Sinn Fein face £400,000 bill for libel

The Iish News report (18 December) on the Declan Gormley libel case suffests that with the addition of legal costs, on top of the £80,000 libel award, Sinn Fein may face a bill of around £400,000.  The case lasted three weeks and that accounts for the legal costs of more than £300,000.

 

The case has certainly been interesting and one of the ironies was that while the press statement that was the cause for the case was snt out by Sinn Fein to all the media, newspapers, radio and television, not one of them actually carried it!  So Sinn Fein face a bill of around £400,000 for a news release that was never picked up by anyone.

The extent of Irish speaking

The limited extent of Irish speaking in Northern Ireland is highlighted in an answer to a written Assembly question.  The answer from Education minister John O'Dowd relates to children from families that use the language on a daily basis as the languge of the home.

English - 299,000 children
Polish - 3,847
Lithuanian - 1,564
Irish - 986
Portuguese - 755
Filipino - 650
Cantonese - 571
Malayalam - 518
Latvian - 359
Slovak - 294

The figure for Irish-speaking children is just 0.3% and is particularly interesting in that among primary school children Irish is the sixth most common language, with English as the most common at 96% and Polish coming second at 1.2%, roughly four times the figure for Irish.

 

There are many children who learn Irish in school and some of them may even attend Irish-medium schools but the figure of 986 indicates the number of schoolchildren who actually speak Irish with their parents as the language of the home.  Many of these homes will have more than one child and so the number of homes will be lower than the number of children but on the other hand there will also be some Irish-speaking homes with no schoolchildren in them.

 

Nevertheless what this shows is that the number of people who speak Irish on a daily basis and for whom Irish is their first language of choice, is much smaller than the number of people who record themselves in the census as Irish-speaking.  That figure will include all those who have learned Irish at school, in the same way as others learn French or German.

 

The fact is that even children who attend Irish-medium schools may not necessarily speak Irish at home as their parents may have no fluency in the language.

 

The census figures for Irish-speaking must therefore be treated with great caution.

Fermanagh GAA supports Sean Quinn

Sean Quinn

Fermanagh GAA has passed a resolution in support of Sean Quinn and his family at its annual county convention.  Around 140 delegates attended the convention and they backed a resolution in support of Quinn and his family.

Quinn was once the richest man in Ireland but is now bankrupt and serving a nine-week jail sentence in Dublin for contempt of court.  His son Sean has also served a prison sentence for failing to comply with a court order to stop putting international  assets out of the reach of IBRC, formerly known as Anglo-Irish Bank.  Another key figure in the business empire, Quinn's nephew Peter Quinn, has failed to turn up for court appearances and is evading the authorities in the Republic.

In a statement the GAA county board said Sean Quinn and the Quinn group had been generous backers of the GAA family for a long time.  The statement also said that 'his exceptional innovative skills have brought great benefits to all Fermanagh people.  Fermanagh GAA wishes to express their best wishes to Sean and his family at this time and hopes that 2013 will bring a favourable conclusion for the Quinn family in their present difficulties.'

However those who saw a television documentary on the Quinn's international business empire may well have a diffent view of the Quinn family.

Moreover some GAA fans and supporters have posted on the internet expressing their disagreement with the Fermanagh GAA resolution and when the Irish News approached Fermanagh GAA for a comment no-one was available.

 

Back in July senior GAA figures had turned up at a rally in support of Sean Quinn.  Mickey Harte, Colm O'Rourke, Jarlath Burns, Joe Kernan and Sean Boylan had all turned up at the rally in Cavan on 29 July, along with Fr Brian D'Arcy.  However a former Dublin GAA chief criticised them for giving public support to the Quinn business dynasty.  Fine Gael councillor John Bailey, who was chairman of Dublin's GAA board for eleven years, said the was 'shocked' by the support of GAA figures for Sean Quinn.  'The law is the law.  Nobody is above the law.  GAA figures should not involve themselves in this controversy and it is sending out all the wrong signals.  I don't accept for a minute that well-known GAA figures should be seen to be supporting the Quinns.'  At the same time Dublin TD Olivia Mitchell said, 'I have absolutely no sympathy for the Quinn family.  I believe the Quinns have done a lot of damage to this country.'

 

Then at the end of September a statement of support for Quinn from a group called Concerned Irish Citizens was read out at half-time at Brewster Park in Enniskillen during the Fermanagh county GAA final.  The statement called on GAA fans to attend a rally in support of Sean Quinn in Ballyconnell, county Cavan, on 14 October.  The statement urged them to 'oppose the injustices against the Quinn family.'

 

At first it was support from individual GAA figures, then an announcement at a GAA final and now a formal resolution of support from the Fermanagh county board.

 

I wonder what those who criticised individual GAA figures for supporting the bankrupt businessman think now that it is formal support from the Fermanagh county board?

 

 

 

 

Sinn Fein face a big bill for malicious libel

Cathal Boylan MLA, one of the defendants

After what was clearly a fractious libel case, taken by Declan Gormley against Sinn Fein and two Sinn Fein politicians, the jury has awarded Gormley, a former director of Northern Ireland Water, £80,000 plus costs.  The case was into its fourth week so the costs will probably exceed the damages.

