McBride battle chronicled by McNamara

The former British Labour Party spokesman on Northern Ireland Kevin McNamara (pictured) has penned a history of the 25-year battle for the MacBride Principles on Fair Employment.

The tome will be published by Chicago University Press in the US and has a British publisher as well.

I like the sub-title: "Irish America Strikes Back" and am sure it will be a great read.

The Irish Echo plans to mark the 25th anniversary of the MacBride Principles in association with the law firm of O'Dwyer and Bernstien in New York. Firm founder Paul O'Dwyer was one of the great exponents of the MacBride Principles.

And we are lining up quite an interesting guest list, including the Comptroller-Elect John Liu and current comptrollers Bill Thompson (New York City) and Tom DiNapoli (New York State).

Foinse ar ais ó na mairbh

Tá an cat i measc na gcoiléar anois nó tá fógraithe ag Pádraic Ó Céide go mbeidh Foinse ar ais mar shaornuachtán taobh istigh den Indo gach Céadaoin.

Go n-éirí leis.

Cultúrlann moves closer to extension

The plans to add an iconic extension on to the Falls Road Cultúrlann moved a step closer today with news that the International Fund for Ireland has allocated £600,000 towards the costs. Now only Department of Culture to match that contribution and the work can start.

In a press release, the IFI says:


Culturlann McAdam Ó Fiaich: The Board approved grant assistance towards the refurbishment and extension of Culturlann Mc Adam Ó Fiach, Irish Language, Arts and Cultural Centre on the Falls Road, West Belfast, and an attempt to position the Irish language as accessible to all. The exact amount of assistance has not yet been finalised but it is likely to be in excess of £500,000. The centre will serve as a community hub for the ‘Gaeltacht Quarter Strategy’ which is working to meet the needs of the Irish Language/Cultural and wider community in order to maximise the social opportunities provided by a growing cluster of Irish language/cultural community based groups and enterprises in West Belfast.

Titanic town

A stroll along the emerging Titanic Quarter revealed a number of gems: not least the pumphouse visitor centre and cafe which stands beside the dry dock where the Titanic was built.

Of course when the new £93m Titanic Signature project is built, it will offer a much more impressive visitor experience but fair play to the Pump House for the job it does and the harbour walk outside. There is no reason why a West Belfast facility in the Gaeltacht Quarter couldn't offer a similar visitor experience by telling the story of the peace and justice process.

Surprisingly, there are some people already living in the apartment blocks at the entrance to Titanic Quarter — though the majority of the site is still a building site and I couldn't get as close as I wanted to the new £200,000 artpiece of a standing (or sinking) Titanic. A security man on site told me he expected some of the apartment blocks to be mothballed. Certainly, anyone who buys at the asking price would be crackers. (If you look closely in this Blackberry pic, you can just make out the new sculpture.)

The other picture is of the almost-completed Public Record Office for Northern Ireland which boasts a stylish Richard Serra-style burnished iron roof (anyone who knows the Periodic Table better than me can let me know what the material is). Expect the new £29m PRONI office to open next year and bring an influx of visitors to a part of town which is still largely bereft of people.

Iarsmalann Uladh

Finally made it to the Ulster Museum to check out the Sean Scully exhibition on Saturday and was greeted by a guide to the museum in Irish. Well done to all concerned.

The Troubles section wasn't as I had thought artworks but a history lesson covering the conflict.

As for Scully, full marks to the museum for honoring an Irish artist and Scully himself gets the thumbs-up for his introductory comments where he says Belfast is a bridge from conflict to peace with much to offer the world.

There's at least six galleries of Scully's work over the past 35 years, much of it bright, bold and big. A Scully is more powerful on its own and sometimes best-enjoyed from the other side of the gallery as in this picture.

Vótáil me don Aonach Oibre — sin beirt againn

Tá ardmheas agam ar an Aonach Oibre a tionóladh i gColáiste Feirste an mhí seo chuaigh thart agus chaith mé mo vóta ar a shon. Tchím go bhfuil ar a laghad duine amháin eile ar aon intinn liom.

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All change

There’s been plenty of change in the next parish over — New York — this week which will have a bearing on ourselves. Controller Bill Thompson — the man who invested $150m of pension funds in the North — ran against sitting Big Apple Mayor Michael Bloomberg and narrowly lost.

Meanwhile, winning the election for Controller was the fresh-faced John Liu, the first Asian-American to hold such a senior elected position in New York. Controller Liu will now have to look long and hard at those investments in the North of Ireland and decide what benefit, if any, they bring the people of New York (fact: none of the $150m has yet been spent).

The good news: Controller Liu has made two visits to the offices of our sister paper The Irish Echo in New York and has already expressed strong support for the MacBride Principles on Fair Employment and is a strong advocate of ethical investing and economic justice.

No doubt, these issues will be aired when the President of New York City Council Christine Quinn arrives in Belfast next week to address the Aisling Awards. Interestingly while we beat New York in many political milestones (for example, New York has never had a female mayor), the Big Apple beats us on one. Christine Quinn is the first openly gay President of the Council. To my knowledge, we have no openly gay political leaders.

I plumped for Presidents' Club

This is a geg. This link brings you to a chart and map of the US to see where the votes are coming from. The Presidents' Club is polling strong in California — all those Silicon Valley fans — while St Malachy's Church is riding high in....Colarado!.

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Níos mó ná bealach amháin amach as an tsainn ina bhfuilimid

"If all economists were laid end to end, they would not reach a conclusion."
George Bernard Shaw.

Bhí mé ag meabhrú ar chomhairle an drámadóra agus muid faoi léigear ag eacnamaithe ar RTÉ atá ag sárú a chéile lena mbagairtí maidir le gearradh seirbhísí agus teannadh ár gcrios.

Ach tá níos mó ná scoil amháin eacnamaíochta ann. Cad chuige nach dtugar seans d'eacnamaithe nach n-aontaíonn le polasaithe an rialtais labhairt amach?

