Max McGuinness applauds Eamon Gilmore, disdains Eamonn J Clarke.
A letter in today's Irish Times from the Reverend Eamonn J Clarke has brought to my attention a welcome declaration by Labour Party leader Eamon Gilmore at last week's Party conference over the scandal of educational apartheid in this country, which I have previously written about here, and here.
Gilmore chose the right metaphor in comparing the status of a Catholic baptismal certificate when it comes to obtaining a place in our still priest-ridden schools to that of a "pass book" in apartheid South Africa which regulated the movements of blacks, coloreds(i.e mixed race), and Indians in urban areas.
The good Reverend(whose co-religionists are well-catered for by many Protestant schools), in a spirit of bogus ecumenicism, decided he should stick up for his fellow Christians and accuses Gilmore of taking a "cheap shot" at the Catholic Church and demands to know whether it is Labour Party policy to make Catholics second-class citizens in this country.
Don't. Be. Silly
All this without ever addressing the real issue: the hundreds of mostly black children who have been shunted into a temporary school in Balbriggan either because they are not Catholics or cannot prove that they are(having neglected to pack their baptisimal certificates on the trip from Lagos).
In his conference speech, Eamon Gilmore actually became the first mainstream Irish politician(Socialist Party ex-TD Joe Higgins holds a similar view) to take a real stand in favour of secularism since as long as I can remember. His predecessor in the Labour Party, Noel Browne was probably the only true Irish republican in recent history. Note that republicanism, if it is to mean anything at all, means a firm commitment to booting God out of the public sphere altogether.
One line in a speech does not a policy make but this is also the first time that a politician from one of the large parties has taken the concerns of immigrants seriously. Lo, Gilmore may be cleverer than he seems and is appealing to them as voters. Immigrants have been firm supporters of left-wing parties throughout the rest of Europe as well as the US Democratic Party so maybe the New Irish are the best hope for our own Labour Party.
So are you proposing that if a school has a shortage of places that IRISH children who have been baptised and brought up in their local parish should lose their places to 'the hundreds of mostly black children' who arrive on the schools doorstep, all in the name of promoting secularism?
I'm guessing you don't have any children who would be affected by this!
Posted by: Diarmuid | November 30, 2007 at 21:39
Is this website an extension of the letters page of the Irish Times Max?
Posted by: Gerard Brady | December 05, 2007 at 21:17