Vo1.? No.

1
Contents October 1983
The War In Fine Gael 7
The Fine Gael party bears no resemblance to
the party that Garret FitzGerald took over in
1977. But the old guard took a stand against
the new order during the recent Amendment
campaign. Was this the start of their revival
or their last stand? Gene Kerrigan charts the
transformation of Fine Gael, and looks at the
war within the party.
Who Is J ames Delaney? 18
A Texan millionaire who owns the site of the
Battle of the Boyne is coming to Ireland to
meet politicians and businessmen. Kerry
Dougherty reports.
Barring Orders 20
The new system of Dail Committees is seen as
a step towards Dail reform. But the published
verbatim report of the first meeting of the
J oint Committee on Legislation is not en-
couraging.
Inside Mountjoy
Mark Brennock visited Mountjoy prison and
examined the conditions in which its 490
inhabitants live. "It is possible to obtain heroin
within the prison. Prison officers say they have
found prisoners in their cells with syringes in
their arms."
. .
Druid's Spell 34
The focus of excitement in Irish theatre has
switched from Dublin to Galway over the past
five years. Kevin Dawson goes to Lisdoonvarna
and Inishmaan with the Druid Theatre Com-
pany to seewhy.
Marathon Notebook 50
Kerry Dougherty talks to eight runners about
the 1983 Dublin City Marathon.
Brian Friel &
The Three Pamphleteers 53
Richard Kearney went to Derry to see Field
Day's production of Boesman and Lena by
Athol Fugard. He also reviews three new Field
Day pamphlets by Seamus Heaney, Seamus
Deane and Tom Paulin.
Departments
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Cover illustration by Littleman
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Editor
ColmToibin
Reporter
GeneKerrigan
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MAGILL OCTOBER 1983 3
LAST EASTER KATHLEEN
and DickMagennisof Maghera
County Derry discovered that
their sixteen-year-old daugh-
ter Elainewaspregnant. Elaine
was a fifth year student at
the local Catholic school, St
Patrick's High School and
was preparing to do ten 0-
level subjects in J une this
year.
Kathleen and Dick Magen-
nis decided to keep their
daughter's child and bring it
up themselves. They went to
see the headmaster of her
school, Fr Devine, to advise
himthat Elaine would not be
sitting the O-levels in J une,
as the baby was due in J uly,
but would return to school I I I I :~: . /
in September to begin the -
year again.
Elaine's parents were sur-
prised that Fr Devine, the
headmaster, did not seem
very interested in Elaine's
return to school but began
to ask questions about who
else in Maghera knew that
Elaine was pregnant. He re-
marked that "Maghera is a
small town with narrow-
minded people". He advised
her parents that she should
be sent away to a CURA
home to think things over
on her own. Her parents
said that they wanted Elaine
to stay with themin Maghera
andthe meeting ended.
The baby, a boy, was
born on J uly 21. Soon
afterwards Kathleen Magennis
met Fr Devine on the street
in Magheraand told himthat
Elaine would be back to
school in September. "We
will discuss it when the time
comes," said Fr Devine.
When Fr Devine returned
from holiday in America in
mid-August the Magennises
made an appointment to
meet him. When they went
down to the school Fr Devine
asked Elaine to wait outside I Elaine, Steven and Kathleen Magennis
,
which she did for a couple
of hours while Fr Devine
discussed the matter with her
parents. Her parents told Fr
Devine that she was feeling
well enough to resume her
studies in September. "Do
you think this isagood idea?"
Fr Devine replied. He went
on to talk of the good name
of the school. He asked them
how they thought the parents
of the other children would
feel. He reckoned she would
be a bad influence on the
other students, according to
Mr and Mrs Magennis.
Fr Devine recommended
that Elaine attend the convent
in Magherafelt, nine miles
away.
However, at no stageduring
this meeting did Fr Devine
refuse to take Elaine Magennis
back. He would not say yes
or no. "If this is an example
of Catholic education," her
father, who is anon-Catholic,
told Fr Devine, "she won't
go to another Catholic
school." Fr Devine asked if
he was being blackmailed and
refused once more to say
whether Elaine could go
back to the school or not.
He wanted Kathleen and
Dick Magennis to go away
and think about it. They
said they had already thought
about it.
According to Mr and Mrs
Magennis, Fr Devine asked:
"Whose idea is this for her
to come back here?" They
told him it was Elaine's
idea. "I find that very diffi-
cult to believe," he said.
The Magennises told him
that if they couldn't get a
reply from him they would
go to the bishop. He accused
them again of blackmailing
him and told them that the
decision was his and hisalone.
However, he still refused to
make the decision.
The following week the
school had already opened
and Fr Devine asked to see
Elaine Magennis. He told her
that as she was over 16 no
school was obliged to take
her. He asked her if she
agreed that she had failed
the school and what it stood
for. Heasked her if she didn't
owe it to the other pupils
to find herself aposition e]se-
where. Elaine Magennis also
claims that Fr Devine said
to her: "You seem to have
adopted this attitude that
you've had a baby and every-
thing is going to be alright."
She told him that she was
not ashamed of the child.
"It's you who have created
this situation," he told her.
Fr Devine has not been
available for comment.
Elaine says that she left
the meeting in tears.
Her mother phoned the
parish priest and asked him
if she could discuss the
matter with him. Fr Me-
Menamin refused. Hehas also
refused to comment toMagill.
She then phoned the bishop,
Edward Daly, who told her
he could perhaps have done
something if she had phoned
earlier, according to Mrs
Magennis.
In the second week of
September, when Elaine had
not gone back to school, the
story of her situation appeared
in the Belfast Telegraph and
the Northern edition of the
Sunday World. Both news-
papers used the term "gym-
slip mum". Radio Ulster also
did areport on the matter.
The bishop and Fr Devine
were later .to say that the
media coverage was one of
the main reasons why Elaine
could not get back into the
school even though the school
had already opened before
the matter was covered in the
media.
Once the story wascovered
in the newspapers, Bishop
Edward Daly said he could
not discuss the matter with
the parents as he could not
be guaranteed confidentiality.
The parents were told that a
decision would be made by
the school committee. On
September 19 they got a
letter from the committee
which deplored the media
coverage and expressed the
committee's support for Fr
Devine. This letter was signed
by Fr Devine. The following
day they were informed that
their daughter would not be
allowed into the school in
view of the publicity her case
had received. "I'll offer her
any help I can outside the
school," said Fr Devine.
At the time of going to
press it is not clear where
Elaine Magennis will continue
her education, but it will
not be in the local Catholic
school.
On the Sunday before the
Amendment vote, Bishop
Edward Daly urged the faith-
ful to vote yes in the referen-
dum. He also promised that
any young person finding her-
self pregnant would betreated
"with Christian kindness,
understanding and compas-
sion". When contacted by
Magill he stated that he
deplored the media coverage
of the matter and could not
discuss it in any detail but
supported Fr Devine in his
refusal to allow Elaine Magen-
nis to return to her local
school.
THE IDA HAS WELCOMED
the decision by Merck, Sharp
&Dohme to establish its new
1.5 million developmental
laboratory alongside its 35
million manufacturing facility
in Ballydine near Clonmel,
Co Tipperary.
Speaking at the launch of
the project, Mr J ohn Gorman,
Manager of IDA's Pharma-
ceuticals and Healthcare Divi-
sion said that the establish-
ment of the process develop-
ment laboratory at the Clon-
mel plant was in line with
IDA's policy of encouraging
companies to broaden their
operating bases in Ireland
beyond pure manufacturing.
Mr Gorman added that the
health care / pharmaceuticals
sector continued to be a key
growth area for the IDA. The
sector, he said, now compri-
ses 1"10firms employing al-
most 14,000 people. It had
exports of 800 million in
1982, or 20% of manufac-
turing exports. Thisrepresents
a major growth since 1970
when employment was 9,500
and exports were valued at
26 million. Ireland now
ranks as the tenth largest
exporter of pharmaceutical
products in the world.
Although there have been
complaints in the area about
the factory and several farmers
have claimed that the factory
has damaged their livestock,
no monitoring of the factory
is being done. This is on the
recommendation of Mark
Lynch of the Department of
Agriculture who said that no
monitoring should be done
until one farmer, J ohn Han- I
rahan, releases information
on the deaths in mysterious
circumstances of cattle on his
farm, information which he
has privately commissioned.
The Department of Agri-
culture then asked for access
to J ohn Hanrahan's land
which he refused on the basis
that he had given them access
in 1981 and they had not
conducted suitable tests. The
Government gave this as the
reason why it could not con-
tinue to investigate the prob-
lem in the area even though
it was established in the J une
issue of Magill that the prob-
lems were on other farms as
well.
At the beginning of J uly
J ohn Hanrahan decided to
grant the Department access
to his farm. However, it took
the Department two months
to respond to him. J oint
tests were carried out on
Thursday September 15 by
a team employed by J ohn
Hanrahan and a team from
the Department, which inclu-
ded Mark Lynch. Eight
animals were shot, some from
Hanrahan's farm and some
from other farms in the area
and tests will be carried out
on these.
There are still no monitors
in the area.
It is believed that An
Foras Forbartha has recently
warned South Tipperary
County Council that the situa-
tion in Ballydine is extremely
dangerous. The County Coun-
cil has not responded.
IN THE SEPTEMBER ISSUE
of Magill in the article entitled
"The Moral Civil War" a
typing mistake occurred
which was not corrected at
the proof-reading stage of
production. We were report-
ing on remarks made at a
meeting on family planning
held in Wexford in May and
we attributed these remarks
to Fr J ack McCabe, the
administrator of the parish of
Wexford who had been men-
tioned previously in the
article. We of course accept
that Fr McCabe did not make
these remarks as he was not
present at the meeting. We
apologise to Fr McCabe for
this mistake.
MAGILL OCTOBER 1983 5
E w~au;
rClfliamentary .Part)'J l1eting on September 22. It was the first suCh
tn.~eting.since the~~f~~~l1dum and..T0tn() 'Donnell was said. to .bepr~0:
paring.. an-.assaultql1;!~heFitzGeraldwing .. The meeting. opened ;w~tfi;
Fitz.~~a. ...':emgconci latory'>l~ mgwoun s, remm mg t e stat t. erewas a
realw?rldout there with realJ ?~oblems and it was time to get down to work, .to
climb every mountain, ford. every stream. The dissident 'IDs who had walked all
over FitzGerald in the Dail vote on the referendum, sat there when FitzGerald
finished. Tom O'Donnell's trouble-making, if there was any planned, never mater-
ialised. Alice Glenn sat mute.. Not one voice was raised against FitzGerald. The
meeting spent two hours discussingthe Criminal J ustice Bill.
The air of triumph among the dissident 'IDs in the wake of the referendum
faded considerably as time went on. Closescrutiny of tallies in some areas showed
that asubstantial part of the No vote wasfromFine Gael supporters. WithinMunster
there was considerable reaction against Tom O'Donnell in some areas. Alice Glenn
has her own problems, heightened by the death of George Colley and the fear that
a strong Fine Gael opponent might emerge in the constituency. Oliver J . Flanagan
had been making noises about the Fine Gael he knew being dead, but fewpay any
attention to Oliver these days.
Within the FitzGerald wing ofthe party there weremixed feelings. Some thought
that the dissidents mighthavefail~d to put the clock back but they had surely
stopped it. Others felt. that sin~eall. the most conservative. forces had given.the
Amendll).~nttheirbest shot>ian?/~chieved an ambiguous and disappointing result
- the9B()~ had been... openedf()~>()tljerissues, less emotise,' Bllwhich .there.. c()91~
be coole.r debate. The r.esult ..... w. o.>u ....... l..... d,for instance, encourage-an earlier decisiono. n.>
divorce.. ......... . . . .> ...
Overall, there was a feeling that fire should be held for the time being. Issues
of morals, sureto provoke conflict; should beleft on the back burner.
However, circumstances dictate that the conflict will
continue. Marital breakdown has been safely batted away
to an interparty committee. That will take a year, then a
long time more to consider the report and even longer to
do anything. One Fine Gael TD, on the conservative wing
but with a realistic view of the need to deal with the prob-
lem, reckons it will take seven or eight years.
The divorce issue is on the back burner, but there are
others more imminent which are likely to revive the con-
flict. Nuala Fennell is gearing up for legislation on illegi-
timacy. More immediate is Michael Noonan's J oint Matri-
monial Property Bill, the headings of which have been
decided and which isnow in preparation.
The demands for such legislation have emerged from the
changed nature of Irish society. Fine Gael is the party
which most represents that change. It is also the party
which has its roots in a conservatism which resists such
change.
ITJ
N DECEMBER 1980 A ROUTINE MEETING
of the Fine Gael parliamentary party had
I before it a proposal that the party immediately
begin holding selection conventions - to
choose candidates in each constituency to contest the
general election which must come sometime in the follow-
ing eighteen months. The TDs considered the matter and
rejected the proposal by 42 votes to one. The one being
Garret FitzGerald.
Once candidates are chosen in a constituency they all
have the same status, whether they are currently TDs or
not. And TDs don't like having ambitious young things
hustling around the constituency, shaking hands and
getting their names known. Maybe the early selection of
candidates would be good for Fine Gael, but it wasn't
necessarily good for the Fine Gael TDs - so they said no. .
The next day, a meeting of the National Executive of
the party voted that selection conventions would begin
as soon as possible. And so they did, on J anuary 11 1981.
The last of the selection conventions took place two days
before Charlie Haughey called the J une 1981 general
election. Fine Gael had aflying start.
The fact that the National Executive could overrule
the TDs in the interests of the party was symptomatic of
the major transformation of Fine Gael carried out since
1977, what more than one participant casually describes as
the "hi-jacking" of the party. The hi-jacking of the hide-
bound and somewhat decrepit party was carried out openly
and met little resistance. The skirmishes were minor and
would only erupt into open war over the issue of the Con-
stitutional Amendment. By then it was too late. The Alice
Glenn wing could demand the silencing of Young Fine Gael
and that group could in turn openly announce its intention
of forcing out the ultra-conservative rump. But that was all
mouth. The war in Fine Gael is not fought like that.
OO
INE GAEL WAS A MICKEY MOUSE PARTY
right from the start. The party represented the
F coming together of three conservative forces
that emerged in the wake of the civil war. The
National Centre Party was acoalition of afew Independent
TDs elected in 1932 from bases of large farmers and pro-
<'.
Treatyites. The Blueshirts were stormtroopers with soft
shoes, a would-be fascist paramilitary group destined to
collapse in farce. The most important element was Cuman~
na nGaedheal.
Cumann. na nGaedheal held power throughout the twen-
ties as a result of the outcome of the civil war. They rep-
resented stability and an end to the conflict and thus att-
racted the large farmer and big business support. They also
had the advantage of the anti-Treatyites not taking their
seats until August 1927.
Having been the natural party of government for a
decade the party organisation was weak, centred on the
Dail. Fianna Fail, having come out of forces that had been
on the run for a lot of that time, had agrassroots structure
which Cumann na nGaedheal did not have. When Fianna
Fail took power in 1932 the disgruntled conservative forces
came together a year later to found Fine Gael, but it re-
mained a top-heavy party, attracting its support on the
basis of its conservative stance and without Fianna Fail's
structure and organisation.
It was significant that Fine Gael chose as its first leader
General Eoin O'Duffy, leader of the Blueshirts. Hewas not
a TD and his political constituency was ideological rather
than electoral.
After a year of O'Duffy's horsing around, and poor
results in the local elections of 1934, the Blueshirt was
bounced and replaced by W.T. Cosgrave. Even so, it was all
downhill for the next fourteen years. In the general election
of 1937 Fine Gael got 34% of first preferences; in 1938 it
was 33%; in 1943 23%; in 1944 20%. When acollection of
small parties cobbled together the Interparty Government
of 1948, with Fine Gael's J ohn A. Costello as Taoiseach,
Fine Gael had drawn 19.8% of first preferences, the lowest
in its or Cumann na nGaedheal's history.
The fact that the Interparty Government got some use-
ful work done had little to do with Fine Gael. While that
government is remembered chiefly for finally declaring a
republic its greatest achievement was the work of Noel
Browne, a member of Clann na Poblachta, which held ten
seats in the Dail, Browne, as Minister for Health, organised
a blitz on tubercolosis, ruthlessly gathering funds and mar-
shalling resources. It was without question the most impres-
siveMinisterial performance in the history of the state. At
that stage between three and four thousand people a year
were dying from tubercolosis. Browne's campaign virtually
eradicated the disease and his speed and efficiency un-
doubtedly saved many lives. I <"
After three years that government collapsed from abelt
of the Bishops' crozier when Browne tried to bring in the
Mother and Child Bill. The experience ended Browne's
Ministerial career but it didn't do Fine Gael much harm. At
the subsequent election they increased their percentage of
first preferences to 25%. In 1954 they participated in
another Interparty Government, a dismal affair that lasted
another three years and which isn't remembered for any-
thing in particular.
Fianna ,Fail resumed office in 1957 and would hold it
for sixteen years, matching the sixteen year stretch from
1932 to 1948. In the elections during this period Fine
Gael's share of the vote rose, settling at 35% in 1973.