Tá gá ach go háirithe le scrúdú a dhéanamh ar an pholasaí maidir le tithíocht agus maidir leis na bainc. Tá praghas na dtithe in Éirinn ró-ard ach níl na praghasanna ag teacht aníos mar tá an rialtas ag cosaint lucht a dtógtha agus an dream a thug amach na hiasachtaí le go dtógfaí iad — na bainc.

Bhí ar an phobal praghas ró-ard a íoc le linn an 'boom' ach níl seans acu margadh maith a fháil anios agus meathlú geilleagrach sa mhullach orainn.

Blast from the past

Our pal in Nua Eabharc Daithí Mac Lochlainn spotted the TUV u-turn on this one first: the party branded Irish a leprechaun language and then recanted with a simple bashing of Irish language.

The party has now apologised.

This BBC report notes that the term "leprechaun language" was first famously used by Sammy Wilson in the 1980s during a City Hall debate. It was actually used as part of a motion to throw me out of the council at my first meeting in November 1987 when I had spoken Irish.

Tale of two cities

And this is the editorial from this week's Andersonstown News which reflects on the fact that while East Belfast this week got £43.5m from the Executive for the Titanic Quarter signature project (good for them) and £10m from Belfast City Council for the same £93m project, West Belfast got....an architectural design competition for a building which has not yet been greenlighted for construction.

You can read the whole editorial, with a virtual appendix listing the Titanic Quarter projects, here in pdf form.

Large boxes which don't connect

So that's how the world works: last Friday I was apoplectic about the high-rise flats towering over the beautiful St Joseph's Church and this Friday I'm looking at a story in the North Belfast News castigating the development.

Though Mark Hackett of the Forum for an Alternative Belfast (i.e. one which people want to live in and which cherishes its people and neighbourhoods) isn't as scathing about the height of the empty apartment block, he thinks it's disgraceful that it has no ground floor activity.

Where there should be shops or a creche or a restaurant or an office even, there is car parking. Without that, there's no connection with the community, he says.

You can read his thoughts on this pdf. But he says: "These large boxes are being marketed as the European model but they lack the sophistication that those models have. I hear a lot of people in Belfast talking about 'tall buildings are good' and 'they create an image of the city that's vibrant', but not if it's a hollow vision because the ground floor activities and connectedness of the streets makes a city really vibrant and we don't have that."

Mark tells me he and his co-conspirators for a better Belfast, Declan Hill and Ciarán Mackel, are known as the three grumps but in this picture, he looks quite angry. Though unfortunately, the photo from this angle doesn't show St Joseph's Church.

Aisling countdown

Swimming From Under My Father

Our LA pal Michael O'Keefe, he of the Black Mountain Zen workshops and movieland, has turned his hand to poetry. Last time I saw Michael was in the Felons about three years ago and we sipped two cokes (one each). Haven't been back at the Felons since, either. (I was going to steal this pic from his website but turns out he got their first, it's a North Belfast News photo — only joking, we're given full credit).

He has his own website of course, I have no way of knowing if it's more truthful or more accurate than the Wiki reference above but you could have fun finding out.

This is what we love about Yanks. They decide they want to be something entirely different. They go to school (they have poetry school in the US, he went) and learn this new trade. And they emerge as their new selves.

So here's an offering from his first book of poetry, Swimming From Under My Father. It's called 'The List Of Lies I Told One Time Or Another'.

I didn't take the money
I will love you always
I have no idea where the Oreos are
Everything will be all right.

God won't give you anything you can't handle.
My defects of character have been removed.
No Sister Marie, I didn't put
the chocolate pudding down Millicent's dress.
Everything will be all right.

I never slept with anyone else.
I'm not sleeping with anyone else.
I don't want to sleep with anyone else.
Everything will be all right.

Why would I lie about that?
Of course it's the truth.
I think you need to take a long look at yourself.
Everything will be all right.

Heaven is where you go when you die,
If you've lived a good life.
Hell is where you go when
you die if you haven't.
God is Love.
Everything is all right.

Bloomberg back, but only just

Mayor Michael Bloomberg has held on to the Mayoral seat in New York City, but contender Bill Thompson, the outgoing comptroller, performed better than expected.

Read the New York Times analysis here.

Future planning

The Comptroller of New York City Bill Thompson (pictured) takes on the might of Michael Bloomberg today to see who will be the next mayor of New York.

I wish Bill Thompson well. He has been an exceptional friend of Ireland in an office where the bar had already been set very high by previous comptrollers.

You can read the Irish Echo editorial on the race here.

The polls have him trailing — after all Bloomberg is outspending him ten dollars to his every one, at least — but even if he doesn't get the key to Gracie Mansion, we can expect his life of public service to continue.

No doubt he holds with the view of Luis Valdez that "the future belongs to those who can imagine it".

Dancing days

A reader sends me this picture from Sailortown in the eighties when dancing priest Cornelius Horan was lending his 'support' to the annual blessing of pets and animals which takes place at St Joseph's.

Unfortunately, the same Fr Horan, then regarded as simply eccentric, went on to disrupt the Athens Olympic marathon and tried to storm a Formula 1 race before being charged with indecent assault.

It gets worse: Irish speaker Horan also danced for the children of one of our local Irish medium schools when he was "jigging his way round Ireland for peace".

Poor mouth in the baby Grand

I'm sure Flann O'Brien would be tickled by the fact that his Myles na gCopaleen creation An Béal Bocht will enjoy a run in the Baby Grand at the Opera House from 11-14 November.

Before that, the ultimate take on Gaeilgeoirsphere will premiere at An Chultúrlann on 6 November. There's more detail on this flyer.

There's a full translation service and here's the synopsis by our pre-eminent professional theatre company Aisling Ghéar:

The Poor Mouth/An Béal Bocht’ - is a two-fingered salute to all things ‘excessively, excessively and excessively ’ Gaelic!. It tells the story of one, Bonaparte O'Coonassa - ‘son of Michealangelo, son of Patrick, son of Owen, son of Sarah, son of Thomas, son of Maire’ !! who was born in a cabin in a fictitious village called Corkadoragha in western Ireland. From the front door of this ‘small lime-white house situated in the corner of the Glen’ you could (allegedly) see - Gweedore, Connemara, Galway, the island of Aran and The Great Blaskets!!! Famed as much for its beauty as the abject, relentless and ‘much prized’ poverty of its residents, the daily fare consists of potatoes, potatoes and yet more potatoes, which they shared with a horse called Charlie, a bunch of sheep ‘a slim thighed cow’, a clutch of chickens and Ambrose the pig!! You’re invited to discover buried treasure, underwater homes and the perils of marathon Irish dancing. A perfect marriage of satire and gazumping!!