 

This was a bad result for Sinn Fein and there may well be another on the way.

 

Gormley is pursuing a second legal case, which involves the Department for Regional Development, former Sinn Fein minister Conor Murphy MP and former permanent secretary Paul Priestly.  This case alleges misconduct in public office, something which they deny.

 

With poor performances from Gerry Adams TD in the Dail and this case in Northern Ireland, the past week has been a bad week for Sinn Fein.

Sunday World - wrong again!

The Sunday World (16 December) carried an article on Basil McCrea and the Union flag. Here are two paragraphs from that article:

And was Basil not right when he questioned the involvement of his own party members, along with those from the DUP, in the distribution of 40,000 anti-Alliance party leaflets before the City Hall vote?

The pamphlet was in Alliance colours and was distributed ONLY in east Belfast - a sinister, cynical attempt to target and pressurise the sitting MP Naomi Long .......

There is a fundamental error in this analysis. The Sunday World states categorically that the pamphlet was only distributed in east Belfast and that is indeed fundamental to their analysis. However the pamphlet was actually distibuted in every constituency in Belfast - North, South, East and West. I know, for example, that the leaflets were distributed in parts of Lower North Belfast and White City because I spoke to some of the people who distributed them and councillors in the Court area distributed them in loyalist estates in West Belfast.

So the entire Sunday World article is based on an untruth!

 

Ironically the article carried a sub-title 'Truth is casualty in on-going war' and included this observation, 'In other words, don't let the truth get in the way of our cause.'

 

It is indeed ironic that truth was a casualty in this article and the author certainly didn't let the truth get in the way of his argument!

 

The one thing I haven't mentioned so far is the name of the Sunday World journalist who got it so badly wrong ... again. It was in fact none other than Richard Sullivan.

Tim Attwood's 'foot in mouth'

The SDLP is really an utter shambles and now Councillor Tim Attwood, brother of Alex Attwood, brings us another example of 'foot in mouth disease'.

 

The Irish News (Saturday 15 December) carried a report on 92 sites in Belfast that have been acquired over the years by Belfast Regeneration Office, which is part of the Department for Social Development.

 

Many of the sites are on the market for sale but the current state of the property market means that there is little interest from developers, especially in the case of sites which are in areas of deprivation or close to interfaces.

 

Tim Attwood was intereviewed by the Irish News and called for an audit of the sites.  He also said that alternative and even temporary uses should be found and then added 'DSD needs to get the finger out and make this happen.'

 

Ever ready with a quote, the SDLP councillor, whom some of his critics unfairly describe as 'Dim Tim', failed to recognise that in criticising DSD he was also criticising his own brother, who was DSD minister from May 2010 to 2011, and his former party leader Margaret Ritchie MP, who was DSD minister from 2007 to 2010.

 

This is not a new issue and nearly all of the sites were in DSD ownership long before I came into the department in May last year.  Indeed one site was acquired more thaan 30 years ago.

 

So during that period from 2007 to 2011, when Margaret and Alex were in the department, did Tim tell them to 'get the finger out' and make things happen.  Somehow I don't think so.

 

In public life it is always a good idea to put the brain in gear before opening the mouth and Tim would do well to heed that advice.

 

Time and again I find SDLP politicians in the Assembly castigating DSD about some issue or other and time and again Iam able to  respond by saying that I inherited the problem from the SDLP.  You would think they would have learned by now but obviously not!

 

Of course what can you expect from a party with a leader like Alasdair McDonnell MP MLA?

 

Meanwhile, with 14 vacant sites on the Shankill Road alone, I have been working with officials to see these inner city communities regenerated.  That will require new approaches and new thinking but that is what I want to bring to the table.

Perhaps in future, just perhaps, Alex Attwood's younger brother will think before rushing into print.  Of course, as the leader of the SDLP group in the City Hall, Councillor Tim Attwood has had a lot on his mind in recent weeks.
 

When a loyalist tune was played INSIDE St Patrick's

An old friend usually sends me a home-made card at Christmas.  This year I think he excelled himself, producing a card with an interesting topical twist and it is based on an incident in the history of St Patrick's Roman Catholic Church in Donegall Street.

 

Earlier this year there was controversy over a loyalist band playing a tune outside St Patrick's but some years ago a loyalist tune was played inside St Patrick's.

 

The church was built between 1810 and 1812 to the design of Patrick Davis and the first organist was John Willis.  However he was dismissed for playing The Boyne Water, with variations, at a service in St Patrick's.  According to Hugh Dixon it was 'probably the only occasion on which this was ever played in an Irish Roman Catholic Church.'

 

As a result of his choice, his services were dispensed with but he went on to play the organ in St Anne's parish church, now St Anne's Cathedral, where he played from 1825 to 1847, and later became the first organist in Donegall Street Methodist Church.  However we don't know if he played The Boyne Water during these appointments.