Fianna Fail maintained its share during this period, avera-
ging 46%. It was the Independents and small parties who
took ahammering and whose support drifted to Fine Gael.
Between 1932 and 1973 Fine Gael had held ahandful of
Ministerial positions in two cobbled-together governments
over a total of six years. Their achievements were mini-
scule and despite all the posturing about "grand old men"
they had attracted few people of genuine talent. The grand
old men had grown old and frustrated in irrelevancy. It was
amiserable little party.
00
URING THE LATE SIXTIES EVERYONE
D
seemed to be going liberal. Even the Knights of
Columbanus went through ashort liberal phase,
eschewing their ultra-secretiveness, scrapping
their robes and turning to charitable work. Within Fine
Gael there arose a phenomenon which became known as
The Young Tigers. This was an attempt by some young
members of the party to align Fine Gael with the perceived
public mood of social reform. In 1964 Declan Costello had
produced his "J ust Society" document and he and Garret
FitzGerald had led the argument against the tight-lipped
Liam Cosgrave wing. Cosgrave was never in any trouble.
The main push from the liberals came at the 1969 Ard
Fheis and failed. The liberals were naive, with pious aspira-
tions but no muscle. J ames Dillon, the party's "grand old
man", was brought out to put the liberals in their place.
He instanced the activities of some nice, obedient and con-
servative young people in the party as the kind of thing
which he would like to see increase. These he called "the
young tigers" which every party needs. The label was
applied by Dillon to the, young conservatives in the party,
but apparently the political correspondents were either
tired or emotional that day and they attached the name to
the young liberals - and it stuck.
The liberals were hammered, some expelled. Few "young
tigers" remain active in politics. However, the liberal wing,
led by FitzGerald, almost had its day in December 1972.
Dessie O'Malley was bringing in the Offences Against The
State (Amendment) Bill. It was a vicious piece of work
which allowed that if aGarda Superintendent said you were
guilty of membership of an illegal organisation you were so
guilty - without any other evidence. (The Bill not only
degraded the judicial process but helped rationalise the
IRA. In those days they stood on ceremony and had all
sorts of silly rules under which they didn't recognise courts
and wouldn't deny membership. O'Malley's Bill was one
of the things that helped them smarten up and become
more professional about things like that.)
Liam Cosgrave licked his lips and rowed in behind
O'Malley. Fine Gael was in turmoil, with even Paddy
Cooney lambasting the Bill. Cosgrave was poised to betray
the parliamentary party and the FitzGerald wing was poised
to take it over in the wake of that betrayal. That night two
bombs went off in Dublin and the liberalism disappeared.
Everyone marched into the lobby behind Cosgrave.
[!]
OR FINE GAEL THE SEVENTIES WERE
F
the best of times and the worst of times. Fianna
Fail's monopoly of the nationalist card had
served it well down the years. Now, when the
blood began flowing in the North its nationalist image re-
bounded on the party. Faced with living up to its rhetoric
the party split in two. Yet its vote held, its percentage of
first preferences slightly increasing in 1973.
Two significant developments ensured that Liam Cos-
grave would in March 1973 - forty years after the party
was founded - be the first leader of Fine Gael to become
Taoiseach. (During the Interparty Governments the party
leader, General Richard Mulcahy, was unacceptable as
Taoiseach because of his role in the civil war - that's how
much the leadership of Fine Gael meant back then.)
The first development was the consolidation of the anti-
Fianna Fail vote behind Fine Gael and Labour. In previous
decades the small party and Independent vote had at times
amounted to over 25%, and never dropped below 12%.
In the mid-Sixties that vote drained away and by 1973 it
was only 5%.
Peter Prendergast: Fitz Gerald's scalpel
The second was the success in arranging transfers be-
tween Fine Gael and Labour. The transfer rate from Fine
Gael to Labour was 71% and transfers in the other direction
ran at 72% - in each case more than doubling the figures
from the previous election.
Liam Cosgrave was Taoiseach - and the stolid, sober,
stern face of Fine Gael conservatism risked a tiny smile.
At a parliamentary party meeting only three months earlier
Garret FitzGerald had proposed the removal of Cosgrave
because of his behaviour over the Offences Against The
State (Amendment) Act - and failed miserably. Now, the
liberals were quiescent.
In Fine Gael the terms "liberal" and "conservative"
'are relative and not necessarily appropriate in general
political terms. For instance, while it was generally known
that on a systematic basis heads were being thumped and
genitals squeezed in garda station basements during 1976
MAGILL OCTOBER 1983 11
and 1977 not one Minister or TD in the party dared raise a
public objection - FitzGerald made his reservations known
privately, for what that was worth. Labour's Frank Cluskey ,
as a parliamentary secretary, made a name for himself
reforming social welfare - but that was about it.
Despite the presence of the supposed "liberal intellec-
tuals" the Coalition was fashioned in the image of Liam
Cosgrave - reactive, unimaginative, ruthlessly protective of
dogma.
The optimism with which the Coalition greeted Sunning-
dale and the Northern Executive compounded the pessi-
mism which followed its collapse. The harsh "law and
order" policies which followed consolidated the party's
conservative base - and consolidated IRA support in turn.
Economic recession turned the screw.
The political ancestors of Cosgrave and his Fine Gael
Ministers - and in some cases their actual ancestors - had
formed the first governments of the state and had shaped
it politically and culturally. Then, in 1932 it was cruelly
taken away from them. For forty years, apart from a
couple of political hiccups during which they got to handle
a few Departments, they had stood on the sidelines cherish-
ing their conservative values, brooding in stagnancy and
politically representing stagnancy. Now, in their hour of
glory things were coming apart.
In the Ireland of the Seventies people were not somuch
demanding contraceptives as making their own arrange-
ments to use them, regardless of the state. When in 1976
the Coalition moved to bring the law into line with reality
Cosgrave petulantly voted against his own government's
Bill. Had he acted with political skill rather than petulance
he could at least have taken more of his Cabinet with him.
A few years later Alice Glenn would prove amaster strate-
gist in comparison with Cosgrave. But Cosgrave was not so
much apolitician as amood.
That same year Paddy Donegan insulted the President
and Cosgrave dug his heels in again. Faced with a choice
between Constitutional propriety and loyalty to his com-
rade in conservatism, Cosgrave remained stony-faced until
the President resigned. The following year, at the party Ard
Fheis, Cosgrave erupted in aviolent, arrogant and threaten-
ing tirade against the "blow-ins" who would dare question
him or his political tradition. The Ard Fheis exploded in
cheering and in the subsequent general election in J une of
that year Fine Gael got the lowest level of electoral support
it had received since 1957.
[]J
0R THE FINAL RALLY OF THE 1981
F
general election campaign Garret FitzGerald
entered Cavan town on the back of apony and
trap, crowds cheering. His left hand was in plas-
ter since he fell off a chair just before the election and
broke a bone. When the pony panicked and the trap rocked
and swayed FitzGerald grabbed a rail with his right hand.
After a few seconds he had to let go. The hand was swol-
len and unusable after three weeks of shaking hands. He
clung on by his elbows until the pony was calmed.
It was worth it. That campaign marked the end of four
years of consistent work by FitzGerald - not so much to
rouse Fine Gael asto create it.
There is a myth that FitzGerald is a bad campaigner,
that he is uneasy with the rigmarole of elections. In fact,
he likes it and is very good at it. It's true that there are
some things he still hasn't got the hang of - like waving;
12 MAGILL OCTOBER 1983

". .
he puts his arm up in an L shape and wiggles it - but he
knows how to pull the crowd-pleasing strokes and is more
capable of making aspontaneous and hilarious speech from
the back of a lorry than Charlie Haughey. The myth was
created by journalists who like the nutty professor image
and look for the things which support it.
The other myth is that FitzGerald is a sensitive soul
who isn't cut out for the rough and tumble of politics.
He is quite ruthless and couldn't have carried out the trans-
formation of 1977-81without that quality.
FitzGerald's main scalpel in the political surgery which
took place after he took the leadership in J une 1977 was
Peter Prendergast. Prendergast's other main organisational
achievement was the creation of a market for Yoplait
yoghurt. Today, one rural TD can without personal ani-
mosity judge that "if Peter Prendergast came down here
tomorrow he would be lynched".
Fine Gael in 1977 was a collection of TDs, most quite
skilled at vote-gathering, who had little central organisation
and little desire for one. TDs had personal followings and
usually joined parties from family tradition and to get the
natural lump of support which went to that party. Mostly
success depended - and still to alarge extent depends - on
constituency work. Prior to 1966 political parties weren't
mentioned on ballot papers.
Fine Gael TDs had little incentive to build the party. A
larger party would take away from their power and the
activists so created would be a threat to their seats. The
incentive to build so that the party could take power and
so increase their influence and patronage was negligible -
that was for Fianna Fail, Fine Gael's traditional role was in
opposition.
Prendergast visited every constituency and appointed
in each a constituency organiser and a PRO. He chose a
high proportion of teachers - partly because they had
administrative experience, partly because they usually had
access to resources like typewriters and photocopy
rna hines.
Mernbership cards were introduced. This had the obvious
ad antage of establishing how many members there were
and where they were. It also cut down the practice of TDs
creating paper branches. Admission to party events, inclu-
ding social activities, was by membership card, providing
an incentive for passive supporters to get involved.
The other main initiative was the change in the party
constitution carried through at the 1978 Ard Fheis. This
was guided through by J im Dooge. The rules were changed
Cosgrave and son: petulance rather than political skill
to give lay members control of the National Executive.
Party officers at local level would now have to be demo-
cratically elected - no bloc selection. No officer could
retain the same position for more than three years - pre-
viously the same people had remained for twenty or thirty
years, or had died yet remained on the books at head-
quarters. Automatic elections each year meant that useless
officers could be removed with the least upset to .the ego,
without having to stage an election specially. TDs would
have to go for renomination in competition with everyone
else.
The TDs and the traditional party followers didn't put
up much resistance. For the TDs there would be an extra
16 seats in an enlarged Dail after the next election and
you'd have to be a right duffer not to get back. Older
members were only too pleased to let the new young enthu-
siasts run around organising, photocopying and licking
envelopes. They could enjoy the party social life and retain
their delegate positions for the important meetings.
Garret FitzGerald visited every constituency, boosting
morale, recruiting, explaining the new plans, discussing
problems where necessary. There were deliberate strategies
of recruiting young people and women, constituencies
which had grown in awareness and activity over the pre-
vious decade but which had been neglected by the parties.
The constituency organisers, having been recruited by
Prendergast, 'in turn did their own recruiting, appointing
organisers in the branches. The constituency organisers
were brought to Dublin on a regular basis for discussion
with Prendergast, for instructions and for training. Where
some individual in a constituency started giving trouble
and couldn't be argued out of it Prendergast set about
cutting away his local support.
There were problems in several counties. In Roscommon,
for instance, while FitzGerald was making his second round
of visits to constituencies, the local TD, J oan Burke, was
excluded from apress conference. There was local reaction,
a belief that the slick new crowd were freezing her out.
Rather than compete for a nomination in 1981 Burke
resigned from politics.
The Constituency PRO in Roscommon, J ohn Connor,
appointed by Prendergast, made no secret of his ambition
to win a seat. There was arule that constituency organisers
and PROs, because of their prominence, could not stand for
a seat at the subsequent election - without this rule the
TDs would never have cooperated. Suddenly, the new
people whom Connor and the constituency organiser, Mark
Kennedy, had brought in - many with no Fine Gael pedi-
gree, their families being Clann na Poblachta or even
Fianna Fail - were becoming delegates. Connor claimed he
had never wanted to be PRO, had only taken the job be-
cause there was no one else, and wanted to stand for nomi-
nation despite the rules. A page of the minutes where
Connor had been appointed PRO allegedly went missing.
Prendergast backed Connor, saying he had merely been
Acting PRO and had not been ratified. The selection con-
vention in 1981 went on until 3amamid chaos and threats.
Connor won the seat in 1981. In 1982 he lost it to Liam
Naughten, a long serving Fine Gaeler who had taken the
short end of the ticket in 1977 to help the party when
there was little in it for himself. There is now asharp split
in Fine Gael in Roscommon, the newer members support-
ing Connor, the traditional Fine Gae1ers supporting
Naughten.
Similar controversies erupted in several constituencies,
but the reorganisation was overwhelmingly successful. The
TDs cooperated more than might have been expected,
perhaps impressed by FitzGerald's enthusiasm. FitzGerald's
image helped win many to the party who wouldn't have
joined in Cosgrave's time. In 1979 FitzGerald used the Euro
and local elections to push into the public eye many of the
new faces. Alan Dukes, Nuala Fennell (who previously
had run as Independent), Monica Barnes, Maurice Manning,
Gay Mitchell, Richard Bruton, Mary Flaherty, George
Bermingham, Hugh Coveney, Bernard Allen, Madeline
Taylor, Ivan Yates and Brendan MacGahon all had their
first run for Fine Gael then.
One other important change was the recognition of the
need to get the urban vote. Previously, every branch had
the same number of delegates to conventions and Ard
Fheisanna, regardless of the size of the branch, although
an urban branch might have many times the number of
members that the scattered rural branches had. By weigh-
ting the representation according to population this was
MAGILL OCTOBER 1983 13
changed and the organisation itself became more urban.
The combination of FitzGerald's image and the organisa-
tional changes transformed the party. At headquarters a
shoal of whizzkids were brought in to package the election
campaigns. The early selection of candidates, forced
through by the National Executive despite the TDs, was
crucial. It gave candidates time to become known and gave
the organisation time to work out the kinks. The fact that
the candidates were out shaking hands early in 1981
brought further pressure on Haughey to call an early elec-
tion. When it came, Fianna Fail had to choose all its can-
didates within afew days.
The 6% increase in first preferences in 1981 is deceptive.
Similar swings in the past had produced an extra nine or
ten seats. So well managed was the party in dividing up the
vote that this time it brought an extra 22 seats. By the
November 1982 election FitzGerald's momentum had
carried the party from 30% of the vote and 43 seats in
1977, to 39% and 70 seats. The majority of members were
new and half had joined in the previous two years.
[[]
HARLIE HAUGHEY SAID HE DIDN'T
C
trust Garret FitzGerald to bring in the Con-
stitutional ban on abortion. It was the Novem-
ber 1982 election and that was the kind of
thing Charlie tends to say, so no one took him very serious-
ly. FitzGerald reiterated his commitment to the Referen-
dum and gave a date for bringing in the Bill. In the brief
period at the beginning of the campaign when Haughey
tried to make an issue of the Amendment the Fine Gael
candidates loyally went out and stood on the backs of
lorries and swore blind their party's commitment on the
issue.
When, a few months later, FitzGerald was expressing
his reservations there was a shortage of sympathy for him
within the parliamentary party. "You can't make apromise
like that and then come back into arural constituency and
say you've changed your mind. He should have come right
back after the election and brought it in immediately, got
shut of it."
The conflict between the old Fine Gael and the new had
been sporadic and muted during the major changes. Now
it was open. It wasn't primarily a matter of ideology, but
of approach to politics. Alice Glenn has a deep-rooted
conservatism. Godfrey Timmons agonised over the issue.
Beyond them there are varying reasons for the actions of
the dissident TDs. Both Tom O'Donnell and Oliver J .
Flanagan have a personal dislike - to put it mildly - of
FitzGerald. Other TDs took a long cold look at their elec-
toral bases. Even Oliver Flanagan, although he would
probably have opposed FitzGerald just for the sake of it,
had an eye to his constituency. At one parliamentary party
meeting he exploded: "And I'll tell you this - at the next
election I'll get more votes than ever!"
When FitzGerald opened up the party it was a genuine
openness. The old days when TDs called meetings with
letters sent from the Dail are gone. Now the meetings are
called by party officers in the constituency and if the TDs
don't attend that's too bad, the meeting goes ahead and
makes decisions. The party couldn't have grown and att-
racted talent without giving party members some role.
That openness has forced up through the party issues and
attitudes which represent real conflicts of interests and
14 MAGILL OCTOBER 1983
which reflect the uneven development both within the
party and within society itself.
The bulk of the new recruits are middle class. Conserva-
tive on many issues, liberal on some. Those who live in
urban areas see little fault in abolishing illegitimacy. In a
rural area the prospect of a knock on the door from the
product of a liaison in a ditch twenty years ago, demand-
ing parity with the "legitimate" offspring, islikely to create
havoc. Opposition to such legislation will be called Defend-
ing The Family. If the measure was being brought forward
by Michael Noonan, as a matter of J ustice, some of the
opposition might be soothed. If, as seems likely, it is Nuala
Fennell who is bringing it forward the hackles of some will
automatically raise.
Even more likely to arouse trouble is the J oint Matri-
monial Property Bill, which will probably arrive in the Dail
session after next. This will decree that all property within
the home is jointly owned by husband and wife. When
Noonan first raised the matter at a parliamentary party
meeting there were mutterings about "expropriating a
man's property". The liberals may push that the measure
go beyond the home and cover joint ownership of land.
That will create even more conflict. Many TDs will be
taking amanly attitude.
Opposition to such measures is likely to go beyond the
supporters of the rather academic Amendment. And
beside such issues of property, the potential for trouble
from Barry Desmond's proposed reform of contraception
facilities seems small.