There are great things happening in the Gaeltacht Quarter — and Aisling Ghéar is at the very heart of them. But there's no use preparing masterplans and reports if the Irish speaking community of Belfast doesn't support the living, breathing companies which make the Gaeltacht Quarter tick. See you in the Opera House.

Interest in Chomsky's Jewish parentage

On his blog, Nelson McCausland makes an interesting reference to Noam Chomsky's Jewish parentage in an article which excoriates the respected academic and activist.

Minister McCausland says: "Chomsky was born in Philadelphia to Jewish parents" before going on to list a series of McCarthyite style charges including "him he is a member of the revolutionary IWW" (for the uninitiated, the largely irrelevant International Workers of the World); he is "controversial"; he is "shunned by the mainstream media".

Chomsky was in town to give the annual Amnesty International lecture in Queen's and to speak at St Mary's College in West Belfast. He adds: "The choice of such a prominent figure from the far-left as their speaker must say something about the politics of Amnesty International and maybe even the Human Rights Centre at Queen's. For those who are not familiar with the HRC at Queen's, the director is Professor Brice Dickson, the first chief commissioner of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission."

However, what that "something" may be, we can only guess as the normally candid minister who won't attend any events which involve Catholic ceremony doesn't elucidate. Why not?

Micheál Ó Brolacháin ar lár

Brón orm cloisteáil inniu ar mo bhealach ar ais ón Oireachtas i Leitir Ceanainn go bhfuair Micheál Ó Brolacháin bás aréir.

49 mbliain d'aois a bhí sé agus i measc na leabhar a scríobh sé bhí Laochra, Sráid Sicín agus, do pháistí, Gréagóir Goraile. Bhí greann ar leith ann agus dúil mhór aige sa tsaol. Bhuail mé leis ar dtús agus muid ag plé le Conradh na Gaeilege agus na heagrais agóidíochta a d'eacair as, go háirithe Freagra.

Ba guth úr é i saol na litríochta Gaeilge sna hochtóidí agus is oth liom nár lean sé den scríbhneoireacht. Folisíodh Laochra i 1983, an bhliain chéanna inar fhoilsigh Séamus Mac Annaidh Cuaifeach Mo Londubh Buí. Ar ndóigh is beag aitheantas a bheir muid do scríbhneoirí na Gaeilge, ní iontas mar sin iad éirí as an scríbhneoireacht. Tchím ón idirlíon go raibh baint aige fosta le Shamrock Rovers.

Go raibh suaimhneas síoraí aige.

You are the one

American Indian leader Yvonne Swan sends me the YouTube link from Californnia to the song Floyd Westerman-Red Crow wrote for her. Chante Waste Win is Dakota for You Are the One.



Meanwhile, for my sins (and among Floyd's memorable songs performed in the Conway Mill in 1985 was 'Custer Died for Your Sins'), I attended the Polish MacBeth in the docks last night, complete with motorbikes and witches on stilts. I will kindly draw a veil of silence over that event.

What I was taken with however was the density of the apartment developments shadowing the beautiful St Joseph's Church in Pilot Street. Where once stood small terraced homes, there are now towering (and empty) apartment blocks of the sort of density you would see on 42nd Street in New York (city of eight million people). Some of the apartments have spectacular views across three metres to...the apartment block next door. Here's a prediction: these apartments will remain unoccupied for the next five years.

Hopefully, the government isn't so stupid that it will buy them up for 'social housing'. Much better to provide good quality houses for those in need of social housing than to condemn them to these high-rise monstrosities which deface the landscape.

Finally, fair dues to the parishioners of St Joseph's who fought like hell and held regular Sunday mass at the door of the chapel to prevent the church from demolishing this grand old building. Amidst the follies of mammon, it shines like a beacon to real values.

Final call

With only days to go before nominations close for this year's Aisling Awards gala, a partial shortlist has been released.

It includes in the community endeavour category, the West Belfast and Greater Shankill Enteprise Council for its Think Transformation masterplan and LORAG on the Lower Ormeau which is completing work on a massive renovation of the Shaftesbury Recreation Centre.

There's still time to nominate a business for the annual business accolade.

Guest speaker at this year's thirteenth annual celebration will the Speaker and President of New York City Council Christine Quinn. Speaker Quinn, a passionate Irish American and the first-openly gay President of the Council, will carry out a full range of appointments in Belfast before giving the main address at the Aisling Awards on 19 November in the Europa Hotel. As well as meeting with Lord Mayor Naomi Long, she'll attend a reception in West Belfast, be welcomed into East Belfast, enjoy a business breakfast at the Presidents Club and have lunch with the main gay and lesbian advocacy groups in the city.

Speaker Quinn is pictured with Pádraic White, chair of West Belfast and Shankill Enterprise Council and Cllr Michael Brown, then head of the Belfast City Council Economic Development Committee, in February 2008.

San Francisco steps up

Ciaran Scally sends me this press release:

San Francisco (October 28, 2009) - The San Francisco Board of
Supervisors have voted unanimously to adopt a resolution supporting the
reunification of Ireland by peaceful, electoral and diplomatic means.
The resolution was prepared by Supervisor Sean Elsbernd and first
introduced by Supervisor Chris Daly on October 20th. The Board acted on
the resolution at it's October 27 meeting.

The resolution was supported by several members of San Francisco's Irish
Community. Several of the speakers, who are immigrants, told the board
that they came to the United States because the circumstances created by
partition forced them out, citing discrimination in employment and
education as well as the unwarranted imprisonment of nationalists and
republicans under the corrupt policing and judicial systems.

