Defending the Good Friday Agreement, and the lessons of 1916

2nd April 2013 Socialist Action 0

Next week will see the 15th Anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, described recently by Sinn Fein’s Martin McGuinness as ‘the single most important political agreement in our time’.

In his speech to the Dublin Commemoration of the 1916 Easter Rising, Martin McGuinness speaks of the Agreement as a turning point in Irish history, and resulting in a period in which republican objectives can be realised. He also warns against complacency and of the threats posed to the Good Friday Agreement by those who oppose equality and change.

Situating today’s struggle for a united Ireland in the context of the revolutionary struggle of 1916 which ‘started a bush fire of decolonisation, which engulfed the British Empire’, he spoke of the inspiration it inspired in ‘generations of people throughout the world who rose up against colonial rule’.

Photo: Sinn Féin

SDLP join unionists in attacking Good Friday Agreement

22nd March 2013 Socialist Action 0

By Frances Davis

Sinn Féin have correctly condemned attempts of anti-Good Friday Agreement unionists to push through an anti-peace process bill in Stormont this week – and hit out at the fact that the latest stage of the bill’s progress was backed by the SDLP.

Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness commented: ‘by supporting TUV legislation against former prisoners the SDLP have thrown the spirit of the Good Friday Agreement out of Stormont’s windows’.

Budget will fuel growing anti-austerity movement

21st March 2013 Socialist Action 0

By Nicky Dempsey

The struggle against austerity in Britain has moved up a gear.

The recent anti-bedroom tax protests were very broad-based geographically and in layers of support. The campaigns against local hospital closures are also gaining widespread support and are increasingly coordinated.

Rank hypocrisy in debate on press freedom

19th March 2013 Socialist Action 0

By Jane West

In the furore over the Tories’ retreat on the Leveson enquiry one thing is clear: the Tories are bound hand and foot to the media moguls that own Fleet St and the pundits and hacks that do their bidding.

The one thing it is not about is ‘press freedom’, thrown about hysterically in recent days by those defending the absolute right of the media to decide for itself what level of lying, prying and spying should be deemed acceptable.