OO
ROM NEXT MONTH FINE GAEL AND
Labour will hold joint parliamentary party
F meetings. TDs from one party will then be able
to question Ministers from the other party.
Fine Gael and Labour are working hand in glove.
The normally expected reaction from Fianna Fail to
such conflicts as are due is the one they adopted during
the Amendment debate - sit tight, say nothing. Charlie
Haughey's leadership, like Liam Cosgrave's, is reactive, not
innovative. It is a line that is increasingly hard to follow.
Fianna Fail needs the city votes which Fine Gael has won.
Already Michael Woods and Tras Honan have made vaguely
liberal noises.
The decision to sit tight and let Fine Gael tear itself to
shreds over the Amendment may not, in the long run, have
been the right one. As, increasingly, the issues of the day
are fought out within Fine Gael rather than between it
and Fianna Fail the latter smells of stagnancy. A long row
of heads nodding in time to Charlie's beat presents an
image of weakness rather than strength. But allowing
differences to emerge would bring pressure for a free vote.
And that would help Fine Gael out of its difficulties when
its two wings clash.
Fianna Fail sits tight. Labour props up Fine Gael. Fine
Gael tries to find a compromise between the old and the
new. Young Fine Gael can't kick out the conservative
rump - they're needed for electoral purposes. The con-
servative rump can't shut up Young Fine Gael without
tearing apart the party and pushing it back to the miserable
state of the Fifties. Garret FitzGerald has said privately
that Young Fine Gael will be shut up "over my dead body".
Alice, Tom and Oliver might like to arrange that, but their
prospects are poor.
D
elaney is a second generation
American whose paternal grand-
mother hailed fromNenaghand grand-
father from somewhere in Sligo. He
is a 52 year old graduate of St. Mary's
. University and the University of
Chicago. At one time he was a colle-
giate, MarineCorpsand Golden Gloves
boxer. In 1957 he formed the pheno-
menally successful Rand Corporation
and today ismarried with three daugh-
ters. He is also areal estate developer
who built and owns a shopping centre
in San Antonio, Texas called Water-
ford Square.
He burst onto the Irish American
scene two years ago when the
Ancient Order of Hibernians, of
which he is a longtime member,
held its annual convention in his
hometown of San Antonio. In the
ensuing two years he has risen to
national office within the AOH -
. .
Kerry Dougherty writes about the American millionaire who helped
fund the Amendment campaign and who is to visit Ireland this month.
J
amesDelaney,a self-made Texas
millionaire with an extraordinary
interest in Ireland, is the man who
bought the site of the battle of the
Boyne earlier this year. Among his
close friends he counts the Irish
Ambassador to the US, Tadgh
O'Sullivan, Cardinal Tomas 0 Fiach
and the NorAid man accused and
acquitted of gunrunning for the IRA
last year, Michael Flannery.
Hebelievesin a 32 county Ireland,
capitalism, Irish American unity and
the Pro-LifeAmendment.
"J im Delaney bears a striking
resemblance to ayoung J ohn Wayne,"
says one Irish politician who knows
him. "He looks like him, talks like
himand isevenabout the samesize."
Most of all, the Chicago-born
version of the Duke believes that
Irish 4mericans have an important
role to play_in Ireland. He says it is
time for all groups "whether they
believe the rosary or the armelite is
the answer" should come together
to pressfor aunited Ireland.
Delaney dismisses suggestions that
American citizens should mind their
own business with a curt: "Try telling
that to the J ews about Israel. We
don't happen to believe that our
interest in human rights stops at
our shoreline."
J ames Delaney will be arriving in
Dublin on October 25 for a two week
tour which will include meetings
with businessmen, industrialists and
politicians and a visit to Cardinal
o Fiach. He has astanding invitation
to meet with Fianna Fail leader
Charlie Haughey and his solicitor in
Dublin is trying to arrange meetings
with as many other political leaders
aspossible. .
Delaney also received a phonecall
from Brian Lenihan when he was in
the States earlier this year. Because
of .previous commitments, however,
Delaney was unable to meet with the
Irishpolitician.
"If the Taoiseach asked me if I
thought he should meet with J im
Delaney I would answer with a very
strong 'yes'," says Paddy Harte TD,
who met Delaney last J uly when he
attended the Irish American Unity
Conference in Chicago. "I recognise
something in J im Delaney that other
Irish Americans don't have, a real
graspingof the Irishsituation."
Also travelling with Delaney will be
J im Shannon, a California lawyer who
was mentioned as a possibility for the
ambassador's post after WilliamShan-
non's departure, Paul O'Dwyer, former
New York City Councillor and long-
time Irish activist, Dr. Charles Ricea
law professor at Notre Dameand the
philosophical guru of American Right-
to-Lifers, Bill Lacey, a trade union
leader andseveral other businessmen.
The reason for the Delaney dele-
gation's trip to this country is to
explore possibilities for American in-
vestment here. Their plans sound
almost like an American version of
the IDA. The Texan says he and his
wealthy American friends would like
to provide venture capital for new
Irish industries and invest in flagging
companies. They would also like to
encourage more exports for the Ameri-
canmarket.
Delaney said. he became aware of
the need for American investment
when he purchased the site of the
Battle of the Boynethis year.
"The people I dealt with while
buying the site were largely Protes-
tants," he says. "I'm looking for an
economic revitalisation of the country
and my philosophy is that a high
tide raises all the ships and that
includes the Catholics."
If Delaney and his friends are pre-
pared to come to Ireland with their
chequebooks, credit cards and wallets
wide open then it is certain J ames
Delaney will become a household
name before long. But sceptics, both
here and in America are asking who
exactly is this man, and what he is
really trying to do in Ireland.
he is one of six national directors and
chairman of the Order's Right to Life
committee - and has made somevery
diverse friends within the Irish com-
munity.
The most curious thing about this
flamboyant American is how he has
managed to straddle the gap between
the warring factions within the Irish
American community. He is able to
move freely within the various groups
without alienating the others.
For example, last J anuary the
National President of the AOH, J oe
Roche, found himself persona non
grata at the Ambassador's Residence
in Washington simply because he
attended a NorAid banquet in New
York City. Prior to that dinner Roche
and O'Sullivan had met on a weekly
basis: "Now he won't even speak to
me," says Roche.
J im Delaney also attended that
banquet, despite that he still enjoys
excellent relations with the Irish
Ambassador. Il\!an interview, Delaney
boasted that on the weekend of
September 17, not only was he the
guest of the ambassador's at a lunc-
heon and dinner in Washington, but
the kindly Mr O'Sullivan put his
official limo at Delaney's disposal.
Limo-lending seems to be a hobby
of Delaney's who alsoput his personal
car at the disposal of Cardinal 0Fiach
when the church leader was a house-
guest of the Delaney family's in San
Antonio last February. During the
Cardinal's stay in Texas, J im Delaney
was able to raise 1 3 15,000 for the
University of Ulster in Coleraine.
This was not the first encounter
between the two men. Delaney sayshe
helped oversee contributions excee-
ding 1 3 100,000 to the Cardinal's
library in Maynooth through the AOH.
Mr Delaney must also have endear-
ed himself to the Cardinal with his
support - both morally and finan-
cially - for the Pro-Life Amendment
campaign.
According to AOHPresident Roche,
the Order contributed "thousands of
dollars" to the Irish Pro-Amendment
campaign. Mr Delaney ismore hesitant
saying that he is not sure of the exact
sumbut that all monies were givento
the National Right to Life Committee
in Washington and earmarked for
Ireland. Delaney also says he met
with Dr Don Wilke, the controversial
Pro-Lifer who wasdisowned by PLAC,
in Texas before the pro-life activist
came to Ireland. He has the highest
praise for Wilkeand saysthat the local
Texas AOH donated 1 3 5,000 for
Wilke'susein Ireland.
When discussing the implications
of the amendment, J im Delaney has
no patience for arguments about the
sectarian nature of the bill and admits
that had it been defeated he would
have had difficulty in bringing along
his American delegation this month.
"I frankly can hardly discuss this
with people who refuse to differen-
tiate between biology and theology,"
he says. "This campaign was very
important to us, wethink it reaffirmed
the dignity of Irishwomen.
"If people could only see what
has happened here (in the US) in the
ten years since abortion was legalised.
I wouldn't want to see this happen
in Ireland."
D
elaney is also outspoken on the
breakdown inmorality inAmerica.
Delaney blames the current scourge
of two social diseases: herpes and
AIDS (auto-immune deficiency syn-
drome) upon abortion, contraception
and the "permissive sexual environ-
ment" inmodern America.
"If you're going to permit contra-
ception you have to legaliseabortion.
It's the backup," he says flatly. "We
now have doctors in court who per-
formed abortions and wound up with
live babies. They failed to do what
they set out to do, kill the baby. I
Delaney boasted that not only was he
a dinner guest at the Irish
ambassador's in Washington, but the
kindly ambassador put his official
limo at Delaney's disposal.
would hate to see this kind of thing
in Ireland."
Delaney islessoutspoken about the
violence of republican paramilitary
groups in the North. While saying he
does not support Violence, he brushes
those considerations aside when talk-
ing about Irish unity - he believes
that the paramilitary-types and the
Fine Gaelers will eventually join hands
and make a32 county Ireland.
In a recent interview Delaney told
the San Antonio Express: "I don't
support the IRA. But I have a 12
year-old daughter. If we lived in Ire-
land and they carried my daughter
home with a British plastic bullet in
her head and her only crime had been
going to the store to get a carton of
milk, I'd sure join the IRA. And if
there wasn't one, I'd start one."
At the Irish American Unity Con-
ference this summer, which Delaney
organised, there was a moment of
perfect irony: after Paddy Harte
spoke to the "hostile audience" (they
werea"99 percent republican crowd")
congratulatory messages were read
from Cardinal 0 Fiach and Gerry
Adams - in spite of the fact that
Adams has proclaimed American busi-
nessmen with interests in Ireland as
"legitimate targets".
"It's crazy. The Irish Government
has been so careful to keep their
distance from NorAid ~nd the really
republican wing of the AOH and
suddenly you've got this guy Delaney
with all of them wrapped around his
little finger," notes one observer. "The
only difference I can see between
Delaney and Roche is about a million
bucks. Maybethat's all it takes, money,
to make everyone listen."
Out of the unity conference camea
decision for the group to send alobby-
ist to Washington (which experts say
will cost about 13150,000to 13200,000
a year) to urge Congressmen to put
pressure on the British Government
to "commence a phased and orderly
withdrawal with all deliberate speed
to be completed within two to two-
and-a-half years and that the US
support development with a 'Marshall
Plan' in deprived areas of Ireland."
They also are encouraging members
to contribute to the Green Cross.
In addition, Delaney's group says
they are concerned with the "supp-
ression of free debate of nationalist
issues in the Republic through rep-
ressivelegislation of various types."
Resolutions of this sort have been
issuing regularly from NorAid over
the years and the Irish Government
has totally rebuffed that group. With
Delaney's money and influence, how-
ever, the Government, through its
ambassador in Washington seemsto be
taking particular notice of this Irish
American sentiment.
Mr Delaney, for his part says he
is awed: "I can't believe what we've
been able to do since we had this
conference. It attracted everyone from
a Catholic Bishop (Hurley of Corpus
Christi, Texas) to the Yiddish Sons
of Erin. We're really making a move
towards aunited Irish American voice
and you know, 45 million Americans
claimto havesome.Irish blood."
In a San Antonio interview Mr
Delaney admitted that part of his
popularity has to do with his Texas
presence: "Texas is a magic name in
Ireland. It is known as astate that has
produced frontiersmen and achievers.
There is a wide respect for Texas and
Texans," he said. "They figure if its
fromTexas it's got to begood." -
Mr Delaney even goes so far as to
compare the death of hunger striker
Bobby Sands to the American Alamo
and the assassination of President
Kennedy 20years ago.
"I don't know what we'll accom-
plish during our trip to Ireland," Mr
Delaney says. "I would like to see it
as a step towards our givingeconomic
aidto a32 county country."
J Clearly, we are going to hear alot
more from Mr Delaney.
<".
MAGILL OCTOBER 1983 19
Gene Kerrigan reviews the first official report of the proceedings
of one of the new Dail committees - proceedings which three TDs
described as farce.
E
mbarrassed by complaints about
the Dail's inefficiency and ir-
relevance, the TDs this year began a
system of Dail Committees which, it
was hoped, would improve things.
The published verbatim report of the
first meeting of the Joint Committee
on Legislation is not encouraging.
September 6, 3 .02pm. Some mem-
bers are present, mostly Fianna Fail.
They begin, the Committee's Clerk
acting as Chairperson. Des O'Malley
is nominated for the Chair. They
decide to lock the door, in order to
keep out the Fine Gaelers. There is no
key. And the Clerk's assistant is sent
to stand at the door and do bouncer.
3 .04pm, eleven Fine Gael TDs and
Senators come charging in. The
report notes that at this stage there
were [Interruptions.] This means that
so many people are shouting and
bawling that the official reporter can't
keep up with them.
Senator Alexis FitzGerald: I presume
there are no published Standing Orders
for this committee. There was never
any suggestion that the doors should
be locked. I do not see how members
can suddenly call on themselves to
lock out other people on the commit-
tee. That is an outrageous suggestion.
Denis Gallagher TD: We are in the
process of taking a vote. The people
present have decided on how they
want the decision to be. What happens
when nine or ten people walk in after-
wards? They cannot be allowed to
participate in the vote. It is just not
on.
David Molony TD: Why cannot we
participate in avote?
Sean Calleary TD: You cannot parti-
cipate in a vote in the Dail once a
certain stage is reached. We had well
reached that stage. If you do not hear
the bell ringing at that stage you
cannot vote.
Molony: The whole thing is a farce.
It would bejust as well to walk out.
They didn't.
FitzGerald: Is there avote taking place
at the moment? If you want a vote
we will vote.
20 MAGILL OCTOBER 1983
Ger Connolly TD: The door was
locked.
Des 0'Malley TD: The vote 0bviously
has to be confined to those who are
present at the time. That is so in either
House.
[Interruptio ns.}
Alan Shatter TD: Will we have the
position in this committee that every
time somebody calls for a vote they
are going to go to the door and lock it
in case somebody else walks in? Can
we not deal with this in a mature and
sensible way?
Mervyn Taylor TD: Is it seriously
being suggested that members of this
committee present here are to be
debarred from voting? Is that the
suggestion of the Fianna Fail Party?
Weshould know that.
O'Malley: Nobody who is present
when the vote is called will be de-
barred from voting.
There was some more chat and some
more (Interruptions).
Maurice Manning TD: How can the
meeting be called to order if there is
no chairman? This is a farce at the
very outset. As I understand it, there
has been an agreement between the
various parties that the chairs of
committees will rotate and there will
be sharing of the chairs between the
various parties. If there is an agree-
ment between the Government and
the Opposition that this is to be a
Government chaired committee, surely
Fianna Fail are going to accept that.
That is my understanding. Unless there
has been alack of communication--
0('.
[Interruptions.}
Manning suggested a fifteen minute
adjournment to cool things off
O'Malley: In the circumstances weare
in, Acting Chairman, it might be very
foolish to adjourn. If you do so, the
whole problem that has arisen will
be re-opened again. At least, you are
now aware of who was here at the
time the voting started and who was
not here. If the meeting breaks up for
even a short period, for all we know
other members may turn up and some
of the members who are here now may
not come back. One does not know.
For that reason it is important that
you should dispose of this matter now.
Manning: I think all the members
are present now.
This kind of thing went on for some
time.
O'Malley: I set out the sequence of
events to the Acting Chairman and he
confirms my recollection of it. It
follows from that that we must pro-
ceed in accordance with that.
Molony: I submit, Mr. Acting Chair-
man, that you do not have the right
to deny us, the people who are on this
committee and attending this meeting
now the right to vote.
O'Malley: I do not think, in fairness
to the Acting Chairman, that he is
denying anyone a vote. He has to
enforce the decision of the committee.
Heis anxious to do that.
Acting Chairman: I have already out-
lined the position. The committee asa
J oint Committee is subject to the
Standing Orders of both Houses. In
the taking of divisions in select com-
mittee the Seanad Standing' Order
requires that the door be locked, the
corresponding Dail Standing Order
does not. The committee decided that
NETWO RK
the doors should be locked and we
were proceeding to take a division on
that basis.
Shatter: Thedoor wasnot locked.
Acting Chairman: It was barred by
one of the officials who informed the
members ontheir entry of theposition.
Mary Flaherty TD: If we are getting
down to whether or not the door was
locked, in a Dail or Seanadvote if one
arrives before the doors are actually
locked one is allowed to enter. If we
are down to that level of farce in
deciding whether we will be entitled
to vote, we gained entry before you
had effectively locked the door and
before the taking of the vote had
actually commenced. In practical
terms we are physically entitled to
vote as we arrived before we were
barred physically. Perhaps we will
have to arrange for adequate locks to
besupplied.
After some argy-bargy Senator Sean
O'Leary asked a pertinent question.