"All we want for the people of Ireland are the same democratic rights
that people here in the United States enjoy," said Ciaran Scally.

Joan O'Neill, echoed those sentiments, saying, "I left because of the
discrimination that I faced there. Irish people should be given the same
opportunity for self-determination as every other people."

Another speaker, Regina Costa, pointed out that the language of the
resolution is consistent with the provisions in the Good Friday
Agreement, which provides for a referendum on reuniting the nation
should a majority of voters wish. "San Francisco has a long tradition of
supporting democratic rights in many lands, and supporting the same
rights in Ireland would mean a lot to Irish Americans in San Francisco,"
she said.

Support for Irish reunification is strong in San Francisco, as evidenced
by the decision of the United Irish Societies to adopt "Unite Ireland
Now" as the theme for the 2010 St. Patrick's Day Parade.

The Board's action follows hard on the heels of the passage of a similar
resolution by the Executive Board of the California Democratic Party on
July 19th, 2009, and the San Francisco Labor Council on September 28.

The resolution can be found on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors
Web site, under minutes of 27 October.

Aloofness and avoidance

Thanks to the tipper who alerted me to this Independent piece back in June, though its prediction of an extensive Troubles gallery at the Ulster Museum proved wrong.

In the lengthy piece, John Gray, former librarian at the Linen Hall Library is quoted: "The museum was guilty of aloofness and avoidance. It's fair to say a lot of institutions were."

Thank goodness those attitudes are all in the past.

Lost language

You can just imagine the anguished discussion at the Ulster Museum as they debated where to put the Fáilte sign at the reception.

The solution, as you see, was to put a number of languages in alphabetical order, with Fáilte and Fair Fae Ye coming with the 'f's.

I have seen many ingenious solutions to the language conundrum here (i.e. how do we accord respect to the Irish identity without pissing off the old guard) but this is the first time I've seen the alphabet deployed.

Nowhere else on these islands would the indigenous language(s) be relegated to the same level as non-indigenous languages but there's always a first.

A more telling commentary on the head-bowed approach of the Ulster Museum to its surrounds is the little sign directing visitors to 'The Troubles'. Like a mad aunt hidden in the attic, the inquisitive visitor wanting to find out what this conflict thing was all about is steered towards a box-room afterthought.

The bad news: I was in the museum for a farewell party for Marie-Thérèse McGivern who is leaving Belfast City Council in the smashing new atrium last night and the galleries were closed so I didn't manage to see the building in all its glory. Another day.

Slice of the old block

Sal Lupoli, who started his pizza empire from a converted mill in Lawrence, Massachusetts with Minister Conor Murphy and Mayor Michael Sullivan of Lawrence.

The trio are pictured during the minister's visit to Lawrence, the poorest city in Lawrence but also a city on the bounce back.

I came across Sal's self-promotional pizza site for Salvatore's today and thought it was a great template for anyone who wishes to really push their business. At the minute, nominations are coming in for this year's Aisling Award business accolade and a few more like Sal (who has also converted 1.2 million sq ft of mill buildings in Lawrence) would make life easy for the ajudication panel of the PwC-sponsored award.

You can nominate a business at the Aisling website.

Magic Johnston's 15-second movie show

I was down at Weaver's Court today as part of my odyssey into the emerging companies of Belfast.

Weaver's Court is Belfast's best-run business park which is under the tutelage of City councillor Tom Ekin. It has a series of exciting companies across several acres, including a company working for HBO which explains why Sean Bean was there last week. (Tom Ekin had to relocate from South Africa to Belfast to be threatened by racists, as you can see from our report.)

The park is in the heart of Sandy Row and you have to run a gauntlet of union jacks to reach its entrance but inside it's a world away from the poverty and joblessness of that loyalist estate. Hundreds of graduates work in a score of businesses in the park including Asidua and Anaeko.

On my way out of the park today, I was shanghaied into calling into the wackiest but potentially most profitable of them all: Philip 'Magic' Johnston's media zoo which includes this fine 15-second movie booth where I watched a series of shorts.

Philip, who once authored the alternative mag DV8 until he published a green, white and orange union jack on the front cover and found shops wouldn't stock it, is also a dab hand at ipod apps. His virtual 'I Snort Cocaine' joke app has turned over £26,000 this year. He swears it's a joke and certainly not as injurious to your person as the real thing.

Yes Hasan

Kiva.org remains an inspirational website which funds the entrepreneurs of the developing world with our loans....note they're not asking for charity but loans.

I've been a Kiva lender for some years now and every penny I've lent (the total is no more than $1500 or £1,000) has been repaid. And when it comes back round, I lend it out again.

It's the brainchild of Irish American Matt Flannery who's based on the west coast of America; we must get him to Belfast (or even New York) at some point.

I've just lent $200 from my account to Lebanese wannabe entrepreneur Hasan who needs another $250 lent to him to reach his target of $1,000. Any wannabe bankers among readers of From The Balcony are welcome to pitch in....or if he has already hit his target, I'm sure there are many other hardworking applicants on Kiva.

Here's Hasan's pitch on Kiva.org:

"Hasan is a 39 year old man who lives in Bourj El Barajneh in the southern suburbs of Lebanon with his wife and their child.

"Hasan has been selling espresso coffee for three years. He has requested a loan from Al Majmoua in order to purchase merchandise and phone cards for his work. This is the first time that Hasan has requested a loan.

"His clients are his neighbors and people from his region. Hasan decided on this business because he wanted to have independent work. In the future, he plans on opening a shop to sell mobile phones and phonecards."

Festival blues

That blue Monday feeling, especially considering there's a bank holiday down south, and I thought I might catch something at the Belfast Festival at Queen's.

Numbers attending events this year must be down considerably because every day I get another email request (unsolicted and efforts to unsubscribe have failed) inviting me to attend events the same night.

I will see Macbeth at the docks this Friday night though that seems to have been a particularly challenging gig as it's outdoors in late October, in Belfast, at night, by the water. Did anyone mention the weather at the planning stage? On Friday last, I was offered a ticket for the Sunday performance for a tenner. Smacks of desperation.

