Gerry Adams

Momentum around Unity Grows I want to begin by commending the SDLP for organising last week’s conference – The Future of these Islands: Preparing for Change. It was a well-attended day-long event, held in Belfast, on the issue of Irish Unity. Among those who contributed to the series of discussions was Dublin Minister for Justice Jim O’Callaghan, former Taoiseach Leo Varadkar, Sinn Féin’s Conor Murphy and others, including leading figures in the SDLP like the party leader Claire Hanna. Add this to Fine Gael’s announcement that it is planning to publish...

The Unity Bill passes its First stage The “Planning for Constitutional Change Bill 2026”, which I referenced in last week’s column, has passed its first hurdle in the Dáil. It will now go to second stage on 7 July and then on to the Committee stage before returning to the Dáil later in the year. The Bill sets clear goals and timetables for measures that have to be taken to properly plan and prepare for constitutional change on the island of Ireland. It does so in accordance with the provisions of the Good Friday Agreement. It requires the Taoiseach to prepare and publish a Green Paper within 12 months. This has to address issues as diverse as public finance, taxation, public services, human rights, governance arrangements and relations between Britain and Ireland. The Bill also obliges the Government to establish a Citizens’ Assembly on Irish unity within six months of the publication of the Green Paper. Convened and funded by the Department of An Taoiseach, this will bring together representatives of the people of Ireland from all communities and citizens who have a stake in the future. Clodagh Good Last Saturday I joined hundreds of people in Knock Methodist Church for a celebration of the life of Clodagh Good. The Church was filled to overflowing with political representatives from over the last four decades or so, of all political hues including Gerry Kelly, Jim Gibney and Richard McAuley. It was a beautiful, uplifting and inclusive event. As was befitting the woman we came to honour. Clodagh Good, nee Coad, is the wife of Harold Good. Harold was a key figure in our peace process. He did extraordinary work, not least with Fr Alex Reid. He was one of those from what is usually described as the Protestant tradition who went beyond the rhetoric and into the essence of that tradition to explore how it could be a catalyst for positive change. A catalyst for good. The Methodists are like that. Especially Clodagh. She was from Waterford. As Irish as the day is long. With strong yet gentle religious beliefs which anchored her life. A woman of good humour with an unassuming practical good natured welcoming attitude to those of us lucky to enjoy her hospitality. She and Harold married sixty years ago. She left the tranquillity of Waterford to journey with him throughout Methodist institutions far and wide before making her home in the North. The Arts in a New Ireland The Sean O'Casey Community Centre is in East Wall, Dublin. It is an excellent local facility providing a range of amenities for the community, including a playschool and crèche, a sports hall and 7 a-side pitch, and facilities for senior citizens. It also has a wonderful theatre. Last Thursday Sinn Féin’s Commission on the Future of Ireland held a well-attended public discussion there on ‘The Arts in a New Ireland’. About 70 people participated in a thoughtful, informative and enjoyable conversation. Aengus O’Snodaigh TD welcomed everyone and spoke briefly about the many advantages and opportunities for the Arts community that Irish unity can bring Slán Finally, Keir Starmer announced his resignation on Monday. His support for Israel in its military actions against the people of Palestine and the Labour government’s disgraceful criminalising of those opposing the genocide, undoubtedly played a significant part in undermining his leadership. Along with the electoral successes of Plaid Cymru and the Scottish National Party there is a changing political dynamic emerging within the British political system. It is an opportunity for those of us who believe in Irish Unity to grasp this moment. Keir Starmer did nothing for Ireland. His successor may not do any better. That is why, relying on our own strength, we must press on. Until we prevail and our people, all of us, decide our own future.