O'Leary: Under what authority did
you accept a proposition, if you did
accept a proposition, to establish
Standing Orders of this committee
without having that item on the
Alexis FitzGerald: "Nobody barred
my wife and 1. "
agenda? Under what authority did
you do that?
Connolly: Under the authority of the
members who werehere.
O'Leary: It was never put to the
committee that we were actually
adopting a set of Standing Orders.
That was never put to the people
present. A committee cannot unila-
terally decide, without notification to
members who were absent, to adopt
Standing Orders. That is not reason-
able or legal or legitimate. I must ask
in those circumstances for a clear
ruling that whatever was done was
not the adoption of a Standing Order
because that could not be done with-
out notification. I ask for aruling on
that.
Acting Chairman: There is a provision
that the rules of procedure of the
Houses apply to procedure in select or
special committees.
FitzGerald: Nobody barred my wife
and 1.
Yes, indeed. A moment later, Des
O'Malley put the boot in.
O'Malley: There is a motion before
the committee by Deputy Molony
that we now proceed with the vote.
I suggest that we do that now. I
suggest wedo it onthe basison which
we had already proceeded to vote.
Theprocess commenced.
Shatter: The logical basis is that cer-
tain members of the Fianna Fail Party
in this committee room at ten seconds
past three bolted the door and voted
whatever they wanted.
(Interruptions.}
There were a lot more (Interruptions)
but O'Malley kept at it.
O'Malley: I suggest weproceed.
And ...
O'Malley: Procedures were called out
by the acting chairman and I suggest
wefollow them through now.
O'Sullivan: There is a lot of legisla-
tion and it is in the interests of our
country to proceed and try to get
this through as quickly as possible.
Shatter: I would ask Deputy O'Malley
to remember that there are anumber
of items on which agreement will
have to be reached. The danger of this
squabble today is that there will be a
total breakdown. This is completely
unnecessary. I put it that agreement
has been reached between the Whips.
O'Malley: I have not been informed.
(Interruptions.)
Fianna Fail's Ger Connolly
best to sort things out.
Cormolly: We seem to be deadlocked
on this. I very much regret this. I
would like to know from Deputy
Mervyn Taylor whether there was an
agreement between him and the Whips
of the Fine Gael Party and our Whip.
Taylor: I understand that there were
discussions - I was not present -
Connolly: I do not want to put you
in an embarrassing position. I am led
to believe that there was no agreement
between the Whips. There may have
been an agreement between the
Labour Party and the Fine Gael Party.
I know nothing of an agreement and
none of my colleagues knew anything
about an agreement. I will go out and
seewhat the position is.
O'Malley: I think it is inappropriate
that the meeting should adjourn in
the light of the rather unusual cir-
cumstances.
After a lot more of this kind of thing
Ger Connolly, sound man that he is,
returned with the information that
Charlie Haughey, Garret FitzGerald
and Dick Spring had discussed the
matter previously and agreed that a
Labour member should Chair the
Committee. It was just that no one
-had told anyone on the Committee
about this. At which point Des
O'Malley, being cornered, withdrew
his nomination. As a consolation prize
they let him be vice-Chair. Then the
Committee began some work. This is
called Reform Of The Dail.
. . .
MAGILL OCTOBER 1983 23
O
nethird of the prisoners inMountjoy have a drug problem.
This figure has been confirmed to MAGI LL by the
Department of J ustice. The Prisoners Rights Organisation
claimthat this figure could be as high as fifty percent.
Despite this, the five day detoxffication programme inMountjoy for
heroin addicts is totally inadequate. The effect of this programme
is to make thewithdrawal effects more tolerable for the first five
days. tt does nothingto cure addiction.
According to a doctor inthe J ervis Street drug treatment
centre the only effective treatment for heroin addiction is
longtermrehabilitationand to this end a small number of
Seamus Rooney on the roof of Mountjoy prison, on June 81983watched by ,)';0 prison
officers. Photo by Derek Speirs (Report)
1
prisoners are transferred to the Coolmine centre. A recent
Department of J ustice survey on drug abuse in Mountjoy
questioned eight prisoners whp had attended the Coolmine
centre. All eight had dropped out of the programme and
gone back on drugs.
The Department of J ustice survey, published in October
1982, questioned 19 serious drug abusers who had pre-
viously been in Mountjoy. Seven had gone back on drugs
within a day of release, another six had relapsed within a
week and all had relapsed within eight months.
Despite this evidence the Department of J ustice has not
seriously attempted to tackle the problem of drug addiction
in the prison.
It is possible for prisoners to obtain heroin within the
prison according to the Prison Officers Association. Prison
officers say that they have found syringes in the grounds
of the prison which have been thrown from cell windows,
and they have found prisoners unconscious in their cells
with syringes in their arms.
In court drug addiction isn't taken into account by
judges when passing sentence as it is seen as the responsi-
bility of the prison authorities to deal with the problem. A
recent development within the prison has been the intro-
duction of a system of random searches of six or seven
prisoners for heroin per week, but it would/ take a major
effort by the authorities to tackle the problem and that
effort isn't being made.
The majority of patients attending the J ervis Street drug
treatment centre are ex-prisoners. This has been confirmed
to Magill by adoctor in.theJ ervis Street centre. Despite the
seriousness of the drug problem in Mountjoy, Barry Des-
mond's recent proposals to tackle drug abuse contain no
reference to Mountjoy.
T
HERE IS A STRICT DIVISION BETWEEN
the categories of prisoner in Mountjoy and
this is reflected by the wings of the prison into
which different prisoners are put, and the type
of work they are allowed to do. Entry to the prison is
through a corridor which leads into a semi-circular cage-
like structure known as the circle. Through the metal
grilles one can see 'A' wing leading off to the left, 'D'
wing leading off to the right and 'B' and 'C' wings in
between these two. Each wing has three landings, the floors
of which are made of perforated steel so that they are also
visible from the circle.
'A' wing is occupied by recidivists i.e. those who have
already served at least one prison sentence. The workshops
in 'A' wing are the most primitive, the largest being the
mat shop. Here prisoners make mats which are then used
for "teeing-off" on golf courses. There is also a glove shop
28 MAGILL OCTOBER 1983
where prisoners sit at tables and turn gloves inside out.
According to ex-prisoners there is not enough work to
occupy them all day. There is a small shoe repair shop
where prisoners repair their own shoes and the shoes of
prison officers. The other activity in 'A' wing is sewing
mail bags.
It is clear that there is apolicy of givingthe least rehabi-
litative work to recidivist prisoners.
Among the inhabitants of 'A' wing isagroup of itinerants
who live in a cell known as the caravan. Estimates of the
exact number in this cell vary between fiveand ten. Among
the duties of the itinerants is to pick up the faeces in the
grounds of the prison which have been thrown from cell
windows by prisoners because they are locked into their
cells from 7.30 at night until 8 o'clock in the morning,
and aren't allowed out to go to the toilet. No one elsewill
do this work. This happens every morning, and has been
confirmed to Magill by the Prison Officers Association and
every ex-prisoner to whom Magill has talked.
'B' wing is occupied mainly by remand prisoners -
prisoners who are awaiting trial. Here there is no prison
work - prisoners can spend their time in the exercise yard.
There is a small staircase in the middle of the corridor on
the ground floor of 'B' wing which leads down to the
basement.
The base is the common term for the basement of 'B'
wing. It is darker than the rest of the prison. It is used to
accommodate prisoners who are being punisnec, ?::'SC-U=~
.who need to be protected from other prisoners ~::
prisoners who are considered to be disruptive. Prisoners
who are being punished are confined to their cells in tLe
base for 23 hours a day, and get one hour's exercise" in a
cage in the 'B' wing exercise yard. Prisoners who are in the
base for their own safety are treated the same asthe priso-
ners up in the main prison. Malcolm Macarthur is one of
these prisoners.
Seamus Rooney is also in the base, but he is not there
to be punished or protected. According to one prison
officer he is there because "he has a habit of climbing
onto roofs". During the summer he climbed onto the roof
of the prison. When he carne down he asked to be trans-
ferred to Dundrum because he claimed that he was being
victimised by prison officers in Mountjoy. Within a week
he was transferred back to Mountjoy and put in the base.
He and his family claim that he is locked up for most of
the day, and that he has no access to recreational or educa-
tional facilities. The three prisoners who climbed onto the
roof of the maximum security wing on September 11 also
say this. The prison authorities however insist that he is
being treated the same as any other prisoner. When this
reporter visited Mountjoy on September 19, Seamus
Rooney was pointed out as he watched videos in a dark
room with four other prisoners.
'C' wing is the hospital wing, which is occupied by
alcoholics, some heroin addicts and, according to one
prison officer "general headcases". Recently some sex
offenders have been accommodated in the hospital wing.
The doctors surgery is on the ground floor of this wing.
About 140 prisoners are receiving some form of medica-
tion. Prisoners who have difficulty in sleeping or who are
"over energetic" are given
tranquillisers.
According to a member
of the medical staff, 25%
of the total prison population
are receiving tranquillisers
and two or three prisoners
are sent to Dundrum every
week.
I
The only work which could
conceivably be of use to
prisoners is done in 'D' wing,
which is occupied mainly
by first-timers and some long-term prisoners. The work-
shops are in the basement and the work involves carpentry,
leatherwork and upholstering.
There is a new training unit in Glengarrif Parade behind
Mountjoy which provides very useful training courses in
welding, carpentry and other trades. These facilities are
abused by the authorities.
The unit has been used to accommodate prisoners who
are not participating in training courses, such as debtors
who have defaulted on repayments and the Ranks workers
who were jailed earlier this year for contempt of court.
In 1981 the then Minister for J ustice, J im Mitchell, per-
sonally intervened in the administration of justice by
asking the prison authorities to put the jailed Ault and
Wiborg strikers in the training unit. Though the courts
have committed these people to Mountjoy, in the modern
training unit they are sheltered from the realities of life
in Mountjoy. This abuse of the training unit prevents other
prisoners from learning useful skills.
The newest addition to Mountjoy is the high security
unit which accommodates prisoners who are considered
to be a high security risk. These prisoners were previously
kept in the Curragh military detention centre, and are
serving very long sentences. A prison officer was suspended
in early September for allegedly smuggling keys into the
unit. The authorities believe that these keys were to be
given to Henry Dunne, who is in the high security unit.
Henry Dunne was sentenced to nine years in February
this year for possession of firearms with intent to en-
danger life. His brother Larry jumped bail in J une shortly
before being convicted for the possession and supply of
heroin, cocaine and cannabis worth between fifty and
sixty thousand pounds. His sister Colette is serving two
years for possession of drugs with intent to supply.
The atmosphere in the security unit is more relaxed
than in the rest of the prison. When this reporter visited
there were around eight prisoners in the exercise yard
doing weightlifting and other exercises. Other prisoners
were in a workshop making
headboards for beds and up-
holstering. The cells in this
unit are considerably larger
than those in the rest of the
prison, and there is hot and
cold running water in each
of them. On the walls of
Henry Dunne's cell there are
pictures of his family inset
into small heart-shaped
cushion-like frames.
. .
T
HE DAILY ROUTINE OF PRISONERS IN
Mountjoy is as follows: At 8 o'clock the cells
are unlocked and prisoners "slop out". This
involves emptying out 'the chamber pots which
have been in their cells since 7.30 the previous night. Be-
cause there are forty prisoners on each landing emptying
chamber pots into two or three toilets, the toilets some-
times get clogged up and overflow onto the floor. Each
prisoner has abasin and he can fill this with water and wash
in his cell. But if the hot tap on the ground floor is turned
on, there is no hot water on the upper two landings; many
prisoners wash and shave in cold water.
Each prisoner is entitled to one shower and one change
of clothes - including socks and underwear - per week.
All the prisoners wear uniform.
After "slop out" prisoners collect their breakfast which
they bring back to their cells to eat. During the winter there
is an hour's exercise in the morning from 9 o'clock to 10
o'clock. In the summer work starts at 9a.m. Prisoners work
in the workshops or attend classes until 12.15 when they
collect their lunches and return to their cells where they
are once again locked up until 2 o'clock. From 2 until 4.30
the prisoners return to the workshops or to classes. At 4.30
they are locked up to eat their tea. From 5.30 until 7.30
is recreation when prisoners can play pool or watch tele-
vision. The television is turned off every evening at exactly
7.30 and ex-prisoners say that this is particularly frustrating
if the programme that they are watching has only a few
minutes left to run. Every Thursday prisoners can watch
the first ten minutes of "Top of the Pops". There are,
however, video facilities and prison officers often record
30 MAGILL OCTOBER 1983
programmes which are shown later in the evening and ;
screen them the following day.
At 7.30 prisoners are locked up for the night. They
spend over 15hours aday alone locked in their cells.
P
RISONERS ARE ALLOWED TO RECEIVE
one half-hour visit per week, with the possi-
bility of an occasional extra visit in exceptional
circumstances. The visiting room contains two
long tables, one on each side
of the room. The tables are
about seven feet Wide, with a
six-inch high glass partition
along the middle to prevent
anything from being passed
by hand to the prisoner.
At 4 o'clock on Monday
September 19 the visiting
room was full. About twenty
prisoners sat along the table
on the left, and another ten
sat along the table on the
right. Four prison officers
looked on. Several prisoners
and their visitors were kneel-
ing on their seats and leaning .
across the table towards each
other, perhaps in search of
privacy, perhaps simply to be I ' ~~
heard. ~
One prisoner at the table
on the right was trying to
talk to his child while his wife
looked away towards the
door with her head in her
hand. Her eyes were red and
shiny, it appeared that she
had been crying. At the table
on the left another couple
were having aquiet row.
'That was the half-hour
that those prisoners spent
with their families that week.
T
HERE IS CELL ACCOMMODATION IN
Mountjoy prison for 480 prisoners, but there
.are often over 500 prisoners in the prison.
Sometimes prisoners spend their first night in
the prison sleeping on pool tables, on other occasions
prisoners have slept on the floor of the welfare office. This
has been confirmed to Magill by prison officers and ex-
prisoners. Some single cells are occupied by two prisoners,
contrary to prison regulations. This is very uncomfortable
for the prisoners involved, as the cells are very small. The
overcrowding problem has eased somewhat over the sum-
mer, but it will become chronic when the courts resume in
October.
The current solution to the overcrowding problem is
early release, known as "shedding" by the authorities.
During the day phone-calls come in to the prison from
courts around the country telling how many prisoners are
arriving that evening. When the total number of incoming
prisoners is known, it is compared to the total number of
cells that are available.
There are usually too few cells.
Then the releases start. According to the prison governor,
prisoners are released on the basis of files which are kept
on them. These files are examined at "review meetings"
which take place every Tuesday within the prison. For
each prisoner there is a report from the welfare staff,
the psychiatrist and the Gar-
dai in the prisoner's home
area. If a prisoner is close to
the end of his sentence and
there is nothing in his file
d which indicates that heshould
not be released, he is released
when there is a shortage of
accommodation.
According to the Prison
Officers Association, however,
the releases occur in a much
more haphazard fashion. They
say that accommodation is
often needed too urgently to
allow for this type of review.
Five or six cells may be
needed within a matter of
two .hours or less. There is a
ri1~. m
l
' '. white card outside each cell
1!1 t ~. which gives the name of the
. occupant and his expected re-
lease date. According to the
POA asenior member of staff
is sent out to walk along the
landings and select five or six
prisoners who are close to the
end of their sentences.The
prison officer returns to the,
office with the names of the
prisoners and other prison
officers are sent to the work-
shops to find the prisoners
who are to be released. They
are sent to their cells to pack
their belongings and by late afternoon there may be five
or six prisoners taking an unexpectedly early trip home.
The effectiveness of prison as a deterrent to crime can
be judged by the fact that two thirds of those imprisoned
in 1981 had previously served prison sentences .
The dehumanising nature of the work given to reci-
divists in Mountjoy offers no hope of rehabilitation for
these prisoners.
The system of releasing prisoners due to overcrowding
means that Mountjoy even fails in its most basic function
- that of containment.
From J anuary to August this year over 26 million was
spent on the prison service. For the first eight months of
this year each prisoner has cost the taxpayer 80 a day. A
third of them will be involved with drugs when they are
released.
The majorityof them will return to Mountjoy.
On Tour with Druid Theatre in Lisdoonvarna and Inishmaan
Kevin Dawson
HE PARISH
PRIEST OF LISDOONV ARNA HAD HEARD OF THE
Druid Theatre Company alright, and knew they were
coming to play in his village tonight, but he probably
wouldn't be going to see them. No, he had other things to
be doing - that's what he'd told all the journalists who'd
come annoying him during the week, looking for quotes
about the Bachelor Festival. "I told them I'd more to
do than help them write paddy-whackery stories for their
Dublin papers or their British rags," he said. Damn journa-
lists were all the same: only looking for funny stories
about country folk, never interested in the truth. "And
what is it," he asked, as his shiny Toyota covered the last
few miles into his over-publicised parish, "that brings you
to Lisdoonvarna?"
