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The Politician

got quite a bit to put in here - ach well! Not so much! How can you condense five years of political action and put it into a single web page? 
    Impossible!  I just got disturbed when people started killing each other, and shot my mouth off in the local, Belfast, Press, appalled at the stupidity of people shooting, bombing and maiming each other in order to either 'Keep Ulster British' or 'Fight for a United Ireland'.
    I'll not try to analyse the situation that developed, except to say that it appeared to me that the only thing that would help in the long-term would be to try to unite the ordinary decent people of the country, Catholic and Protestant, Unionist and Nationalist, and learn to live together.
    I was not alone in my views, and eventually, in 1970, those who felt like I did got together to form a Political Party, at a packed meeting in the Grand Central Hotel, Royal Avenue, Belfast.
    It was the start of five years of hectic activity, in which I, as an elected member of the Party Executive, Chairman of the Publicity Sub-Committee and ultimately Founder-Editor designer of "Alliance", the party newspaper, became totally involved - at the same time studying to take a degree in education. Quite a balancing act. 
    To cut the story short - I'm a bit pushed for time - elections took place in 1974 and I was selected to stand in the South Down constituency.
    These clippings record the event:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thirty years later "Alliance" still survives - only just - despite the hard lines drawn between the two tribes that exist in Northern Ireland.
    The story remains to be played out.  It's taking much longer than I first thought.  People seem to be afraid to move out from entrenched attitudes- not a bit of wonder, I suppose, when the hard men of violence have a grip upon 'their' areas and violent murder and obscene beatings and knee-cappings are daily occurrences.
    I remain firmly convinced that Alliance shows the way forward.  It may take 100 years, but I believe that in the future Alliance, or the movement that it represents, will play a part in finally resolving conflict in Northern Ireland.
    There are enough good people out there to ensure that this happens.  All they have got to do is find the courage - and the wisdom.
    Oh, by the way! I was not elected to the new Northern Assembly.  Eight of my Alliance colleagues were, and two of them, Bob Cooper and Oliver Napier, became Ministers in the new NI Government.  Regretfully, six months later the Assembly collapsed, brought down by a general strike organise by Ian Paisley and his Loyalist bullyboys, and the failure of a weak-kneed British government to face up to threat that was, in my opinion, more bluster than substance.
    I did get my Education Degree, just about!  It was 1975, and I was 43.
     "For goodness' sake!" I say to young people who seem to have missed out on education, "I was 39 before I took 'A' Levels!"

 

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