Sadly, the Festival also failed to fill the Clonard Monastery for a classical concert last Friday night. I've been told there was one local guy there but he was minding the cars! All in all, the Festival fails spectacularly to connect with the working class people of Belfast and (with the honourable exception of Kabosh theatre company which is performing a play in the Somerton Road synagogue) has the feeling of venturing onto the reservation when it wanders into West or North Belfast.

The Festival at Queen's has ambitions of becoming Ireland's premier festival. Until this disconnect with the working class people of Belfast is sorted, that ambition will sadly remain unrealised.

(I went on the website tonight to see if I could get tickets for DV8's To Be Straight With You — see YouTube clip — only to realise that while it's still prominent on the site, complete with 'book now' tag, the play only ran for three nights last week!)

Hold (up) the front page!

Indeed, this is the type of front page, you really do want to hold up.

It's the first time in eons that I've seen the national colours in such splendour on our front page but then any story involving English artist Conrad Atkinson — and his Silver Liberties piece banned from the Ulster Museum in 1978 — has to be in full multicoloured beauty.

Headlined, 'What the Ulster Museum doesn't want you to see' the story reveals that leading Belfast artist and curator at the GT Gallery, Peter Richards, believes Conrad's magnificent Silver Liberties will be shown in the revamped Ulster Museum...in 2011.

You can read the full story on the Andersonstown News Monday edition front page in pdf format here.

What Do I Get?

I occasionally listen into Bob Dylan's radio hour and was intrigued today to see he had picked up a Buzzcocks single from 1978, Everybody's Happy Nowadays for his show the day after I'd been to see their 30-year-on reunion at Queen's Students' Union last night. Dylan noted that their first gig was as support to the Sex Pistols and their first single, Orgasm Addict, was banned by the BBC. "These guys knew what they were doing," he deadpanned.

They tell me they've just spent £10m on renovating the Union but I couldn't see £10 of work..place looked as dilapidated as ever (mind you, it was dark).

Lead singer Pete Shelley was fatter and 31 years older than he was in this video but for fify-somethings, they put on a high-energy show.

Next up on the revival circuit: Horslips in December. Nostalgia ain't what it used to be.

Joining the Dots

Some soundbites for ten from the excellent Presidents Club Joining the Dots seminar last week:

1. The majority of foreign direct investment jobs being brought into the North by Invest NI (jobs from NYSE last week honourably excepted) are not only low paid but are reducing the average wage.
2. Some of the jobs are going to non-residents. Therefore, public money going to create jobs for people from EU accession states. Noble but may not be a great economic strategy.
3. The next decade will be "miserable" for the public sector.
4. The North has, in relation to depressed Britain and sunk Republic of Ireland, a fastgrowing economy but it's productivity and wages remain poor.

In short: "This is a good place to be in business but not necessarily in which to be an employee."

And these quotes aren't from a republican critic of the system either but some are from Graham Gudgin, economist and former Ulster Unionist party advisor.

Irish America's Aosdána

Former NYPD detective and esteemed New Yorker Brian McCabe put pen to paper after the memorable Irish American Writers Association gala honouring William Kennedy.

You can read his tribute to Irish America's 'aosdána' here.

Take a bow Finola Meredith

Alone among our national journalists, Finola Meredith of the Irish Times took up the issue of the banning of Conrad Atkinson from the Ulster Museum in 1978 in coverage of the revamped museum's reopening.

In today's Irish Times, she notes that the Museum has a small — some would say minimalist — space for 'Troubles' art. But even there there's no Conrad.

As readers of From The Balcony know, his monumental work Silver Liberties; A Souvenir of a Wonderful Anniversary Year was banned from the museum on the insistence of the porters — who were backed by the Trustees.

That piece is now in the Wolverhampton Art Gallery collection, having been bought for a significant five-figure sum.

Writes Meredith: "But there have been damaging controversies too: in 1978, attendants at the museum refused to hang Silver Liberties: A Souvenir of a Wonderful Anniversary Year , Conrad Atkinson’s artwork commemorating Bloody Sunday. The staff’s “work-to-rule” action was backed by the museum’s trustees, and caused a stand-off with the Northern Ireland Arts Council, which described it as “a denial of creative freedom”. “Silver Liberties” is currently held at the Wolverhampton Art Gallery, which has one of the biggest collections of Troubles art in Ireland and Britain. A group of Belfast artists is campaigning to have the piece reinstated in the new Troubles gallery at the museum."

Time to get the story of our war and peace told by means of the visual arts in a West Belfast museum.

Here I am standing in front of Silver Liberties at the Wolverhampton Gallery. It shows the faces of those cut down on Bloody Sunday by the guys we are supposed to buy poppies for, a picture of a baton-wielding Brit taken from a wall in West Belfast, and pictures of people beaten up in police stations in Britain. It's a commentary on how the use of British soldiers on the streets of Belfast and Derry would ultimately lead to the brutalisation of British citizens. We may be the guinea pigs but you'll get yours too was the warning.

There's a clearer image of Silver Liberties in our catalogue for Conrad's 2007 visit to Belfast for his exhibition, Some Birds Singing; Some Wounds Healing which is on the web here.

One third in poverty

Addressing the Health Inequalities conference, Mary Hinds of the Public Health Agency here, said "our poorest children go to their schools — to their beds — hungry".

She said: "Over a third of our children live in poverty. Older people in rural communities are particularly affected by physical isolation, dispersed population, limited access to services and a poor transport infrastructure. Migrant workers experience difficulties in accessing health and social care services. Poor mental health affects one in four.

"In the travelling community, men still dies 10 years earlier and women 12 years earlier than those from the settled community."

Her killer line: "Social justice is a matter of life and death."

Also pictured is health minister Michael McGimpsey addressing the opening of the conference.

Poverty doesn't recognise peacelines

Just out of the pioneering conference on health inequalities hosted by the Ann Brown Trust in the Farset International Hostel on the Springfield Road interface.

The Andersonstown News and Shankill Mirror joined forces to sponsor the event, publishing, for the first time the same editorial on the issue of disadvantage and health inequalities.