What indeed. Franko was from Dublin and had been selling
kebabs from a mobile stand in the main street all during
the previous week. He said the bachelors only appeared in
force at the weekends - hundreds of them, he said. Mon-
day night would be quieter. Franko said the man to talk to
was J im White, who owned the two big hotels and ran the
whole show - publicity, American girls, the lot. Franko
had sold kebabs this summer at Tralee Races, the Kilkenny
Beer Festival, and at the rock festivals at Lisdoonvarna and
the Phoenix Park. But he said he'd never in his life seen as
much drinking as here, during the Bachelor Festival. Until
he'd seen it, he said, he wouldn't have believed that so
many people could be so intoxicated.
At four o'clock on Monday afternoon, in a hall in the
bowels of the Kincora Hotel, Druid director Garry Hynes
was going over entrances and exits with her cast, making
them familiar with their new stage in preparation for the
eight o'clock show. Like her brother J erome - Druid's
manager and administrator - Garry Hynes is small, ener-
getic, dedicated, and immensely capable. She is the main
reason among all the reasons why the focus of excitement
in Irish theatre has switched from Dublin to Galway over
the past five years. But now she and her troupe were in a
small dark hall in a Munster village, preparing for the first
one-night stand in their first-ever village tour, and beginning
to appreciate the risk they'd taken. 'The Wood of the
Whispering' had packed out in Galway, and could have run
for another four weeks there in Chapel Lane. Here in the
Kincora Hotel, just two hundred yards and a bend in the
road away from the main street, they were already well ...
out of town; and Lisdoonvarnaseemed to have other
things than theatre on its mind.
On the stage in street clothing, Martin J aimsie practised
his first stage entrance, balancing imaginary baskets on
either arm. He and Mick Lally trundled Ray McBride
across the stage in his wheelbarrow to make sure they'd
be able to lift him off in it in the second act, stage left.
And Mary Ryan and Mary McEvoy squirmed in behind the
big iron gate they'd have to stand up on to tease Maeliosa
Stafford and Michael O'Sullivan. As J erome Hynes counted
all the chairs in the hall, Garry asked technical manager
Steve Plant why one of the lighting stands kept wobbling.
He said the floor wasn't level, but that it was safe enough.
J erome counted a hundred and fifty chairs. He'd been
promised two hundred and fifty. Garry explained to her
actors that this flat hall would require a clarity of speech
and diction unnecessary in their raked Galway theatre. "I
want you to concentrate on clarity tonight." J erome and
crew member Padraig Breathnach set off in the truck to
get more chairs. They admitted that everybody would be
happy enough if they filled more than three dozen seats
tonight.
When the session was over, the Druid Theatre Company
went back into the village to check into their rooms in J im
White's Hydro Hotel. On, the telly in the corner of the
Hydro Lounge, White was telling an RTE Countrywide
reporter about the Bachelor Festival. That morning the
Irish Press had run a story about the American 'girls' who'd
been flown in the previous week, and had reported that
they were only travel agency employees on agroup holiday,
not spinsters off some mid-Western shelf on alast desperate
search for a mountainy Irish man. White said he'd never
said they were. Nobody knew where J im White was right
at the minute. But he was around.
All over the main street were red and orange notices adver-
tising the services of an official matchmaker. Available
daily. Or on request. Druid posters were harder to see, but
they were there. The official matchmaker was J im White.
For fifteen pounds you could fill inoneof hismulticoloured
questionnaires. For another five pounds he could arrange
an introduction. Between seven o'clock and a quarter past
the Druid players crossed town from the Hydro to the
Kincora as the pubs filled up. In an hour's time they'd
know whether places like this really were untapped wells
of theatrical interest, or just so much boozy barren ground.
Perhaps they should have left Lisdoonvarna until after the
Festival. Perhaps they'd come at the wrong time.
MAGILL OCTOBER 1983 35
They needn't have worried. At eight o'clock the hall in the
Kincora was packed, and the people of Lisdoonvarna were
still coming in. Groups of teenagers, gangs of children,
families, old folks, the whole town. Hardly any tourists just
looking for something else to do. Garry Hynes watched the
hall fill with the kind of people Druid had gone on the road
to find: the provincial villagers who miss out on even the
occasional city tours, and to whom Irish theatre has - since
the days of Anew McMaster and the 'fit-up companies -
been one big rarely-opened book. Someone from the
village came in and asked if they could hold the curtain
till a quarter past, so's the people who'd gone to eight
o'clock Mass could catch the Gospel and then come across
for the show. At twenty past eight in the warm hushed hall,
after the thin taped voice of Eamon de Valera as an intro-
duction and a haunting Irish song, 'The Wood of the Whis-
pering' began with Mick Lally as Sanbatch Daly standing in
the corner of a Galway forest and picking the nits and lice
out of his hair.
qTHE TIlREE
HOURS THAT FOLLOWED, THE PACKED HALL SAWA
characteristically vibrant Druid performance ofM.J . Molloy's
1953 drama of a western village on the brink of terminal
decline. The few youthful women must go away to marry,
or remain as spinsters; and the young men seemdoomed to
bachelorhood. Only Sanbatch, the imaginative tramp who
fears his own imminent induction into the county mental
hospital, can see in the sum of these individual dilemmas
the mortal threat to any village that finds itself without
weddings or children. Molloy's play is aremarkable mixture
of violence and word-play, of cartoon villainy and the real
shadows of lunacy and loneliness, and encompasses gun-
shots and fairy magic while holding constantly before the
audience the dreadful picture of a population that emigra-
tion isbleeding to death.
For three hours the audience of three hundred was en-
thralled. Maeliosa Stafford's and Michael O'Sullivan's
caricatures of eccentric old bachelors went down a storm
- Stafford in particular managing a powerful combination
of hilarity and menace in a 77-year old idler who boasts
that he has literally driven young women mad. Every major
exit was applauded, as if the players were familiar friends
just finishing a pub-floor recital; and Sanbatch's barbs
about the absurdity of old bachelors threatened to raise the
low Kincora roof. During the quiet moments, as when
Sanbatch calmed Marie Mullen's unspeaking Sadie, or when
Ray McBride as an old man spoke of his approaching death,
the faint sounds of clattering dishes or wheezing accordions
could be heard from the other quarters of the hotel. But
there could be no distraction from the stage: when the
lights faded at last on Sanbatch and Sadie, the applause was
tumultuous. Everything Druid had set out to do had been
vindicated.
MAGILL OCTOBER 1983 37
Three elderly women sat in shawls of multicoloured wool.
Not all the performers confined their talents to the stage.
In between his scenes in the second act, Ray McBride had
slipped out of the hall into the Kincora lounge and danced
a reel in grey beard and old man's clothes. After the show
he went out again and danced and told jokes, capping the
lot with a spontaneous sketch based on a dancer's need to
change his shoes before performing.
Back in the village, another show was under way. Middle-
aged couples mingled in the hallways of the Imperial Hotel
before going in to drink and sway to amplified accordion
ballads. A bear-like American named 'Silky' Sullivan
prowled about in a luminescent green kimono sporting the
name of his Irish pub in Mephis, Tennessee. Two bachelor
brothers in the Hydro came to the point of blows before
J im White, the former Donegal Fine Gael TD who'd come
to Lisdoonvarna to start a tradition, switched momentarily
from matchmaker to peacemaker. In the lounge nearby the
farming men were waiting and watching before approaching
the seated women in the hope of an introduction. J im
White spoke of the number of people he'd helped, the
happy marriages he'd made. Next year he was going to
bring over athousand American girls, he said. Silky Sullivan
had promised him 250.
In the Inisfail bar a satisfied gentleman addressed Maeliosa
Stafford over the froth of a pint and an enormous paunch.
"There'll be a lot of girl-eens with heavy bellies after this
week," he declared. "But sure boys will be boys," he added
"and women will be mothers." And he went in search of
romance.
Most of the Druid folk got to bed by three or four. The
young barman who'd worked until 6am was serving break-
fasts in the dining-room at 9. Service was slow. Ray
McBride and Martin J aimsie washed down their rashers and
sausages with rancid-looking pints of lager. Sean McGinley
couldn't manage any breakfast at all. Most were beginning
to regret having drunk so much the previous night. Last
year the crossing to Aran had taken place in a force seven
gale, and every breakfast had made asecond coming before
it was done.
RUID HAD
BEEN TO INISHMAAN J UST ONCE BEFORE, WHEN IN
the autumn' of last year they brought over their classic
production of 'The Playboy of the Western World' in cele-
bration of J ohn Synge's formative summers there and of
the people who had told him the story out of which the
'Playboy' grew. So they had acted out their play before
an island audience which listened in English and watched
and then murmured in Irish from man to man, comparing
the play before them with the story of the fugitive mur-
derer that all of them knew from old. Druid had formed a
special relationship with the people on that evening. And
now they were going back.
The two-hour crossing from Ros a Mhil was rough but
bearable. Only Michael O'Sullivan suffered badly, huddled
on the foredeck in fierce concentration, wearing the thin
blue jacket that offered him no protection against the
regular lashings of spray. Marie Mullen, all in black savefor
a brown woollen headscarf, stood stock still and gazed over
the port side. McGinley and Maguire and Stafford cracked
jokes and lit cigarettes at the prow of the boat, where the
going was toughest; and Martin J aimsie, still suffering from
the long night in Lisdoon, slept the whole journey out in a
bunk below deck.
There was a special welcome for Druid on Inishmaan, and
particularly for Mick Lally and Martin J aimsie, two men
well-known to the islanders. Inishmaan is a special place.
High on a cliff there is a spot known as 'Synge's Chair',
and from it you can see the waves beating mist and moun-
tainous breakers off the cliffs on Inishmore, across the
sound, or look east to the Twelve Bens hunching up out of
the brown bogs of Connemara. Many of the fields are fertile
~some are nothing more than vast sheets of cracked stone,
bordered by stout walls just the same. If Neil Armstrong
had stepped onto the Moon only to find it riven with
ditches and careful fences, he would scarcely have seen
MAGILL OCTOBER 1983 39
anything more strange.
If the physical centre of the island is the massive prehistoric
fortification known as Dun Conchuir, the chief figure
among the population is Tarlach de Blacam, a young
Dublin man who came ten years ago to live on the island
with his wife, a native of the island, and who has since
helped the islanders reverse what was aconsiderable tide of
emigration by building a modern knitwear factory and an
airstrip. Electricity and hot water have also been introduced
in the last five years. Without them, Inishmaan would
slowly have been suffocated in its own primitiveness.
J ust down the hillside from Tarlach's house, Garry Hynes
assembled her players in the school hall on Wednesday
afternoon and began discussing points learned from Lis-
doonvarna. Her manner is friendly and understanding, but
authoritative. The actors accepted her points and offered
her and one another all kinds of criticism and encourage-
ment. It was an intelligent collective session, with Garry
at the centre. She wanted a lot of ad libs cut out, and the
third act thus tightened up - "It's quite understandable
that they should creep in like that but it's not acceptable."
She spent some time with Eamonn Maguire, working on the
first scene. She asked Mary Ryan to be less agitated during
the first act, and not to giggle later on when 77-year old
Maeliosa Stafford proposes to her: "The others will giggle
behind his back, but not you. That would be rude. Nobody
would giggle to his face." On a seat by the wall, Sean
McGinley repeated a set of lines to himself, over and over.
HAT NIGHT
THE AUDIENCE ASSEMBLED IN A MANNER AS
naturally ceremonial as the beginning of any drama. From
all quarters of Inishmaan they came walking, making their
way to the tiny hall along the gritty tracks running hither
and thither between the innumerable miles of dry stone
walling that cover the island like the veins of a leaf. Chil-
dren came skipping across the fields of stone that slope
down towards the seabehind the school building, and lined
up on the 'single bench between the stage and the rows of
chairs. Young men and old men came together, the old men
in flat grey caps they would wear throughout the show.
And in pride of place, in the front seats at the right, three
elderly women sat in shawls of multicoloured wool, their
hair tied back in traditional style. Only one spoke any
English.
If Lisdoonvarna was strange new ground for a professional
theatre company, Inishmaan remains more extraordinary
again. Most of the audience that night could speak English,
and the majority of those fluently. But as the night passed,
and audience warmed to players, it became clear that it
was not the language that mattered most. All eyes stared
closely at the people on the stage, following their passions
and fortunes intently. The linguistic jokes were scarcely
heeded, the visual subtleties devoured. Old men lit pipes,
pointed at the stage, and smiled: The women seemed cap-
tivated by Ray McBride's dying Stephen Lanigan, sighing
everytime he spoke in his remarkable old man's voice, or
stroked his stick with delicate fingers. When he was carried
in on Martin J aimsie's back, or wheeled about the stage in
abarrow, the rooflifted.
Only during Sanbatch's fairy-challenging scene was the
audience utterly still. It is eighty years now since Synge
wrote of the beliefs of Inishrnaan, and of the strange mix-
ture of Christian and supernatural beliefs then current
among the people there. When Mick Lally's Sanbatch
pounded the stage with acrozier and called up the demons,
the children on the front bench turned back towards their
parents with faces that mingled excitement and concern;
and when he mentioned the daoine beaga and the siogai;
the three old women in the front seats turned to one
another, without speaking, and smiled.
It was a remarkable night's theatre. It was - as was Lis-
doonvarna in its own way - the kind of evening Druid
had gone on the road both to find and create. Afterwards
the people flowed back up the hill towards the island's
only pub. The previous night it had stayed open all night
while songs were sung and performances given. Ray
McBride sang and joked and, at Mick Lally's request,
offered a sketch based on the RDS Horse Show which
involved his playing both radio commentator and horse at
the same time. Later he danced to the tin whistles of Sean
McGinley and Aine de Blacam - whose sister, Peggy, is
married to Mick Lally. Ray McBride is astar.
But tonight the pub was closed. The woman in charge was
in a bad mood, and had thrown everybody out at aquarter
past eleven. Young men and old men stood outside at the
gate in the pitch dark, silently, lighting an occasional pipe.
There are no policemen on Inishmaan. There was not the
slightest suggestion of disorder. In a house nearby an old
bedridden man was sleeping. When he was a baby he lived
in the cottage below Dun Conchuir where J ohn Synge
lodged. Sometimes, when the woman of the house was out,
Synge played the fiddle beside the cradle, or rocked the
baby boy asleep. There is now no other human link with
Inishmaan's most famous visitor.
In 'The Wood of the Whispering' Sanbatch Daly draws
three young couples together and brings the prospect of
life and happiness back to a village that had been dying.
Early on Thursday afternoon Druid set off for Inisheer
for a single performance before bringing the words and
themes of their Connaught playwright back to the people
of the western mainland. People who wouldn't otherwise
have had the chance to hear them.
. . .
Throughout the day the tiny planes of Aer Arann ferried
young people from Inishmaan to Galway, making seven
round flights instead of the usual one. A young island
couple were to be married in Galway the following day.
There'd be a big do in Salthill afterwards, then the honey-
moon. By the time the Druid tour had reached the Dublin
Theatre Festival, the young couple would be back on
Inishmaan, beginning their lives anew.
'The Wood of the Whispering' finishes at the Edmund Burke Hall
on Sat. Oct. 1 as part of the Dublin Theatre Festival
D
o we really need Leitrim? It's
not an easy question to ask.
People's feelings can be hurt. The
issue may prove divisive. Nevertheless,
the Spontaneous Aggravation Party
(SAP) has earned its reputation of
grasping the nettle by the horns of
the dilemma. And last month's Execu-
tive meeting of SAP did that very
thing - and in the process forged a
neweconomic concept.
Do wereally need Leitrirn?
No offence, mind you. No one is
putting Leitrim down. No oneis deny-
ing that county's harsh beauty, the
mind-expanding calmness of Lough
Allen, the sorrowful mysteries of
Kiltyclogher and stuff likethat. Drum-
shanbo, home of the Mayflower Ball-
room, has a special place in my own
heart. No one can doubt that Leitrim
is a unique and pleasing stitch in the
fabric of our society, or that the loss
of that county would leave a small
hollow in the soul of the nation.
That is not the point. Of course
we want Leitrim. The question is:
do weneed Leitrim?
Some background. SAP has in
recent months been accused of being
merely destructive. "Knock, knock,
knock", say our critics. "Why can't
you be constructive? Why can't you
build up instead of always tearing
down? Our poor nation needs all the
constructive suggestions it can get in
this, its hour of need." That's the
kind of thing people say to us.
Okay. Do wereally need Leitrirn?
Things are bad. Week after week
jobs are melting away. A number of
foreign banks have had to build new
vaults to hold our IODs. Irish capital
is on strike. Two hundred thousand
workers arelocked out. The economy
is in crapsville and the NewEconomic
Order has taken over the government.
The word is out - get your finger out
and pull up your socks; roll up your
sleevesand tighten your belt; then lean
over and put your nose to the grind-
stone. It's an uncomfortable position,
but just close your eyes and think of
Ireland.
Stern measures, we are told, are in
order. In J anuary 1982 Garret
FitzGerald sat down with J ohn Bruton
and they asked each other: do kids
really need shoes? They decided the
kids didn't and put 18%VAT ontheir
footwear. Since then the New Econo-
mic Order has asked itself if kids
really need free school transport.
Answer - no. Hopit, kid.
J ohn Kelly, God bless him, has
wondered if we really need all these
young people hanging around street
corners. He decided we don't and
encouraged them to bugger off out of
it and givethe rest of us a chance to
makeafewbob.
