stand up to them and say, "Go to hell. We are not accepting that". We do that on all sorts of other things. We did it on policing. We did it on decommissioning. We did it on loads of things. We said, "We do not care what the British Government says. Do your worst — we are not budging". <BR /> <BR />Would it not be wonderful to have a constitutional crisis in Northern Ireland that had nothing to do with an orange versus green dynamic but had to do with being anti-austerity and the rights and interests of the people at the bottom in society.”
“It used to be that we had two ideologies: one was orange, one was green and "never the twain shall meet." Now, perhaps, we have two ideologies: one is to do with a socialist ideology — you can have that in as broad terms as you like — and the other is to do with a capitalist ideology that is based on the interests of the system and the market, and letting the market rip through every aspect of our daily lives and all the rest of it. <BR /> <BR />Sometimes, the old ideologies in this part of the world led to constitutional crises, did they not? People ran around saying, " We have to avoid this crisis" or, after the crisis developed, " We have to solve this crisis". How about this for a constitutional crisis? Run it up to the wire.”
“Sorry, Mr Deputy Speaker. I will bring my remarks to a close. <BR /> <BR />I welcome what the Minister just said. I hope that, if I have to make a contribution to that discussion — I would welcome the opportunity — the outcome-based result will be a system that raises more money for local spending and one that gets and harvests that money in a fair way that does not bear down disproportionately on poor people. <BR /> <BR />Ideology is hardly ever discussed in politics, but it is relevant to the Budget, to all spending and to all tax-raising powers.”
“There is no need to apologise. I welcome that, and, if we can move towards a situation —”
“We live in a society in the North in which the kingpins of casino capitalism are pursued and bowed down to all the time while we say, "Here is more money. How much profit are you making? How much corporation tax do you think you will have to pay?". It is OK saying that we will alleviate it. They are the people who are feather-bedded. Casino capitalism is feather-bedded in the North and elsewhere. The richer you are, the softer the bed you get to lie on in this society. I think that the Minister may well agree with some of the things that I am saying, but he is constrained by the system that he is operating —”
“Somebody pointed out — I forget who it was — and it is commonly pointed out that this will catch people who are asset-rich but cash-poor. There are a lot of people in that situation, mainly older people who have houses that are now worth loads of money. Here is one way of handling it: link the rates to ability to pay and to wealth. There is no question that that can be done. That will deal with the question of somebody who is 70 or 80 years old and living in a house that is suddenly worth £1·5 million but they only have a pension. Link the two together. Why is that never suggested? I will tell you why it is never suggested: because that would hit people in the upper echelons of the earning range and we do not do that, do we?”
“Half my time in the last couple of months has been spent talking to public-sector workers and their unions about the threat to jobs and the number of people living under acute anxiety because they do not know what will happen in the future. Will the offer be, "You can have a transfer to Belfast or take redundancy."? I am talking about reality here and about people who gathered last night so that I could talk to them and try, as best I could, to advise them. None of that will be dealt with in the Budget outlined here. In fact, the Budget will make all these things worse. <BR /> <BR />We could raise more money locally; there is no question about it. I want to deal with whether we should lift the cap on rates.”
“That is our big problem when we talk about job creation and about how the Budget will relate to creating jobs. The reason that we talk about this is that the private sector has failed Northern Ireland. It is the private sector that has not provided jobs, so the state has to move in and subsidise it, and, while subsidising the private sector, we take jobs away from the public sector. <BR /> <BR />Loads of people in Derry, for example, and in Newry, west Belfast and north Belfast — I do not want to be accused of concentrating only on Derry, but that is the place I know, so that is the one that I will talk about.”
“At the same time, note the reference in the Budget to the money that will be necessary to pay off people in the public sector. We are borrowing money to destroy jobs at the same time as we talk about boosting employment and getting proper jobs. The effect is that, while we talk about job creation, we are indulging in job destruction. We have people being paid off. <BR /> <BR />Incidentally, the philosophy behind that is, "Private sector good; public sector bad". The public sector is all these staid, fuddy-duddy, superannuated, feather-bedded people producing nothing while the private sector is slim and dynamic and roaring forward. What a load of old nonsense. Look around the world at the private sector and the market system: the public sector is a model of efficiency compared to the private sector.”
“In fact, what will happen here, which will have a devastating effect on budgets — I am talking about the Budget — is that shedloads of money will be shovelled into the coffers of major multinational companies. That money will not then be available for the day-to-day spending that ordinary people need, whatever that is: £200 million or £300 million.”
“OK. One matter that, I am sure you will agree, falls within the Budget is the funding. There are references here to the funding of various aspects of our life — our social, economic and political life. The whole idea of the reduction in corporation tax is relevant to what we are talking about here, because it is relevant to the amount of money that is calculated or forecast to be available for fulfilling all the functions of government. Of course that is relevant, but it is also nonsense. It has been talked about around here, and it is accepted that it will boost the private sector and that our Budget situation will be easier because we will have a booming private sector, tax receipts and all the rest of it.”