John McVicar, manager of the Shankill Mirror and myself were asked to say a few words to close the groundbreaking event. I noted that while John's an Ulster Unionist who wears a poppy — and this is the start of poppy season so he had his pin in today — and I'm an Irish republican who wears an Easter lily but we realise poverty doesn't recognise peacelines. Changing the situation where 19 of the 20 poorest wards in the North are in West and North Belfast and Derry must remain the core mission of all.

On coming back to the office, I see this great letter from Senator Steve Tolman, who attended the Boston conference.

Finally, here's a few pictures of our friends from the Irish Technology Leadership Group at the Cultúrlann yesterday. In one picture, two young pupils from Coláiste Feirste are pictured with Ciarán Mackel, Seán Mistéil, Padraic White and Jennifer McCann MLA while among the larger group is Sammy Douglas, advisor to the First Minister, Peter Curistan, who built the Odyssey complex, Johnny Gilmore of Sling Media, John Hartnett and Cllr Tim Attwood.

Full marks to Technology Leadership Group

John Hartnett, one of the founders of the Irish Technology Leadership Group in Silicon Valley, led his group of powerful tech moguls and venture capitalists into the Cultúrlann today for a reception in the Gaeltacht Quarter.

It's a great credit to the Group that they put Shankill and West Belfast on their itinerary. In fact, four of the group took time out to meet young people from the Shankill and assess a school project.

Addressing the Cultúrlann audience after West Belfast and Greater Shankill Enterprise Council chair Pádraic White (former head of the IDA) had spoken, Hartnett said that he had got his start with Wang — a firm Padraic brought to Limerick.

Now a major player in Silicon Valley, Hartnett was here last week with Hillary. He then travelled to China, Hong Kong and Taiwan before coming back to Belfast for this week's visit.

Others in the room included some of the most powerful figures in Intel and Johnny Gilmore from Warrenpoint who founded Sling Media, one of the greatest digital media companies in Silicon Valley.

Ó Pheann an Aire

They're all at it now. Minister Nelson McCausland's new blog is up and running.

Last night, I attended the first-ever meeting in Belfast between the PSNI and the Irish speaking community.

Previously, meetings between the old RUC and Irish speakers took place at the end of a baton or the butt of a rifle so it was nice to see the new arrangement where if not at the front of the bus, we're about half-way up.

A good start and as the Irish says, every start is weak, bíonn gach tús lag.

But that's no excuse for the PSNI representative to blame lack of Irish speakers for failing to provide an adequate service for Gaeilgeoirí. After all, he adamantly supported the use of the plastic bullets which have been used to murder our children and terrorise our community, and if they need to train PSNI officers to fire those weapons, they'd sort that out in the blink of an eye. How come they can't act as robustly (to use the Good Friday Agreement terminology) when it comes to the rights of Irish speakers.

Still, like everyone else I was there to support the move to changing the police service here so that it serves the community and as Barry Gilligan (pictured) said, every journey starts with a single step.

Pump it up

I am in the magnificent Pump House where the Titanic was built down at the Titanic Quarter for a meeting about small start-up businesses. It's 8:30am and the place is buzzing.

There are 1500 graduates working down in Titanic Quarter at the minute - quite a change from the tens of thousands of shipyard workers, including my pops, who once worked here - many of them in the Northern Ireland Science Park.

I passed the Belfast Metropolitan College and the Public Record Office, both under construction at a cost of around £30m.

This part of Belfast is changing at a bewildering speed, an exemplar for the rest of us.

After my visit to the dock of the bay, I leapfrogged across the M3 bridge and over to the Presidents'Club where Mark Finlay was hosting a discussion about how best to work with the diaspora to encourage economic development here.

After that, it was into the beautiful, state-of-the-art premises of Coláiste Feirste where Colma Nic Sheáin and Jake Mac Siacais were hosting a wonderful jobs fair, aimed at Irish speakers in particular.

And now, I have an editorial to do and then the quarterly meeting of the Irish Language Broadcast Fund where we will distribute up to £1m I hope on independent film-makers as well as the biggies such as BBC to produce Irish language content for our TV screens, our computer screens and our radio stations.

The pictures show the Innovation Avenue with the not-so-clever Stop sign ('smart boy wanted, last boy too smart) down at Titanic Quarter (note the glass buildings just opened), the pump house as dawn broke this morning at 8am and the picture of the port actually working the old-fashioned way, cranes were unloading grain from the ship in the distance.

Transatlantic partnership — Joe Leary interviewed

The Irish American Partnership, headquartered in Boston, has 3,200 donors across 50 states, a significant number in California and Chicago as well as along the East Coast and, of course, in sunny Florida where many wealthy Irish retire.

Irish American legend Chuck Feeney was a prime mover in the Irish American Partnership's early days and encouraged its commitment to education in Ireland.

That commitment continues to this day, as this blog reported last week. In this short interview, Partnership President Joe Leary talks about the partnership, his support for the integrated school movement in the North and his first visit to an Irish medium school.

Pictured with me showing Joe Leary around the Belfast Media Group press hall is editor Robin Livingstone (left).

Throw away that business plan

It's never too late to teach an old dog new tricks, methinks, as I file by Blackberry from Mobile Monday, a monthly get-together in Belfast's Black Box to look at ways of turning great mobile tech ideas into viable businesses.

Shortly, a number of youngsters will pitch their businesses to an audience of locals and some ex-pats who are here with the Irish Technology Leadership Group from Silicon Valley.

I have been wondering why all the high-tech, bioscience jobs etc are based in east or south Belfast but never in west.

The two great exceptions to that rule are Andor (which had to threaten it would go to Dundalk if the old IDB didn't fund its operation in West Belfast) and Noel McKenna's APT which moved into an empty advance factory.

Surely with one of Europe's great hospitals, the RVH, West Belfast should have some of these start-up companies! I asked Alan Watts of the Halo programme that very question tonight and he says they have been working with some medical-linked companies. I hope to find out more on Wednesday morning when I attend a breakfast in the Northern Ireland Science Park about the Halo investment scene here.