American Trade Unions and Ireland Last Friday I spent an enjoyable couple of hours in the company of my good friend American Trade Union leader John Samuelson and the staff of Áras Uí Chonghaile and Fáilte Feirste Thiar – the west Belfast Tourist Board. Unbeknownst to John both organisations had agreed to name one of the Áras rooms after himself and a former Transport Workers Union, (TWU) President Mike Quill. Keeping the Faith for Unity This Easter the Good Friday Agreement is 28 years old. It only seems like yesterday that we were all gathered in Castle Buildings wondering if David Trimble was going to take the leap. He hadn’t spoken to Sinn Féin at any time during the negotiations – except on one occasion when I said hello to him in the toilet and he told me to grow up. But on Friday 10 April 1998 he signed up to the Agreement. It was a defining moment in our recent history. It was a compromise between conflicting political positions. For the first time since partition the Agreement brought peace, stability and hope, and the opportunity for a better future for all the people of the island of Ireland. Terry ‘Cruncher O’Neill It was the profound sadness that I heard on Sunday of the death of my friend and comrade Terry ‘Cruncher’ O’Neill. Cruncher was an incomparable singer of Irish songs of resistance. Type his name into google and you Will discover videos and audio recordings of Cruncher singing. My memory is full of occasions when he enthralled an audience. There is a great Frankie Quinn photo of himself, Joe Cahill, me and Gerry Kelly singing ‘Something Inside So Strong’ at the tops of our voices outside the old Sevastopol Street office. Cleaky is in the foreground looking after us. Gabriel Rosenstock. As we go to press I am also sorry to hear of the death of Gabriel Rosenstock, poet, play wright, haikuist and writer. Gabriel was one of the leading lights of Irish language literature. He was the author and translator of more than 180 books and publisher of over 400.

Remembering Frank Stagg Last week marked 50 years of the death of Frank Stagg on hunger strike in Wakefield Prison, in England. Events, including a black flag vigil and a march and rally were organised to remember the Mayo man. Gerry Kelly who was on hunger strike in England in the 1970s for over 206 days, during which he was force fed 167 times, gave the main oration in Ballina and spoke of Frank’s great courage and commitment. I was in Long Kesh when Frank died on 12 February 1976 after 62 days on hunger strike. Britain’s intransigence and in particular the obduracy of the then Home Secretary Roy Jenkins, ensured that Frank’s fourth hunger strike would result in his death. As we walked around the Cage or sat in our cells the talk from when Frank embarked on his fast, was about his resolve and strength of character as on his own he faced the brutality of a British system determined to break him. Two years earlier we had watched as Frank’s friend and comrade Michael Gaughan, another Mayo man, had died on hunger strike. Holy Smoke I used to smoke. I was very addicted to it. I smoked everything that was legal. I smoked a pipe for years. I liked the pipe. There is a certain ritual attached to pipe smoking. Filling your pipe requires special skills. It takes time. And care. Fill it too loosely and it will not last long. Too tightly and it will not burn at all. Most pipe smokers had a number of pipes. But there was always a favourite one. My favourites were invariably Kapp and Petersons. Particularly the bendy ones, favoured by Sherlock Holmes. Kapp and Peterson still have a shop in Dublin. Kapp and Peterson gets honourable mention in Samuel Beckett’s Waiting For Godot. In Belfast Miss Morans in Church Lane, which is still doing business, was a favoured supplier of pipes and good tobacco. Pipe tobacco is of course a matter of choice and taste. And addiction. I was inclined towards heavier brands like Condor. The I graduated to War Horse, particularly War Horse plug tobacco. The preparation of this type of pipe filler requires a pen knife for cutting off little slices of tobacco. These were then rubbed between your hands until they were reduced to the desired consistency. This added to the ritual. It was probably theraputic. If thats not a contradiction. Ditto with the smell of pipe smoke. Back in the day pipe smokers were a fixed presence in pubs and at most social gatherings. Many people, barely visible in the clouds of smoke, would declare how much they liked the smell. The death of Nora Comiskey It was with sadness that I heard of the death last week of Nora Comiskey. Many Dublin republicans and some of us from Belfast and other parts knew Nora over many years. She was a former president and long-time activist in the 1916-1921 Club. This was a unique institution founded in the 1940s whose aim was to try and bring together some of those who fought on the pro and anti- Treaty sides in the Civil War. Many did, including Nora who had been in Fianna Fáil. Its founding charter is the 1916 Proclamation and among its objectives are a commitment to honour those who fought for Irish Freedom and who work for its achievement. It also seeks to contribute to the cause of an Ireland — united, independent and sovereign