So, you can see that SAP's new
MAGILL OCTOBER 1983 43
economic policy is in this tight-belts
tradition. Leitrim, we love you - but
sacrifices must be made for the com-
mon good. Wemust liquidate some of
our assets.
T
he thing about Leitrim is that it
doesn't have any big cities or
towns, it doesn't have any centres of
industry. It just kind of sits there,
getting on with its life. In short, we
don't really need it.
How do we go about turning this
prime piece of real estate into cash
on the barrelhead? Wecould raffle it.
A limited draw. "Own your own
county".
Or we could cut it up into 12" by
12" pieces and flog it to the Yanks.
"Wanna peeca deoul sod, yer honour?"
But SAP policy is more imaginative.
We believe that Leitrim should be
disposed of in such a way as to create
downstream industries.
Sell it to the Russians.
Don't bother yourself with all
that nonsense about spies. What in
the name of jazus kind of secrets have
we got that the Russians would want,
apart from our methods of turf pro-
duction and the technique of getting
the figs into the figrolls? The Russians
would clear our national debt over-
night and leave us with enough folding
green to build an airport beside every
holy statue in the country. It's a
natural.
Okay, so they'd build awall around
Leitrim and put up a few mental hos-
pitals to stash their cranks and dissi-
dents. Sure, wouldn't that do wonders
for the building industry?
I've just had a phone call to say
that surely this would make the Yanks
angry with us. Indeed it would. And
for that reason, and in order to assert
our neutrality, it would be incumbent
upon us to sell Westmeath to the
Yanks.
There would be some problems, of
course. Some of the Irish citizens in
these counties are quite attached to
them, for some reason or other. How-
ever, each sales contract would have a
clause guaranteeing the right of those
born there to live out their days in
what was their county. Another clause
would guarantee that the essence of
their Irishness was respected - i.e.
all official letters sent to them would
begin, "A Chara".
The spinoffs would be enormous.
Longford, slap bang between New
Russia and New America, would be-
come known as The Peace County.
It would get great write-ups in Time
and Newsweek, not to mention
Pravda, and so many tourists would
flood in that everyone in the county
would be asrich as Albert Reynolds.
All of the counties surrounding
New Russia and New America would
prosper, building large hotels to house
the spies and journalists who would
come to get a peek. Wecould arrange
regular international incidents if the
flood of visitors slowed down. Ros-
common would become the natural
venue for international summits.
We've got 26 counties, wewouldn't
miss two. In fact, we could probably
squeeze enough cash out of the
Russians and Yanks to buy back the
other six. (This has now become SAP's
Northern policy - it's as realistic as
anything coming out of Dublin, Lon-
don or Belfast these days.)
There are some people who would
quibble, some who would have doubts
about the morality of this plan. Well,
anyone who believes that current
economic policy is based on any kind
of morality, rather than political and
economic expediency, please raise one
hand. See? Caseclosed.
<'.
For most business concerns,
whether manufacturing or ad-
ministrative, the task of stock-
taking is alaborious and time-
consuming chore. Related
tasks such as stock distribu-
tion and ordering are equally
toilsome and cause financial
losses where not carried out
accurately and efficiently.
Enter the computerised Stock
Control Package.
The Stock Control Package
is essentially a group of com-
puter programmes for stock
recording and control, and al-
though many variants of the
package are available on the
market, they share an exten-
sive commonality. The pack-
age will perform the calcula-
tions associated with manual
stock control, but with an
accuracy, speed and range
beyond normal human capa-
bilities.
Having installed the pack-
age, the first step in setting
up the system to suit user
requirements is creating afile
for each item type in the
stock inventory. To com-
plete each file, abank of item
descriptions including the
stock number, amount of
units in stock, cost and sales
price, VAT rate, and location
of stock item, will be input.
Then the present stock levels
and other appropriate data
are keyed into the descrip-
tion boxes. Thereafter, stock
movements are input and new
levels immediately computed.
Providing the up-to-date
account of the- stock situation
is the stock recording func-
tion of the package which
facilitates existing file data
to change as movements take
place. Besides giving clear
descriptions of the events
affecting the stock situation,
this information is also useful
in the preparation of invoices
and other financial docu-
ments. Items can be listed
by value aswell asby amount.
The stock analysis function
allows the user to look at
stock information in greater
detail for more complex jobs
such as stocktaking. In this
instance, the package will
produce accurate lists of
recorded stock balances which
can be quickly checked with
actual balances. Frequent use
of this function tends to pro-
duce more satisfactory results
in so much as there tends to
be less discrepancies between
the two balances.
Another feature of the
stock analysis function is its
ability to evaluate the rela-
tionship between any stock
item, or group of items, to
overall profit. Armed with
this information, the user can
devise a strategy based on
those items which are fast-
moving and profitable, and
discard those items which
don't contribute enough to
justify their presence in the
stock inventory.
Perhaps the aspect of
stock control which causes
the most anxiety to com-
panies is stock issue. It has
become a fact of accounting
practice that provision must
be made for "Goods Gone
Astray", and further losses
are made through mistakes in
delivering and distributing
goods. The Stock Control
Package will reduce these
problems in two ways.
Firstly, the allocation of
items will be accurately
checked as it happens, lessen-
ing the possibility of items
being misappropriated. And
secondly, the package will
sort out the items to be
allocated in order of a prior-
ity stipulated by the user.
For example, a mail order
company may wish to distri-
bute goods in the order in
which they are requested,
that is, first come first served.
The stock ordering capa-
bility ensures against stocks
falling below pre-ordained
minimum levels. When a
requisition is placed for stock,
it is automatically checked
against existing resources. If
the remaining stock balance is
less than the specified mini-
mum level, an order will be
automatically placed for re-
plenishments. This function is
particularly useful where fast-
moving, non-durable goods
are concerned, maintaining a
near-optimum amount of
stock at any given time.
A package facility which
operates in tandem with the
ordering programme is the
forecasting programme. This
provides further information
for use in deciding when and
how much stock should be
ordered. Taking account of
such factors as seasonal trends
and recent stock trends, it
offers a prediction of stock
movements over aset period.
Naturally, such capabilities
as the Stock Control Package
offers demands an amount of
back up on the part of the
user. The purchase costs of
the package, and perhaps a
computer on which to run it,
will add to the cost of stock
control. A degree of com-
puter knowledge is asked of
the user, who must also be
more alert than usual so as
not to input erroneous infor-
mation to the system.
There is an enormous
potential for saving due to
the forecasting capabilities of
the package. With accurate
ordering levels, the user can
invest elsewhere money which
was previously tied up pur-
chasing stock which then re-
mained unmoved or unused
for a considerable time.
Greater control and flexi-
bility for management is
generated by the provision of
instant information regarding
often crucial stock items, and
the ability to immediately
implement changes in policy
regarding any of the items.
Personnel involved instock
control are also freed of
some of the more mundane
duties, such as cross-referen-
cing stock movements. The
saved time and effort can
be redirected towards trying
to reduce costs elsewhere in
the company, for example in
purchasing costs. Another
type of cross-referencing is
also eliminated from human
effort, that between different
departments within the one
company or organisation.
The considerable time and
money-saving possibilities of
Stock Control Packages de-
mand the attention of any
business concerned about the
accuracy and efficiency of its
methods of stock control.
Details of such packages, for
use on micro, mini, and
mainframe systems, are avail-
able from most large com-
puter dealers.
Nissans grass is greener
N
issan Datsun's town and
country Prairie does not
have an equal vehicle type world-
wide. It's new, it's innovative,
and it's designed to fill a market-
ing void. And no doubt it will
succeed. But the name Prairie
belies this estate car's true attri-
butes in as much as it carries out
its suburban duties in an efficient,
comfortable, and very driveable
fashion, and yet will outperform
some saloon cars, carry heavy,
large and awkward loads, and
convey the family complete with
excess baggage on a camping
holiday to the most inaccessible
parts of this fair land.
All this and yet it is capable
of returning average affordable
fuel consumption figures of
32mpg (city driving), and
37.7mpg (country driving) using
mostly fifth gear.
The front-wheel-drive Prairie
owes its excellent performance
to the use of the very potent and
flexible 1488cc engine and trans-
mission unit of the Sunny Sentra,
albeit with a lower final drive
ratio of 3.895:1 enabling it to
cope with the extra weight and
carrying capacity of the Prairie.
The Prairie, with an air drag
coefficient (Cd) of 0.4, (a very
low figure for such atall vehicle),
manages to slip through the air
stream in avery efficient manner.
This characteristic together
with low engine revs in fifth gear
results in a fuel consumption
figure of 45mpg at a steady
56mph. (UK Dept. of Transport
official figure.)
Gearchange and clutch action
is light, although when changing
gear quickly from second to third
and from fourth to fifth it is all
too easy for the gearchange
action to be blocked between
third and fifth, and the reverse
blank gate respectively. Consider-
ing the above average distance
between clutch and brake pedals
it is surprising to find that there
is insufficient space in which to
rest one's left foot between the
central bulkhead and the clutch
pedal.
The Prairie is very well equip-
ped to include stereo radio,
tachometer, 3-speed wipers with
variable adjustment on the inter-
mittent cycle, and a separate
rear passenger heater with 2-speed
blower located under the front
passenger seat. However, the
normal heater is not of the bi-
temperature variety so it is not
possible to have, at the sametime,
face level cold air and footwell
warmair.
Nissan engineers have gone to
the trouble of providing awarning
buzzer together with a lock-up
device to prevent the right rear
sliding door from opening when
the petrol filler lid is open. This
device effectively prevents the
sliding door from accidentally dis-
lodging a petrol pump filler
nozzle when filling up.
Visibility from the reasonably
comfortable driver's seat is very
good indeed. The driver's arm-
rest needs either to be lengthened
by about two inches or re-located
rearward by the same amount in
order to provide proper support
particularly for long legged drivers
with the seat adjusted back fully.
Strong self centering action
together with the heavy front end
(as a result of the front-wheel-
drive layout) produces heavy
steering at slow speeds and when
parking. Other anomalies include
an instrument panel binnacle that
reflects in the windscreen, sun-
visors that are not deep enough
for sunrise/sunset conditions, and
a "T" bar type handbrake lever
that a child could accidentally
release by twisting same.
These relatively minor criti-
cisms apart, the Prairie is good
value at 8,875 for a vehicle
that satisfies a desire in those
people who dream of owning but
cannot afford a Peugeot 505
family type vehicle for example
which costs 14,995. This is not
in any way suggesting that the
Prairie would compete with or be
compared to the 505, but it does
illustrate the market niche that
has been heretofore uncatered for
and full marks to Nissan for
filling it.
At the end of this year Nissan
will celebrate 50 years in the
vehicle manufacturing business by
introducing a very special and
more expensive limited edition
Prairie to worldwide markets in-
cluding Ireland. Weare precluded
from saying anymore about it at
this stage.
Safety
Conscious
Volvo
A
t the recent launch of the
booted version of the Volvo
340 and 360 in West Germany We
were reminded of Volvo's com-
mitment to safety. Only last year
at the International Safety Con-
ference (ESV), which was held in
J apan, Volvo appealed to the car
industry worldwide to improve its
knowledge concerning personal
injuries resulting from collisions.
T~e net result of Volvo's continu-
ing safety research is the trans-
formation of knowledge gained
into safety related design and.
construction of Volvo cars. For
example Volvo were first to
introduce the concept of head
restraints and shock absorbing
bumpers, and fitted seat belts as
standard equipment before any-
one else.
As'aresult of statistics gather-
ed concerning personal injuries
resulting from side collisions
Volvo fitted steel impact bars in
the front doors. The 300 series
is the only car in its class with
this type of protection and it is
one of the few cars to benefit
from the standard fitting of a
high impact type laminated wind-
screen which is twice as thick as
a normal laminated screen and is
able to prevent a 5lb steel ball
from entering the interior at
speeds of up to 13mph.
The 300's front-hinged bonnet
is locked in position in such a
way as to prevent it being forced
through the windscreen in the
event of a collision. And a head-
on crash in a 340 will cause the
rear engine carrier to break off
thus dropping the engine onto
the road and preventing possible
leg injuries to the front seat
occupants.
Unlike many hatchbacks on
the market today the latches of
the 340/360 folding rear seat
backrest are of the "crash safety"
type. In other words in the event
of an accident the luggage will
stay in the boot. And unlike
many of its competitors the 300
series is not equipped with. a
split rear seat because say Volvo
their tests have shown that it is'
very difficult to safely lock a
split rear backrest in position.
In the event of the car turning
over after a crash, petrol leakage
is prevented by asystem of check
valves. Volvo engineers consider
what they call dynamic safety
(prevention of accidents) as of
equal importance to crash safety.
That's why they opted for the
excellent handling characteristics,
responsive and accurate steering,
and balanced braking, that afront
engined/rear gearbox, rear-wheel-
drive design can provide.
Another interesting feature of
the new 340/360 is the use of
asbestos-free friction material for
front brake pads and clutch disc.
The kevlar rayon material used
instead is claimed to last longer
and possess better anti-fade pro-
perties.
The new saloon fitted with
low rolling resistance Michelin
MXL tyres, reduced fuel con-
sumption of between eight and
thirteen percent depending onthe
model, and a lower Cd factor of
0.38, was launched on the Irish
market on the 28th September.
Prices are 9,385 for the 1.4
litre 340 GL and 12,475 for the
115bhp fuel injected 2litre GLE.
Off the
Beaten
Track.
W
hen one thinks about
"cross-country" or "road
and track" vehicles the Land
Rover immediately comes to
mind. The Land Rover was first
introduced to the public back in
1948 at the Amsterdam Motor
Show. Now, thirty-five years and
1.3 million Land Rovers later,
there are few countries in which
the vehicle is not used, and few
places that Land Rovers have
not been.
However, wealthy farmers,
construction companies, and the
American market have always
demanded something a bit more
luxurious than the "workhorse"
Land Rover, hence the intro-
duction of the Range Rover in
1974 now priced at 27,780
(2 door model).
Other vehicles that have ap-
peared on the Irish scene include
the Toyota Land Cruiser .Station
Wagon (21,250) the Datsun
Patrol Estate (20,965), and
within the past few months the
Mercedes G-Wagon priced at
32,987 (300 GD 2-door).
All of the above vehicles are
classified as private passenger
vehicles because of having rear
seats. It's really a Government
tax rip-off because without rear
seats and rear windows the
Mercedes 240 GD G-Wagon for
example, costs 19,108 compared
to 32,351 for the estate version
as tested by Magill. This massive
price difference highlights the
huge gap between the import
duty rates of the two vehicles,
11%% compared to 64%, and
makes a nonsense of a system
that charges 13,243 for the
privilege of a back seat with a
view.
We decided to combine the
G-Wagon test with a one week
touring caravan holiday. That
way, fully-laden test conditions
would be achieved together with
a high mileage for realistic fuel
consumption figures. Also, it
enabled us to sample first hand a
caravan type holiday.
Young Caravans Ltd obliged
us with the loan of a 14 foot,
5-berth Piper caravan for which
they are sole Irish distributors.
The new Piper and Abbey
Acclaim range of caravans are
manufactured by Cosalt Caravans
Ltd of Grimsby, England, and
were introduced to the Irish
market last year.
The majority of touring cara-
vans in this country are hired
from between one to three
seasons before being sold to the
public in September/October at
an average price reduction of 15%
off the original retail price. The
retail prices of the Piper range
(unused) varies from 3,644 for
the 11 ft, 4-berth to 4,541
for the 16 ft, 6-berth.
If you want the combination
of a low-eost family holiday and
. .
the freedom to move where I
and when you like then hiring a
touring caravan could be the
thing for you. The G-Wagon
proved to be an added bonus
with its ability to convey one's
family complete with picnic to
the most inaccessible mountain
regions. In low-ratio 4-wheel-
Wl1 iskeyto changeyour'mind about whiske~
is powerful ann flexible enough
for off-road work including sand
dunes, and indeed for hilly road
work pulling 626 kilogrammes
of caravan, but its overtaking
abilities, minus the caravan, leaves
a lot to be desired. The fuel pump
governor cuts in at 52mph leaving
the G-Wagon breathless around
the all important overtaking speed
range of between 50 and 60mph.
With a modest maximum power
output of only 72bhp pulling a
1.9 tonne G-Wagon plus about
0.3 tonne of passengers and
luggage its not hard to see why
this poor power to weight ratio
makes fast road work impossible.
However, adequate power is
only one of the ingredients that
go to make for safe, fast driving
in a vehicle of this type. The
other ingredients areaccurate and
precise steering, and good hand-
ling and roadholding. And it is
in these areas that the G-Wagon
excels no doubt aided by its
clever coil spring suspension set-
up and precise power assisted
steering.
When towing a caravan one
can expect an increase of up to
20% in fuel consumption so an
overall 21.6mpg for theG-Wagon's
700 miles of motoring is very
good indeed. The more time one
spends at the wheel of the Mer-
cedes G-Wagon the more one
appreciates its many capabilities,
like being able to select four-
wheel-drive, and low ratio, and
the front/rear differential locks
while on the move. In fact the
low ratio effectively splits the
existing four speeds in half
resulting in the availability of
eight speeds if required.