Most of the emerging tech companies are in the NI Science Park in east Belfast's Titanic Quarter though the Cathedral Quarter is making waves as well. E-Synergy is based there and Mobile Monday took place in the Black Box, one of the Quarter's premier venues.

I met with two wonderful young people Naomh McElhatton and Daithi Conlon of Green Beans Media, which sells internet ads, a tough business in a very tight sector. They're pictured. Good luck to them and they're buoyed by the fact that the stats claim there's now more money being spent on internet advertising than on TV.

Main speaker of the night was East Belfast boy David Kirk, formerly senior with AOL and Cisco, who is here with the ITLG "to give back". "We are very, very interested in helping the whole island and want to give back our time and experience," he said.

He said the business plans he has reviewed as part of the 'dragons' den' session for new tech companies tomorrow impressed him. "There is no shortage of talent. I would put the engineers I've met here up against engineers anywhere in the world. There is also no shortage of ideas."

However, at the end of a session where more than one speaker lashed Invest NI, he said "the ecosystem underserves that talent". He feels that while the local capital for emerging tech companies is at around £20m total (someone in the audience suggested there might be a total of £40m available), at least £100m was needed to make an impact. He also found too much "dumb money": investors who were willing to sign a cheque and turn up to one board meeting a month. His style, au contraire, was to get his sleeves rolled up and work as a member of a team to make the businesses he invested in a success.

And in another piece of advice you won't get in business school, he said business plans were to secure funding only and should then be thrown away. "If you're still using the same business plan 90 days after you start your business, then you're asleep at the wheel."

Irish bash on Eugene O'Neill's birthday

I was delighted to hear that the inaugural Irish American and Writers Eugene O'Neill award night was a great success with Matt Dillon, Patrick Shanley and Gabriel Byrne joining in the fun to present to William Kennedy (he of the Roscoe/Ironweed series who I have only read in non-fiction - his history of Albany).

Pulitzer-prize winning Kennedy is regarded as the father of Irish American literature — the grandfathers and grandmothers are all dead — and no-one is reckoned to have captured the intrigue and adventure of Irish American political life better than him.

Well done to Peter Quinn (of American fame), Michael Patrick MacDonald and Larry Kirwan, among others, for coming up with such a great initiative and I was delighted that Peter McDermott of the Irish Echo was able to play a small part in the New York event.

And now probably the biggest-gathering ever of Irish American writers will take place in Chicago over Halloween. Organised by Cliff Carlson, who runs an excellent monthly Irish magazine in the Windy City, IBAM will gather over 40 Irish and Irish American writers in one spot, including Black 47 and Eugene McIldowney.

Most important lines

It was great to get an invite to do the BBC radio show 7 Days today, not least because I got to meet again with David Dunseith who was moved sideways from Talkback to this Sunday noon-time recluse. David is the BBC's greatest broadcaster but surely he should be on the airwaves more often.

On the way in to the BBC studios, I got to study the bewildered tourists making their way round this godforsaken city on a drizzly Sunday morning.

The show itself didn't feature the questions which are most important to me: including the fact that today the people of North Belfast are marching for the right to housing. At present over 90 per cent of those in greatest housing need in North Belfast are from the nationalist community.

St Malachy's and waiting for inspiration

Excellent picture round-up of our Boston conference in the free Irish Echo digital edition here.

During a restful day, I got to visit St Malachy's church in Belfast city centre which has been nominated for the Aisling Belfast Brand award.

And I was stunned at the beautiful restoration work in this fine Markets' church which dates back to the 1840s. It's as beautiful as any church I've seen on the continent and architects Consarc deserve a pat on the back for their restoration work. If you visit, look out for the unbelievable wedding cake style ceiling.

I also picked up some eyecatching cards by artist Grant Wood today (he of American Gothic fame) which had this little quote from him: "I joined a school of painters in Paris after the war who called themselves neo-meditationists. They believed an artist had to wait for inspiration, very quietly, and they did most of their waiting at the Dome or The Rotonde, with brandy. It was then that I realised that all the really good ideas I'd ever had came to me while I was milking a cow. So I went back to Iowa."

The cardlets show his affectionate portrayal of rural life, Dinner for Threshers.

Our picture shows a statue of St Malachy at the entrance to the church with the message in Irish 'Ár bpatrún. A Naomh Mhaolmhaodhog, guidh orainn'.

Shout out from new Comptroller

Nice to see the incoming Comptroller of New York City John Liu give a nod to the Irish Echo when acknowledging those newspapers which give a supportive nudge to his campaign.

The New York Daily News suggests that this is a return to the rainbow style coalition which elected Mayor Dinkins 20 years ago.

Writes Errol Louis in the Daily News: "Noting that none of the city's major dailies endorsed him, Liu drew cheers by ticking off the community papers that did - including El Diario, the Amsterdam News, the Gay City News and The Irish Echo.

"It was a night showing our city at its finest. Those who aspire to lead our city should study what happened, and learn from it."

And John Liu called into the Irish Echo offices yesterday to acknowledge our coverage of his campaign. Mind you, he still has to go through an election in November. At this stage, however, it doesn't look likely that his republican opponent will have a prayer.

Frank forges ahead with cure for spinal paralysis

Great to see that our old pal Frank Reynolds is storming ahead with his plans to cure spinal breaks by creating a 'scaffolding' over the torn chord and tissues.

Frank is of Leitrim stock though brought up in New York and is an Irish Echo 40 Under 40 alumnus.

According to the latest edition of entrepreneurs mag Inc. "Reynolds is now tantalisingly close to a solution that will help victims of even the most severe injuries recover bodily functioning — whether that means breathing on their own or walking again. Already successful in primate experiements, InVivo's spinal cord treatment uses a biodegradable polymer that is injected or implanted into the spinal cord to form a 'scaffold' that reduces cell death and scar formation and promotes the survival of neural stem cells, which repair the injured spinal cord."

Frank tells me Inc. are now working on a cover story about his MIT-based company. Good for him.