And Flowers Grew up Through the Concrete is Laurence McKeown’s second prison memoir. Big Laurny, is a very fine writer. This latest book is an account of his journey through imprisonment, hunger strike, brutality and growing self-awareness. It is beautifully written and unashamedly honest in its emotion. Laurence is one of those gifted republican POWs who spent years – decades in some cases – in British prisons and who have written about their experience. Together they have generated a huge body of prison literature comparable to previous periods in the independence struggle. Among them are Eoghan MacCormaic and Jazz Jim McCann; Pat Magee; Gerry Kelly; Síle Darragh’s inspirational account of the women in Armagh - ‘John Lennon Is Dead’; Danny Morrison, Roseleen Walsh; Tony Doherty, Chrissie McAuley, Jim McVeigh; Jake MacSachais, Richard McAuley and others. I apologise to any I have left out - always a danger when you produce a list of any kind. Perhaps the best known of all the prison writers is Bobby Sands whose poems, songs and accounts of life in the H-Blocks and on Hunger Strike still resonate over four decades after his death. Writing on scraps of paper to be smuggled out, Bobby’s poetry, prose, political polemic, songs and other writings in Irish and English are now part of the tradition. Laurence’s previous books include, with Brian Campbell and Felim O’Hagan, ‘Nor Meekly Serve My Time” which covers the blanket protest from 1976 to 1981; ‘Out of Time: Irish Republican Prisoners Long Kesh 1972-2000’; and with Brian Campbell the script for the film H3. A Real Peace Settlement Needed Last week the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky visited the Irish state. In the course of his meetings President Zelensky also addressed the Oireachtas in which he called for a peace without humiliation. His visit came at a time when there is widespread speculation that the US government is pressuring Ukraine to accept a peace deal that would force it to cede land to Russia. My starting point as a republican is clear. The people of Ukraine have a right to self-determination and the Russian invasion is a breach of international law. With Russia intensifying its drone attacks on Ukraine, especially its targeting of civilian infrastructure like energy, health care and water, there is an urgent need for an intensification of the peace efforts. Gearóid Ó Cairealláin Reáchtáladh deireadh seachtaine d’imeachtaí in An Chultúrlann cúpla lá ó shin chun Gearóid Ó Cairealláin, a fuair bás anuraidh, a chomóradh agus chun ár meas a léiriú dá fhís agus dá chrógacht. Scrúdaigh na himeachtaí téamaí an agóid Mo bhuíochas ó chroí le hEoghan Ó Néill agus na daoine a chuir Scoil Gheimhridh Uí Chairealláin le chéile. Obair iontach, agus sílim go bhfuil Gearóid an-sásta leis. Diaspóra, ceol, siúlóid, fáthanna éagsúla… agus an taispeántas galánta fosta ar shaol Ghearóid — go han-maith. Seo mar chara é agus mar fhear a raibh go leor fiontar aige. Agus é ag baint sult as an saol. Tá gá le gach streachailt le glór ciotach – ach glór dearfach. Bhí Gearóid lón smaointe geala.

