Republican News · Thursday 31 January 2002

Special Court must go

A Chairde,

The Irish judiciary continues to use the inherited British judicial system as it also continues to use the inherited county boundaries. As we all know law and justice can be poles apart.

Is it not time for us to consider an inquisitorial system, as opposed absolutely to inquisitions, where those charged with a crime would come before a judge or tribunal, depending on gravity, where 'the bench' poses the questions to witnesses.

In this scenario an advocate, if desired, should be available to the accused, depending on the gravity of the case and the intellectual capacity of the accused.

Judges in such a system should not have any ownership interest in more than one house and any investments/savings should be lodged in 'state enterprise'.

How often have we heard of counsel putting on a 'great performance' in cases under the current system. Justice is far too important to be determined by the 'performance' of one counsel against another.

Gerry Concagh
Dún Laoghaire

Public pays price

A Chairde,

For many years, Sinn Féin has been working to expose injustice and hypocrisy in Irish society. So, while Charlie Haughey and his Fianna Fáil government were berating workers to tighten their belts "for the good of the country", we pointed out that FF leaders like Haughey, Burke and Lawlor were lining their pockets.

d, while governments and the media told us that British Forces were the "good guys" (and wasted millions of taxpayers' hard-earned money in collaborating with them), it is now emerging that these sinister forces were up to their eyes in murky deeds involving innocent Irish citizens including the 14 Bloody Sunday dead, the 33 victims of the Dublin/Monaghan massacre, human rights solicitors Pat Finucane and Rosemary Nelson, and hundreds of other unarmed Irish people.

During all that time, we had to listen to Church leaders pontificating on contraception, divorce, homosexuality, abortion, etc (as well as condemning republicans and backing British Forces in the north). Once again, Sinn Féin tried to point out the hypocrisy of those clerics, especially Fr Michael Cleary and Bishop Cathal Daly, but in those days of censorship, no one was listening.

Now, decades later, the serious damage done to many vulnerable young children by perverted clerics has, at last, become public. But the Church, when they could no longer hide, tried to maintain their vast wealth, instead of trying to make some amends to their victims.

Just before the General Election, the FF/PDs made a, then secret, deal with the Church, which means that the maximum that 18 Orders can be liable for over 40 years of abuse is only €127 million. Even that is not to be paid in cash. Over €80 million is in property, most of which was paid for by the public and which is now surplus to the declining religious Orders‚ needs. Another €13 million goes to a trust under Church control, leaving only a miserly €25 million cash to be paid by the Church. In contrast, it is estimated that taxpayers, who didn't abuse anyone, will have to pay out up to €500 million.

Once again, the FF/PD solution is that the rich and powerful get a blank cheque while the rest of us are told to bugger off and pay up.

Seán Marlow
Dublin 11

The Ireland Institute

A Chairde,

In the 7 March issue of An Phoblacht, it was reported that the Ireland Institute 'hosted' the launch of Daithí Doolan's election campaign in Dublin South East. This is incorrect: the Ireland Institute rented rooms to Daithí for this meeting and the transaction was essentially a commercial one. This distinction is important to us because the Institute is and must be completely independent of all party politics.

The Ireland Institute for Historical and Cultural Studies was established in 1996 and is based in the Pearse Family Home in Dublin. Pádraig and Willie Pearse were born here, and the family ran their ecclesiastical and architectural sculpture business from the house for many years. When the building was acquired by the Institute, it was in a state of neglect and decay, but has since been restored with considerable assistance from the Department of Arts, Heritage, Gaeltacht and the Islands.

The Ireland Institute is primarily a republican studies institute, founded to promote a broad, democratic republicanism. We deal with republicanism as a body of ideas about politics and society, which addresses the questions of good government and the common good, how society may be run in the shared interests of the people.

The Institute organises public lectures and seminars, and publishes a journal, The Republic. We are interested in both republican theory and its application to real issues. Over recent years we have addressed subjects such as democracy and the arts; republicanism and feminism; Casement and 20th century human rights; planning and democracy in local communities; nationalism and feminism; William Rooney and the Irish Revival; asylum seekers and refugees; Thomas MacDonagh and Francis Ledwidge; the war in Afghanistan; democracy and the EU; and more. We also hosted the recent Le Chéile art exhibition as part of the European action week against racism. A series of lectures in Irish, sponsored by Foras na Gaeilge, is currently in progress.

Irish language classes are run in the house by Sult Teoranta; the Emmet 200 committee have office space as they prepare for next year‚s bicentenary; and Poetry Ireland and the Dublin Poetry Conference each hold regular readings in the house. Most recently, the Latin America Solidarity Centre held an open day in the house as part of Latin America Solidarity Week.

Two issues of The Republic have been published to date; the first, 'Ireland Now', dealt with aspects of contemporary Ireland, while the second, 'The Common Good', examined republican theory and practice in an Irish and international context. The third issue will deal with republicanism and culture and will appear in late autumn.

A valuable aspect of our work to date has been the ability to involve a wide range of people in thinking about and debating republicanism, many of whom would have previously had no such engagement. The importance of this for the development of the Institute and of republican thinking in Ireland, and for the encouragement of a broader democratic culture here cannot be overstated. Any perception of partisanship could undermine the positive contribution we can make, and it is for this reason that we must guard our independence closely.

We hope that your readers will be interested in the Institute and will want to engage with it as it grows in the future.

Finbar Cullen,
The Ireland Institute,
27 Pearse Street,
Dublin 2.