The alloy wheels on the test
vehicle were not standard but
are available as an optional extra
together with wider tyres and
flared wheel arches at a cost of
1,800.
The G-Wagon and Piper, pain-
ted coincidentally in similar
colours, made a handsome couple
and many heads turned as36,121
worth of machinery rolled into
each caravan park for the first
time. In contrast with this the
total cost per overnight stop
varied from a mere 3.00 to
5.00 depending on the caravan
park. And in some cases that
would include the free use of a
tennis court, TV room, hot
showers, and electricity. In fact
facilities in the majority of
official caravan parks were more
than adequate.
However, if you want to get
away. from it all then avoid cara-
van parks beside a good beach.
'Most of these are like mini
villages with the majority of
ground space taken up by large
permanently sited mobile homes.
Examples of these are The
Burrows, Rosslare and Clonea,
near Dungarvan. For those who
do not relish the "goldfish bowl"
experience try Powers The Pot in
.the Comeragh mountains near
Clonmel.
The Piper handles well on tour
and the low front and rear win-
dows makes rear vision possible
via the interior rear view mirror.
The five berths are made up of
one double and one bunk at one
end of the caravan and cordoned
off by a curtain,' and another
double at the other end. A total
of three reading lamps are fitted,
two electric and one gas. For
the electric lights to work off the
normal car socket, the socket
should be wired according to
international EEC standards. The
socket on the G-Wagon was not,
so we solved the problem by
connecting temporarily a length
of single core cable from the
battery "positive" to No. 2
terminal on the socket.
Other standard fittings in the
Piper include a toilet, ample cup-
board space, a two-ring and grill
gas cooker, and a sink unit com-
plete with foot pump. And of
course touring caravans on hire
will usually include cooking/
eating utensils and a week's
supply of gas.
Hire charges per week for the
Piper range varies from 54 to
73 for the 11 ft model depend-
ing on the time of year, to 73
to 97 for the largest 16 ft job.
Considering the fact that a
three bedroom frame tent com-
plete with all necessary equip-
ment costs about 72.50 to hire
for one week (peak period) the
caravan hire charges are by no
means exorbitant. However, a re-
fundable 40 damage/breakage
deposit is required to cover
possible caravan damage or equip-
ment breakage. And if the caravan
has not been cleaned out on
return 10 will be retained from
the deposit.
Your insurance company must
be informed about your inten-
tions to tow a caravan although
usually additional charges are not
made.
Young Caravans Ltd produce
an informative leaflet entitled
'Hire A Luxury Caravan 1983',
but Young's have managed in this
leaflet to site Killarney in the
British Isles under the heading of
"There's no place like home",
and they quote" ... the majestic
beauty of Killarney, boasting
what is probably some of the
most breathtaking scenery in the
British Isles."
The Piper is fitted with an
essential ball hitch lock to hinder
or even deter, a would-be caravan
thief, but alas Young's do not
supply clients with akey!
On the whole, and provided
one is blessed with fine weather
and a Mercedes G-Wagon, a tour-
ing caravan type holiday can be
fun - and relatively inexpensive.
MAGILL OCTOBER 1983 49
<,
M
ichael Sheridan, a veteran of
five marathons, says some of
the challenge has gone out of the races
for him. He predicts that interest in
marathons has peaked in this country
and that beginning this year, atten-
dance at the annual RTE 2 Dublin
City Marathon will fall off.
"After this year you will have
about 40,000 people in this country
who have run a marathon," Sheridan
says. "The level of commitment
needed to compete in marathons is
extraordinary, it takes an unusual
type of person to maintain that level
of training. For most of them it's a
once off thing. They'll probably still
run but it will be in the shorter, 10k
races. "
To renew the challenge of the race
Sheridan and fourteen others, includ-
ing a mother and daughter team, will
set out from Ballinasloe at midnight,
October 30 to complete a "triathalon".
They' will begin with a one mile
swim, then a 100 mile cycle to Dublin
50 MAGILL OCTOBER 1983
Kerry Dougherty talks to eight
marathon runners about the
1983 Dublin City Marathon.
arriving with just an hour to spare
before running in the full marathon.
"It's a huge test of endurance but
we're all training very hard for it and
I'd say we will all be able to finish,"
he says. "Triathalons are very big in
America and some people have even
moved on to super marathons which
entail runs of 50 or I 00 miles."
One of the reasons Sheridan cites
for the expected decline in the interest
in marathons is the amount of time
involved in training. Training for a
I Ok race, however, can be incorpora-
ted into the average jogger's routine.
Training for a triathalon is another
matter, however: "It is really taking
an incredible amount of time. Besides
running I have to swim and cycle
every day. We've been training like
this for the past two months."
E
mily Dowling remembers 1981 as
an extraordinary year in her life.
She had her second child, began train-
ing as a runner and won the Dublin
City marathon.
"I had tried to run in two other
marathons and couldn't finish. I just
set out to complete the race and
wound up winning it. It was un-
believable."
Emily says that far from depleting
all of her resources, childbirth seemed
to invigorate her: "I felt much stron-
ger after I had children, I'm not sure
I would have done as well if I had
trained for marathons before having
my kids," she says. "I believe women
have much more endurance than men
anyhow."
1983 has not been an extraor-
dinary year for the 33-year-old runner
who has been plagued with knee
problems. In J une she. underwent
surgery to correct the "tibial band"
which was giving her problems and she
has just begun training again.
While the other runners are pump-
ing their way along Dublin's streets,
Ms Dowling will no doubt be remem-
bering that day in 1981 when she
finished her first marathon.
"I remember people shouting to me
along the way that I was the second
girl. Then I passed the leader, Deirdre
Nagle, at about 20 miles and I was
thinking 'I feel good, I might just win
this'," she recalls. "The last mile was
terrible but what a day it was. You
only get one day out of about a
million that feel likethat."
F
rank Egan, a 26-year-old solicitor
would agree. "I have never felt as
bad as I did after the marathon. I was
absolutely wrecked," he says now. "I
told my friends at the time that should
I ever think about running in another
marathon to remind me of how badly
I felt last year."
Mr Egan ran his first marathon in
1982. Although he was not much of a
runner before, hewas "reasonably fit"
playing tennis and badminton several
times a week. Hetrained hard for six
weeks prior to the marathon, finished
in three hours and forty-five minutes
and had to be taken away from the
finish in one of the St J ohn's ambu-
lances.
Although it took only a warm
blanket and cup of hot tea to revive
him, Egan limped home on blistered
feet which eventually became infected.
Hegot secondary infections on top of
the first and finally had to have his
feet lanced.
"It was pretty dreadful," he con-
cedes.
For some unknown reason, how-
ever, Egan decided to enter this year's
marathon. He quit after four or five
days of training because "it brought
back all the horrors of last year."
"I know I'll feel awful on the day,
watching all those runners and remem-
bering how good it felt to finish," he
says "but I'll never do it again. I'd
tell anybody to try it once, just to
say you've done it, but to put myself
through that again? I don't think so."
D
ick Hooper, the marathon's first
winner, only wishes he could be
putting himself through it all again.
Unfortunately, he is recovering froma
knee knjury and is not ready to run a
marathon.
"It was the stupidest injury. I
slipped and belted my knee off the
concrete. Everytime I'd run on it it
would practically kill me and the
doctors could find nothing wrong with
it," hesays.
"But a few weeks ago I got acu-
puncture - that's something you do
whenyou're really desperate - and it's
gotten much better."
Although he is not back to running
20 miles a day, Hooper is running
about sevenand hopes to beready for
amarathon in afewmonths time.
One thing on his mind all the time
is the Olympic Trials to beheld some-
time this winter. Ireland will be
sending three marathoners and Hooper
wants to beoneof them.
He went to the Olympics and
European Championships in 1980 and
says until his recent injury he was
improving all the time. In J une he
finished the Limerick marathon in two
hours, 12minutes and 56seconds.
As much as he would like to rep-
resent Ireland again at the Olympics,
Dick Hooper acknowledges that the
Dublin Marathon has something which
the other events don't have - a big
Dublin audience.
"The course passesthrough Raheny
at about 20miles and that's where I'm
from. You can't imagine what a tre-
mendous feeling it is to see all your
neighbours and friends asyou're going
through that hard part of the race."
Up until 1980, the people of
Raheny had no idea of Dick Hooper's
capabilities. When he finished first,
after their encouragement he said he
was able to show that he wasn't "too
bad".
"Besdies, I think it's only right that
a Dub should win the race, and I'm
the only Dubto do it," hesays.
~mmy O'Rourke, a garda living
lin Bray, isafivetime marathoner,
who is also going the triathalon route
this year. He says his first marathon
back in 1980 was quite a challenge,
but after that it was just amatter of
trying to improve his time. Hefinished
his best marathon in two hours, fifty-
fiveminutes.
Although he is used to devoting an
enormous time to his training, Mr
O'Rourke says that the triathai on
routine ismuch more demanding.
"I'm weakest in swimming and
cycling so I really have to spend alot
of time on them," he says. "I don't
mind though, I know a lot of men
who spend the same amount of time
inpubs and I don't do that.
As far as trying to encourage
friends and co-workers to join the
throngs on Halloween this year,
O'Rourke says he never does. "I
don't ever try to tell people they
ought to run, in fact I never talk about
it with the men I work with. If some-
one asksme, I'd givethemadvice.
"If someone is physically fit and
healthy and thinks they would like
to try a marathon I'd tell them to go
ahead. It's a tremendous physical
challenge," hesays.
. .
Marathon Winner Jerry Kiernan
J
erry Kiernan knew he would
be a runner when he was just a
kid. At a young age he noticed that
he could run faster and longer than
anyone else: "It was one of the few
things I really did well," hesays.
Today his sights are set onjust one
main goal - to represent Ireland in
the Olympics next summer in Los
Angeles.
To prepare for the trials next
spring, Kiernan is running in as many
marathons and long races as possible.
He took off to France for a few days
at the end of September to run in a
20 kilometre race. As one of the top
amateurs in the country Kiernan
enjoys the kind of perks that most
after-work joggers can only dream
of: most of the cost of his travel is
paid.
"I'm a teacher so I have to hire
my own substitute while I'm gone so
I'm still a bit out of pocket," Kiernan
says. "But it's definitely worth it."
D
eirdre Nagle would like to shake
loose the "always a bridesmaid,
never a bride" curse that has dogged
her through her last two marathons.
In 1981 she led the women runners
MAGILL OCTOBER 1983 51
up to the 20 mile mark where Emily
Dowling overtook her to winthe race.
Last year she had the distinction of
being the first Irish woman across the
finish line, but again, she was beaten
by Debbie Mueller, the American
woman who won.
"When you don't win there is a
feeling, I suppose, that you wishyou
had run that bit faster," she says.
"But the thing about a marathon is
that just finishing givesyou a lot of
satisfaction.
"As I've discovered, anything can
happen inamarathon."
Ms Nagle says she inherited the
desire to run fromher father who was
arunner himself. Shehasbeen running
for about 15 years, clocking 90 miles
on agood week. Asamother with two
children she says the exercise keeps
her in good physical shape.
Marathons have lost a bit of their
challenge for Deirdre who says that
sometimes shorter races can be more
satisfying.
Would she consider adding spice
to her running by training for a
triathalon?
"No. A big red no with capital
letters," she says emphatically. "I'm
arunner full stop."
Gerry Deegan - aiming for Olympics
G
erry Deegan technically works
for his family's engineeringfirmin
Waterford but he is really working
at something else - a slot on the
Irish Olympic team as a marathon
runner.
Surprisingly, Deegan has only run
in one marathon so far and that was
in Boston where he finished 62nd,
with a time of two hours and twelve
minutes.
The race took quite a bit out of
him: "I was totally wrecked after-
wards," Deegan recalls. "I couldn't
step off a footpath without walking
backwards for about aweek."
He blames his physical reaction on
the fact that he had not actually
trained for the marathon, hehad gone
into it with just cross country ex-
perience behind him.
Deegan says he selected marathons
as his sport becausethe times in events
like the 5,000 and 10,000 metre
races were getting so fast that he
"didn't have a hope" of winning.
Besides, in order to compete in the
shorter races you need to train daily
on a regulation track and there are
only grassones inWaterford.
In his attempt to make the Olym-
pics, Deegan trains for about 18 to
24 miles a day. He says his family,
especially his wife, are making tre-
mendous sacrifices.
The 28 year-old Deegan and his
wife have a five month old baby girl
who has been having some sleepless
nights. To allowGerry to get hissleep,
Mrs Deegan rises with the baby alone
night after night.
"If I make the Olympics she's
coming with me," Deegan says of his
wife. "It's the least I cando."
Africa rather than in Derry or Dublin's Inner-City?
I think several of those who went to the Guildhall on
the opening night, expecting perhaps another Field Day
performance as festive as Translations or The Communi-
cation Cord, may have been as surprised as myself when
they saw the bleak stage light up and witnessed the first
scenes unfolding in alien tones, at times alittle likeBeckett's
Endgame delivered in broken
Dutch. But such initial feel-
ings of reservation were soon
dispelled as Deirdre Donnelly,
Stephen Rae and Des
McAleer gallantly mastered
this strange and estranging
scenario and brought the
action powerfully home to us.
So that when the lights
finally fell on Lena following
Boesman back onto the dark
mudtrack from which they'd
first arrived, one wasleft with
the implacable suspicion that
this journey into alien terri-
tories of feeling was not so
alien after all. The mirror had
in fact been held up to us all
the while. Of course, it re-
mained for us the audience
to make the associations and
parallels. For Field Day to have done this "translating" for
us would have severely limited our options of imaginative
and ideological response.
Field Day have taken arisk with this play. Their whistle-
stop tour of Ireland, North and South, playing in sixteen
venues from Armagh to Tralee, is not likely to beacommer-
cial success. But by altering their audience's expectations
and by shifting the centre of focus from the native idioms
of Irish cultural history, set down in Translations and The
Communication Cord, to the more international idiom of
"third world" struggle, Field Day have taught us the in-
valuable lesson that we may learn as much about our pre-
dicament by looking outside of ourselves as inside. The
drama of Boesman and Lena opens new perspectives on our
own particular experiences of upheaval and dispossession.
With this "foreign" play, Friel's company have not, as
might first appear, departed from their project of creating
new and alternative voices for the community.
The "community" responded warmly and were in more
than genial spirits by the time the post-performance recep-
tion in the Mayor's Council Chamber of the Guildhall got
underway towards midnight. In this traditional bastion of
Unionist supremacy, Orangeman and Teague now locked in
MAGILL OCTOBER 1983 53
merry embraces, the effects of free Bushmills and Paddy
erasing the divisive tribal connotations of their own trade-
marks: Nell McCafferty perched on the Mayor's throne,
under the Derry emblem of an heroically starving Appren-
tice Boy, benignly patting .Official Unionists; SDLP coun-
cillors cajoled with those who in other circumstances would
refer to them as the Stoop Down Low Party; while poets
and intellectuals from the two cultures and confessions -
were almost a nation once again (in Wolfe Tone's rather
than The Wolfe Tones' sense). Even the fires of the bombed
fertiliser factory that lit up the night sky as we finally
stumbled out of the Guildhall seemed, then, for a few
mistaken moments, like torches of celebration rather than
flames of division.
I ,B IUT BRIAN FRIEL HAS DONE MORE THAN DES-
patch his Field Day troop to the foreign legions of
Africa; he has also enlisted the intellectual swordsmanship
of three pamphleteers: Tom Paulin, Seamus Heaney and
Seamus Deane.
More or less coinciding with the opening of Boesman
and Lena was the launching of Field Day's first set of three
pamphlets (to be repeated henceforth at bi-annual periods).
In the first of these, entitled A New Look at the Language
Question, Tom Paulin shows how the history of alanguage
can become a story of possession and dispossession. Even
the ostensibly innocuous act of compiling dictionaries, the
author convincingly argues, epitomises the way in which
the language question isultimately aquestion about nation-
hood, about one's sense of political and cultural affiliation.
Thus, for example, Webster's American Dictionary aimed
to provide a sense of linguistic self-respect and separatism
for his people just after the American Revolution. As
Webster himself put it: "Let us then seize the present
moment and establish a national language, as well as a
national government."
After several pages of fascinating scholarly analysis -
perhaps a little too scholarly for pamphlet purposes -
Paulin raises the vexed question of our lack of aDictionary
of Irish English. In the absence of any such institutional
lexicon the richness of Irish speech lives freely at aprovin-
cial or local level but forfeits
what Paulin calls the "written
instrument of acomplete cul-
tural idea", by which hemeans
"the all-Ireland context which
a federal concept of Irish
English would necessarily ex-
press". One of the most strik-
ingconsequences of the failure
to provide such a recog-
nisable lexicon of "Irish Eng-
lish" is, the author concludes,
a fragmented and at times
derelict cultural discourse with
untold numbers of "homeless"
words. (Our linguistic displace-
ment, this pamphlet seems to
suggest, is not altogether un- Seamus Heaney
like the political displacement ------------
of Boesman and Lena.)