Our 1916 The eight months of the 1981 hunger strike campaign changed the political landscape in Ireland. It was as Síle Darragh, former O.C. of the republican women prisoners in Armagh Women’s Prison, said recently, “our 1916.” It began on 1st March 1981. When it ended on 3rd October ten hungerstrikers were dead. Bobby Sands had been the first to die on May 5th. He was followed over the following four summer months up to August by Francis Hughes, Raymond McCreesh, Patsy O Hara, Joe McDonnell, Martin Hurson, Kevin Lynch, Kieran Doherty, Thomas McElwee, and Micky Devine. On Sunday last people came in their thousands, from all parts of the island of Ireland, and from overseas, to participate in the annual August march and to honour and commemorate the ten who died forty-four years ago in the H blocks and others who starved to death decades before this including Frank Stagg and Michael Gaughan who died in the 1970s in prison in England. The stories of the ten hunger strikers and of their comrades in the H-Blocks and Armagh Women’s Prison, who spent five years on the protest for political status, are many. The brutal physical and mental abuse the women and men endured in defence of the struggle for freedom and in rejection of the label ‘criminal,’ has been articulated in a series of books, poems and articles. These include Ten Men Dead by David Beresford; Seachtain an an Bhlaincéad by Ruairí Ó Dónaill; The Crunch has come by Eoghan MacCormaic, written while he was in the H-Blocks and using the pen name Frankie O ‘Brien; Nor Meekly Serve my Time by some of the POWs; John Lennon is Dead by Síle Darragh; Time Shadows by Laurence McKeown; 6000 Days by Jim (Jaz) McCann: ; Pluid: Scéal na mBlocanna H, 1976-81 by Eoghan MacCormaic; Playing My Part by Gerry Kelly; and the many poems and articles written by Bobby Sands. And there are others including by this writer. Speaking at the Republican Plot in Milltown Cemetery where Bobby Sands, Joe McDonnell and Ciaran Doherty are buried, Uachtarán Mary Lou McDonald caught the legacy and memory of that time when she described the hungerstrikers as: “Ten brave Irish men who laid down their lives on hunger strike for the freedom of their country. Starved and persecuted they lay in the H-Blocks and with every sinew of their being, they refused to be criminalised, refused to be broken, refused to be defeated.” She said: “For them, we will do the work, we will walk the extra yards, we will write our nation’s next chapter – Ireland, united and free… Joined by heroic women in Armagh Gaol, they hungered not only for political status, but for the Ireland envisaged by the proclamation – for the Republic… The legacy of the hunger strikers calls to us today. To stay true to vision and the dream for which they gave everything. To never despair. Never lose hope. Never give up.” Perhaps one of the most emotional moments of the day was as the huge march made its way along the Falls Road toward Milltown. A huge banner of Bik McFarlane was unfurled as the march rounded the bend on the Falls Road, just above Beechmount. The blanket men and women who were leading the commemoration stopped and for a minute lifted their clenched fists in silent salute to the friend and comrade who had led them through that terrible year. In his contribution to Guthanna ’81, published last Saturday, Bik, who died earlier this year, wrote about that experience. His account provides an insight, into t

A Good Start To 2025. On Saturday last leading trade union activists from across the island of Ireland came together in Newry for a packed Ireland’s Future event in the Thomas Davis Hub. It was a wet winter morning and i was pleasantly uplifted by the turn out. The panel included ICTU assistant general secretary Gerry Murphy, Unison regional general secretary Patricia McKeown, Phil Ni Sheaghdha, general secretary of the Nurses and Midwives Organisation, Katie Morgan of FORSA, Greg Ennis of SIPTU and Gerry McCormack of the ICTU. It was a lively and informative debate which pointed to a much better future for workers in a united Ireland. Ireland’s Future is for holding the referendums by 2030 and Saturday’s public sectoral meeting is part of a consultation for what it believes is the ‘crucial five-year period’ ahead of us. Niall Murphy, who is the secretary of Ireland’s Future explained that it seeks “to continue to inform, educate and stimulate the conversation on constitutional change in the years preceding a referendum. The pace of change has quickened and we are firmly of a belief that a referendum will take place around the year 2030, therefore it is incumbent upon the political administrations in Dublin, Belfast and London to prepare, and it is also imperative that civil society, including the trade union movement, recognises the constitutional space we are now entering.” Let the Music Keep Your Spirits High I am not a big watcher of television. When I have my way – which is usually when everyone else is out – the TV goes on only when there is something I want to watch. Other times it is a constant background noise. An intrusion. Like white noise. Sometimes I just like the silence. Or some good music. Alexia and I have become friends. I like to listen to music when I’m writing. So Radio Na Gaeltachta, Radio Fáilte, Lyric, Radio Ulster and RTE Radio1 are my broadcasters of choice. I also have tons of tunes on my phone. And an IPod loaded up with thousands of songs from Seamus Drumm who has the most expansive reservoir of ceol of anyone I know. My ambition is to listen to all Seamie’s collection before I die. Listening to music on these various devices wraps me in a melodious comfort blanket of uplifting sounds. Sometimes I will even join in. A Ceasefire The ceasefire in Gaza is only a step in a long process. It is about justice, peace, and the right of the Palestinian people to have self determination.

