Thursday November 30 1995

[An Phoblacht/Republican News]

Bitter battle but welcome result

THE NARROW YES VOTE last Friday was a welcome result which will finally allow people in second relationships the right to have those relationships recognised in the eyes of the law. Nobody is enthusiastic about the prospect of divorce, but marriage breakdown is a reality in Ireland which could no longer be ignored.

Some of those opposed to divorce are now considering legal action against the referendum result. Any attempt to overturn the people's decision would be misguided. While it highly unlikely the Supreme Court would overturn the referendum decision, it is those opposed to divorce who would suffer most in a new contest. The average voter will not forgive the anti-divorce camp if they drag us to the polls to vote on an issue which we hope is well and truly finished with.

The government very nearly lost the campaign unnecessarily; they could in fact have won it by a much bigger margin. Falling into the trap of relying on opinion polls which showed a large Yes majority, they decided to adopt a ``low-key'' approach, thus allowing the No campaigners to set the agenda. They also bungled the whole question of finance. They were repeatedly warned that their proposed expenditure of public money on a partisan information campaign could be unconstitutional. While the government was wasting public money on an ineffectual advocacy campaign, the Right To Remarry was seriously underfunded, with a budget of less than £60,000. The combined budgets of the Anti-Divorce Campaign and the No Divorce Campaign were been many times that figure. The political parties should have contributed some of their own finance to the Right to Remarry campaign.

Every political party in Leinster House, Sinn Féin, two of the northern parties - the SDLP and the Alliance party, the Workers' Party, and assorted left parties all supported the referendum. Only Richard Greene's Muintir na hÉireann party opposed. Their appalling anti-Semitic remarks about the Jewish members of the government were a decided own goal, one of many that were scored in the campaign.

In reality most of the right-wing parties were divided. A Sunday Independent poll showed that 46% of the supposedly liberal Progressive Democrats supported divorce, while 40% opposed it. Only 51% of Fine Gael supporters supported the amendment, while the figures for Sinn Féin, Democratic Left and the Green party were 87%, 78% and 71% respectively.

These are important statistics given the cultural stereotypes used by sloppy commentators, who wilfully confuse Irish republicanism with fundamentalist Catholicism. Maurice Hayes, writing in the Irish Independent on Monday stated that: ``The areas which voted No most strongly are those which the polls show to have the greatest attachment to irredentist republicanism and Articles Two &Three.;'' Is he deliberately ignoring the large Sinn Féin support for divorce or is he just badly informed? His comments ignore the other cliché of the referendum - the working class. Many commentators referred to the large increase in support for divorce in working-class areas, however it is these areas which most strongly support the retention of Articles Two and Three. Another example of the many journalists' blinkered vision was their surprise at the high support for divorce in Gaeltacht areas. Why do they feel it necessary to ascribe values to a whole group of people, solely on the basis of the language they speak?

Those opposed to divorce were also unhappy with the media. Des Hanifan said that they had been virtually excluded during the last week of the campaign. While the editorial line in every newspaper, with the possible exception of the Sunday Business Post was prodivorce, both sides of the campaign were in general given generous coverage. This was in stark contrast to the Maastricht and Single European Act campaigns when the views of at least three political parties: Sinn Féin, the Green Party and Democratic Left and the 30% of the electorate who were opposed to Maastricht and the SEA were virtually ignored. RTÉ totally ruled out equal air-time for Yes and No sides on that occasion, arguing that most Leinster House parties were in favour and allotting time proportionately.

It would be wrong to suggest that the media was completely objective in this campaign, but it bore no comparison to the partisan approach they took when perceived economic interests - big bucks from Brussels - were at stake.

BY ANTON O MORDHA


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