In the second of the pamphlets, Seamus Heaney pens An
Open Letter in Burns stanzas to the editors of the recent
Penguin Book of Contemporary British Verse. The letter is
prefaced by a telling quotation from Gaston Bachelard to
the effect that the source of our first suffering "lies in the
fact that we hesitated to speak . . . accumulating silent
things within us". Blake Morrison, one of the Penguin
editors has praised "silence" as one of Heaney's most abid-
ing poetic inclinations. Now Heaney ripostes, mischievously
but firmly, that it is time to end the equivocation and speak
out:
For weeks and months I've messed about,
Unclear, embarrassed and in doubt,
Footered, havered, spraughled, wrought,
Like Shauneen Keogh,
Wandering should I write it out
Or let it go.
Heaney's open letter reads as a considered, and let it -be
said courageous, protest against the uncritical attribution
of the term "British" to his poetry. It avoids the tempta-
tion of testy resentment and comes across rather as agood-
humoured rebuke to those who would overlook the histori-
cal and affective charges of our language (in this case the
word "British": Britannia referring to England, Scotland--
and Wales as opposed to Hibernia which referred to Ireland).
Rehearsing the story of a man who stood up in acinema
during the screening of a film to protest, in spite of em-
barrassment, against the misnaming of abeaver asamuskrat,
Heaney sums up the moral of his own letter of dissent as
follows:
Names were not for negotiation.
Right names were the first foundation
For telling truth.
In the third of the pamphlets, Seamus Deanewrites with
customary incisiveness and eloquence of another misuseof
language: the ideological manipulation of the terms "civi-
lian" and "barbarian" to keep the conqueror abovethelaw
and the conquered beneath it. From the sixteenth century
to the present day, "barbarism" has been deployed as a
synonym of anarchism and primitivism to "demonise"
those who threatened the legitimising rule of the British
colonial empire. "Races like the French and the Irish, in
their resistance to the English idea of liberty", argues
Deane, "had now become criminalised - inferno-human
beings".
Thus, for example, one could cite the strategic invoca-
tion of such racial stereotypes as the lascivious, libertine
French or the drunken, feckless Irish. The author ends his
penetrating survey of the history of the political rhetoric
of "civilian" and "barbarian" in the Anglo-Irish conflict,
with this arresting comment on the recent dirty-protest in
the Maze prison in Belfast:
"the conspiracy between the
degraded and the degraders
became so close at that time
that the filthy nakedness of
the prisoner and the space-
suited automatism of the dis-
infecting jailers seemed to be
an agreed contract in their
respective imagesof what they
represented - vulnerable Irish
squalor, impervious, imperso-
nal Englishdecontamination" .
Eventhissummary account
of the three pamphlets should
suffice to underscore theover-
riding common concern of
Seamus Deane their respective authors
all of whom are directors
of Field Day: the use and abuse of languageasapowerful,
if all too often ignored, means of remembering our past,
defining our present and projecting new images for the
future. Without such critical attention to the worlds we
inhabit, no political reshaping of the world can be totally
successful. Already in Translations, Friel had sounded the
note for his three pamphleteers when he wrote: "It is not
the literal past, the facts of history, that shape us, but the
images of the past embodied inlanguage ... Wemust never
cease renewing those images; because once we do, we
fossilise" .
To be sure, these are not "penny pamphlets" written
for the man in the street; they aretwo-pound-fifty pamph-
lets written by intellectuals for intellectuals. But it is an
auspicious beginning nonetheless. For the translation of
these high-minded and crucial debates into idioms more
available to the wider public, there are, of course, the
Field Day plays. If the playwright needs his pamphlateers,
the reverseisequally true.
CARA Data Processing Limited has
won a major order from the Bank of
Ireland to revolutionise the bank's
data processing facilities.
Worth well over lm, the moderni-
sation programme includes the largest
installation in Ireland of RACAL-
MILGO'S PLANET LOCAL AREA
NETWORK (LAN).
The PLANET System, a token
passing ring based network, is being
installed in phases at the Bank's
Dublin headquarters to provide senior
staff with direct access to a manage-
ment information database on a DEC
PDP 11/750 computer.
Twenty terminals are currently
connected to the LAN with plans to
add a further lOin the near future.
A further phase will see terminals at
the Bank's International Division con-
nected via a second PLANET ring to
two mini computers - a DEC and a
TANDEM - again providing staff
with direct access to ashared database.
The data communications network
will, by mid 1984, connect all the
Bank's 350 Branches in Ireland and
25 in the UK to a central computer
on the outskirts of Dublin. Controlled
by a CMS2 network management
controller, the system will be based
on a mixture of high, medium and low
speed links.
"Once we had identified the need
to put our branches on line to Dublin,
our major concern was choosing a
supplier with a solid reputation.
RACAL-MILGO and T-BAR products
met our technical requirements and we
were very impressed with the support
capability of CARA", said Mr Pat
McDowell, Assistant General Manager,
Bank of Ireland Computer Centre,
Cabinteely.
"Having evaluated the systems
available, we felt that PLANET was
really the only LAN ready for delivery
that offered the facilities we needed
in the short term."
The Bank has used its PLANET to
connect three different types of DEC
Terminals to its mini computer. "We
believe that the trend will be towards
the sharing of resources and more
flexibility in inter-office communica-
tions. We are watching the develop-
ment of PLANET's capabilities with
interest", says Mr McDowell.
* * *
AVAIR - Irish Independent Airlines
is to establish a network of scheduled
cargo air services between Dublin and
the UK. The first of these services -
which will be marketed under the
name J ETPAK - commenced on
September 26, when a nightly service
connecting Dublin with East Midlands
Airport began.
Commenting on the new service,
Mr Peter Coyle, General Manager of
Avair, said at a reception held in the
Burlington Hotel, Dublin "J ETPAK is
designed to meet the needs of modern
'industry and commerce for the fast
transportation of, generally, highvalue,
low volume goods such as spare parts,
computer printouts, etc. The new
J ETPAK service has many advantages
to offer to both contract and 'ad hoc'
customers. East Midlands Airport
(EMA) is the cargo airport for the
industrial North of England. It is
located just a mile from the M1
motorway and provides easy access
to business centres such as Birming-
ham, Coventry, Nottingham, Sheffield,
Derby, Leicester and Rotherham."
Mr Coyle went on to say "Our new
J ETPAK service from Dublin to East
Midlands Airport is scheduled to
provide optimum connections with air
cargo services from EMA to Europe
and, also, road trunking services to
other points in the UK."
"J ETPAK will be a fully integrated,
overnight service and will be offered
at keen and competitive rates. Wewill
arrange' to collect customers' parcels
and freight at their offices or factories,
fly the consignments aboard our jet-
prop Shorts 330 freighters and arrange
customs clearance and delivery at
destination. "
* * *
ACCORDING to legend the Italian
liqueur Amaretto di Saronno was
created about 1525 by a poor and
beautiful young widow.
The drink was a gift from her to
the artist, Bernardino Luini, a member
of the Leonardo da Vinci school, who
at the time was painting the frescos
which can still be seen in the chapel
of Santa MariaDelleGrazieinSaronno.
When working on his frescos, the
artist used the young lady as his model
for the madonna and, in return, she
created for him a distinctive drink
brewed from brandy and apricot
kernels, which we know today as
Amaretto di Sarcnno.
Produced in the Lombardy region
of Northern Italy, Amaretto di Saronno
is now sold in 130 countries through-
out the world and has become Ameri-
ca's top-selling liqueur.
Here in Ireland it has previously
only been available through duty free
outlets. Now, because of a growing
consumer preference for cocktails,
D.E. Williams have decided to make it
widely available on the Irish market.
Among the guests present at the
launch reception were Amaretoo di
Saronno's Public Relations Director,
Roberto Biasiol and D.E. Williams's
General Manager and Director, Colm
O'Brennan.
Speaking to the guests Mr O'Brennan
said: "In recent years Irish drinking
tastes have become increasingly more
sophisticated. This has led to anotice-
able growth in specialised cocktail
bars, as well as a growing interest in
the preparation of cocktails at home.
Because of this new emphasis on
cocktails, Amaretto di Saronno is
being introduced to the public as an
essential base for a number of excit-
ing cocktails, as well as being an
extremely pleasant liqueur in its
own right, and as a flavoursome in-
gredient in the preparation of certain
food dishes,"
Readers interested in obtaining
cocktail and recipe leaflets can obtain
these from D.E. Williams, Vintners,
Tullamore.
Raymond Whitehead has been appoin-
ted Sales Director of Ionisation Ireland
Ltd, a recently formed IDA backed
Cork company, manufacturing personal
and industrial air ionisers for the
home and export markets, the latest
model being the Ray Ioniser. These
units which are Irish made have a
price and back up advantage over
foreign made units. Mr Whitehead has
been successfully involved in market-
ing air ionisers for a number of years.
IN THE Dynasty-style carry-on over
who would be President, one phrase
which kept recurring was that so-
and-so would be "unacceptable to
Charlie Haughey". Less often, but
still pretty often, it was said that some
other so-and-so would be "unaccept-
able to Garret FitzGerald".
A thorough search of the Consti-
tution has failed to find a mention
therein of either of these people,
whoever they are. It would appear
from the Constitution that the citi-
zens of this country decide who is
acceptable as fairy on top of the
national Christmas tree. This, clearly,
is not the case. The chief determinant
seems to be whether a particular
President would hurt the ego of either
of the boys. This is not what the
Constitution says. The gap between
what the Constitution intends and
reality indicates the extent to which
the presidency has been corrupted.
Maybe the wording was faulty .

THE MOST cogent argument for the

retention of the office of the Presi-
dency has been that someone has to
sign Bills, technically dissolve the
Dail and technically do a lot of other
things he or she is told to do by the
government.
May we suggest Wigmore for this
position? Won't charge a penny.
Don't need the Arus or the car or the
driver. Always on call for signing Bills
etc, 24 hour service. Would do it just
for the crack. No need for all that
nonsense of unveiling plaques and
opening supermarkets. Leave that to
Mike Murphy.
If Wigmore is unacceptable to
Charlie Haughey we would suggest
Sean Doherty or Hector Grey. Or
there are 200,000 people unemployed
out there with time on their hands.
Most, being generous and patriotic,
would probably do it for the hell of
it. Some might demand an extra
tenner aweek ontheir dole. Any would
behave with greater dignity than the
politicians, including Paddy Hillery,
who have reduced the Presidency to
apub joke.

KNIGHT and Dei, you are the one';

only you beneath ...
Where were we? Last month we
noted the case of Sally Keogh, who
had campaigned for legalised family
planning and how a couple of years
later the Knights of Columbanus were
writing to her new boss, detailing her
history and suggesting something might
be done. Here wego again.
One of those Knights, Nial Darragh,
recently wrote to Southside, a Dublin
giveaway newspaper of repute. He
reminded the editors that a year
previously he and J ohn O'Reilly, an
ex-Knight and one of the founders
of the Amendment campaign, had
visited the paper to complain about
coverage of the Dalkey School Project.
(The Knights conducted a covert
campaign against non-denominational
education.)
Now he wanted to complain about
coverage of the Amendment campaign
and suggested that Southside wanted
"to make homosexuals socially accept-
able".
Darragh warned that this kind of
thing "could possibly provoke a reac-
tion that would threaten the viability
of your enterprise". He also warned,
"a boycott of your advertisers would
not be helpful".
He threatened court action "with
attendant publicity" if the paper was
delivered to his house again, warned
that he would "continue to monitor"
the paper (bit of acontradiction here?)
and would 'later decide "if action
through organisations is necessary".
(Huh? Come again?)
Southside, to their credit, simply
published the missive under the head-
ing "Your Letters".
We would appreciate information
on any similar attempts "to make
the Knights socially acceptable".

THE NEW Travolta/Stallone movie,

Staying Alive, has been hyped to high
heaven. So heavily has it been plugged
that it's no wonder some lines got
crossed. On September 4 the Sunday
Press carried an interview with Stallone
by J anet Maslin. The Sunday Indepen-
dent of that same day ran an interview
with Stallone by Ivor Davis. It was the
same story, word for word. Did J anet
write it, or Ivor, or ... who's fooling
who?
MA GILL extends its sympathy to the
family of George Colley, who died
last month. For over twenty years
George Colley was centrally involved
in parliamentary politics. In our
professional dealings with him he
always acted with courtesy and
understanding. As a Minister he held
several important posts and did the
job with energy and efficiency.
It is unfortunate that any death
should be the occasion of hypocrisy
and cynicism. George Colley in his
going suffered this more than most.
There is a convention that the press
simply report what is said when
.someone dies, that it refrains from
comment and allows itself become
the vehicle for that hypocrisy and
cynicism. It is a convention which
wewill not observe.
The hypocrisy came from the
Haughey camp. Compassion dictated
that they express sympathy at Colley's
death and they did. But they went
further. There was a pretence that
despite the political differences
Haughey and Colley remained close
friends. This wasuntrue. They loathed
each other. In addition, Colley had
decided that if Haughey was still
leader at the next election Colley
would not stand. The Haughey camp
in turn was continuing its efforts to
isolate and evict Colley. Bertie Ahern
said that while he had differences
with Colley at parliamentary party
level they got on well in their con
stituency. This was untrue. There was
bitter and sustained competition and
conflict between them at each of the
last three elections.
The cynicism came from the anti-
Haughey camp, both inside and out-
side Fianna Fail. Theword "integrity"
has become a joke word in political
and journalistic circles since Colley's
death, so often was it abused. One
after another Haughey's enemies lined
up to stress Colley's "integrity", and
by implication the lack of that quality
in his arch enemy. In truth, there is
no evidence that George Colley had
any more or less integrity than most
members of the Dail. Wearenot aware
of any truly dishonourable behaviour
on his part, neither are we aware of
any evidence of sainthood. He was a
successful politician for many years,
with all the toughness that implies.
Following his death, his friends were
not so much praising Colley as damn-
ing Haughey. That is their right.
Colley, being a tough politician,
would have understood that and
probably. would not have been offen-
62 MAGILL OCTOBER 1983
ded. However, it wascynical and there
waslittle integrity init.
When the hypocrisy and cynicism
are forgotten George Colley will be
remembered not for some mystical
integrity but for his clashes with
Haughey and his ultimate defeat. This
is a pity. What he should be remem-
bered for is the fact that it wasColley
who in 1980 put astop to the attempt
to build a nuclear power station at
Carnsore. It is true that his opposition
was on financial and not environ-
mental grounds but that one act was
a positive contribution to the health
and safety of this and future genera-
tions. It wasthe singlemost important
action of his Ministerial career and is
not abad thing to beremembered by.

THE HALLMARK of the present

government is its ability to tease out
problems, probing and discussing, re-
jecting all the simple or obvious solu-
tions and coming up with the most
complicated response possible. Evid-
ence - the Ministerial car fiasco.
It has taken them ten months to
come up with a complex plan which
will probably cost us more money
in the long run. The simple answer
would have been to just abolish state
cars altogether and send their garda
drivers back where they belong - pre-
venting crime. Instead, they assuage
their egos by fiddling with the prob-
lem and then praise themselves for
taking economy measures.
Ministers don't need state cars.
They should be in their offices -
Ministering. They use them for party
purposes, personal purposes, or for
driving down the country to "open"
factories which have already been
operating quite well for a couple of
months. Ministers are not needed for
such duties - and if they want the
publicity they should travel to such
events under their own steam. And
their wages should be docked for the
time they areout of their offices.
Ministers living outside Dublin
should get cmtravel vouchers.
Don't give us the nonsense about
state limos beingnecessary for security
reasons. It's not long since one state
car, complete with sub-machine gun I .
under the seat, wasfound upside down
in a ditch. And another one wasstolen
from outside a Dublin hotel. Some
security.

AT HIS first press conference of the

1981 general election campaign Garret
FitzGerald derided suggestions that
anyone had anything to fear from a
Coalition - despite the disgraceful
"law and order" record of the 1973-
77 Coalition. "You know me", was
hisassurance.
Funny, though, that the Ault &
Wiborg strikers were jailed under
Garret's regime in November 1981.
And the Ranks workers were jailed
this year under Garret's' regime. And
now they're putting people in jail
for refusing to pay ground rent - i.e.
extortionate payments to the des-
cendents of the thugs who stole land
with a King's charter in one hand and
abigsword in the other.
Of course, it's not Garret who's
jailing people. But the buck stops
with him and the fact is that there
were no similar jailings under
Haughey's regime.
The absurd laws on injunctions
urgently need reform. Andthe ground
rent nonsense should simply be
stopped. But perhaps the Coalition
instinct is simply to preserve "lawand
order" - evenif the law is unjust and
theorder non-existent.

HAVE you heard the new hourly

Radio 2 News? Perhaps you don't
listen to Radio 2. Do yourself a
favour, listen.
Some people we know like to
stock up with wine and sit in a com-
fortable armchair with the lights out,
listening to Radio 2 News. They say
it's better than smoking banana peel.
For the best effect you should listen
to three or four bulletins onthe trot.
Our favourite newsreader is Veer
Win J ones, "Squeaky" to his fans.
But the lad who lifts stuff fromBBC's
Newsnight has quite afollowing.
Gene Kerrigan