This Too Will Pass All of this is grist to the mill of our opponents. But we do not begrudge them that. One of our political achievements is to expose the sameness of these parties interests and policies. We now have to create an alternative. So we have to play our own game regardless of what the naysayers claim. Unlike the southern parties Sinn Féin is currently fighting the British general election in the North. So we have to bend our will to that before gathering ourselves for what comes after. One thing is for certain we have plenty of work to do in a changing and volatile political climate with significant electoral challenges. Sanctions Now On 12 June, Israel’s genocidal war on the Palestinian people of the Gaza Strip and the west Bank will have lasted for 250 days. In that time over 36,000 Palestinian children, women and men have been killed and many tens of thousands wounded, some crippled for life with lost limbs and a psychological trauma that will never go away. Ella O’Dwyer It was with great sadness that I heard last week of the death of Ella O’Dwyer. Ella was one of a brave band of IRA Volunteers who travelled to Britain in the 1980s. She and Martina Anderson were arrested in Glasgow in 1985. Ella was 26 years old and Martina Anderson was 23. In June 1986 the two along with three male comrades - Gerry ‘Blute’ McDonnell, Peter Sherry and Pat Magee – were given life sentences at the Old Bailey in London for planning IRA attacks.

A Boy named Jay I did a book signing for Christmas at An Fhuiseog’s stand in the Kennedy Centre. It was a pleasant hour of banter and craic, meeting old friends and making new ones. Gerry Kelly was there just before me but he escaped when I arrived. So it was just me and the punters. And RG and Maggie who was selling all matter of gifts for An Fhuiseog. 2024 – Momentum toward Unity Polls set to increase After weeks, months, of public and private negotiations it is still not clear as 2023 draws to a close what the future of the Executive and Assembly will be. The British government says it has delivered its final word on the issue. The various party positions remain as they were. We shall see what the New Year brings on this.

Unique Robert Ballagh Moore Street Print As regular readers of this column know I have been involved for a very long time in the campaign to protect and develop as a historic and cultural quarter the Moore St. Terrace and its environs in Dublin. The entire terrace 10-25 Moore Street was occupied by the evacuated GPO garrison at the end of Easter Week 1916. The developer - Hammerson - wants to demolish much of the terrace. You Are Never Alone With A Book. I’m glad to say I finished reading a few books over the last month so I will update you on them over the next couple of weeks. First off is The Ghost Limb by Claire Mitchell. This is an intriguing read and Ms Mitchell is a persuasive writer, gentle, witty and positive. She describes herself as an alternative Protestant and Ghost Limb has a sub-title ‘Alternative Protestants and the Spirit of 1798’. In this compelling book a group of these citizens retrace the steps of the United Irishmen - and women- who worked for the unity of Catholic, Protestant and Dissenter over two hundred years ago as a means to end the connection with England. Walking with my Mother Our mother Annie Hannaway – Annie Adams died on the 4th September 1992. Her spirit lives on in the memory of our family and those who knew her. Here’s a little poem I wrote a few years ago.