Redemption at McSorley's

I get accused sometimes in the office of not flagging up enough stories from the Irish Echo and Belfast Media Group titles. Mea culpa but then I'm presuming readers of From The Balcony would already be checking out those sites.

But then occasionally, a story comes along which just has to be put up in lights.

Here's one such piece by Peter McDermott; in my book, it's as good a piece of journalism as I've read in a long time.

Happy reading!

Gun battle of yesteryear

The Belfast Media Group has put up astounding audio recording of the gun battle in Lenadoon which followed the collapse of the first IRA ceasefire on 9 July 1972.

I remember the day well, we also recorded the battle with a small recorder in our back garden about half a mile away.

The IRA, I presume, had about 40-50 armed men and women in the estate; the British Army many more. Perhaps someone with a knowledge of firearms can identify the weapons.

Opening a new chapter

Joe Leary of the Irish American Partnership was in Belfast today to meet with Baroness May Blood who heads up the integrated schools' movement here.

Baroness Blood hosted Joe on a visit to the Cliftonville Integrated Primary School in North Belfast where he handed over a donation from members of the Irish American Partnership to five projects in the integrated sector.

This afternoon, Joe travelled over to the Irish medium college Coláiste Feirste on the Falls, where pupils, aged from 11 to 18, are educated through Irish. Joe's project focuses on buying books for Irish schools so he was particularly interested in hearing that teachers at the school often translate their own course books because appropriate books aren't available in Irish.

Joe met with the Coláiste Feirste librarian Máirín who told him the school library has around 4,000 titles (in Irish and English of course, as well no doubt other languages). Joe is interested in increasing that number. (He's pictured in the library, a former chapel, with Diarmuid Ó Bruadair, one of the exceptional young teacher leaders in the college, and librarian Máirín Ní Dhuibhir.)

Before he left town, the busy Bostonian found time to visit the Belfast Media Group offices. The Irish American Partnership does wonderful work across 50 states and it was great to be able to roll out the green/red carpet for Joe.

I first met Joe about 14 years ago when he presented a generous cheque to Forbairt Feirste to build An Nasc on the Falls Road. It was a thrill to be able to bring him into that award-winning building today.

I interviewed him as we sat outside Central Station in Belfast where he was catching the train back to Dublin and I hope to have that interview on the web tomorrow.

Minister’s praise for MacBride Principles pioneers

It wasn't only State Senate President Therese Murray who warned against economic regeneration which marginalised underserved communities. Minister Conor Murphy also took aim at 'uneven' development strategies.

Addressing the Gateways To Tomorrow conference, Conor Murphy, Minister for Regional Development in the North’s powersharing executive, paid tribute to the pioneering role of Massachusetts in introducing the MacBride Principles on Fair Employment.'

"It is fitting that we are gathered here in Boston, Massachusetts, as we approach the twenty-fifth anniversary of the promulgation of the MacBride Principles this November,” he said. “Massachusetts was of course the first state to endorse the Principles in 1985. Few could have guessed then the influence which the Principles would exert on future British government policy.”

But the Sinn Féin MP warned that inequalities were continue to beset Northern society.
“In the north of Ireland the gap between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’ has widened as never before,” he said. “19 of the top 20 most deprived areas in the north of Ireland are located either in North and West Belfast, or in Derry City. Of the 50 wealthiest areas, none of them is located in North and West Belfast or in Derry. So all of us genuinely committed to public service have a responsibility to tackle these realities and not merely bookmark them.”

He added:

“More and more, the sensible and smart approach to sustainable social development is one which builds the outcomes of equality into the objectives of economy. Such an approach is good for both private business and public benefit."

(Our picture shows Minister Murphy, Garvan O'Doherty, the Derry entrepreneur, and State Senate President Therese Murray.)

In the frame

Deputy Lord Mayor Danny Lavery (left) and Anne Maxwell of the Falls Library congratulate Sean Donaghyon his excellent exhibition of paintings which went on show during the summer at the library.

Sean's daughter Seaneen tells me:

"The exhibition was put together with the help of Danny Morrison (who was one of the people who organised the Feile an Phobail) and Anne Maxwel and my father. It was a great night with around 80 family and friends turning up to show support; many of them people we haven't seen in years.

"There were a number of paintings sold and quite a few commissions. Danny Morrison gave an excellent speech to open the night, and Danny Lavery was there to give the evening added dignity. The exhition was held at the Falls Road Library for the full week; this was an ideal venue for my dad as it was his childhood Library where he spent lots of his youth. The feedback about the exhibition from the local community was fantastic, and we as a family, are all very proud of him."

Sean's wife Anne will be well-known to councillor friends of From The Balcony as she has the tough task of looking after the Lord Mayor's parlour in City Hall.

AOH past President backs undocumented battle

Jack Meehan is not only former National President of the Ancient Order of Hibernians but he's also an excellent Irish speaker.

Here I interviewed him in Bad Abbott's bar in Quincy, Massachusetts, on 6 October, where he addressed a meeting about the undocumented Irish.

It's been a while since I did a Máirtín's Minute. It's good to be back. This interview lasts just two minutes and 20 seconds.

"Passing of legislation of a permanent nature. That's what we're striving for," says Seán Óg Ó Miadhachainn.

Walkouts and busy schedules

DUP MLA Gregory Campbell says he failed to stand and applaud Hillary Clinton because he had busy diary appointments.

Back to the future for the US Secretary of State. When she and her hubbie met Belfast city councillors on the marble (main reception) at City Hall, some of the DUPers failed to turn up that time too.

A sign that the consensus was moving away from the party.

Anyhow, here's a quote Kate McCabe, President of the Irish American Unity Conference, read out at the Gateways to Tomorrow conference by Eduardo Galeano:

A man from the town of Neguá, on the coast of Columbia, could climb into the sky.  On his return, he described his trip.  He told how he had contemplated human life from on high.  He said we are a sea of tiny flames.

“The world,” he revealed, “is a heap of people, a sea of tiny flames.”
   
Each person shines with his or her own light.  No two flames are alike.  There are big flames and little flames, flames of every color.  Some people’s flames are so still they don’t even flicker in the wind, while others have wild flames that fill the air with sparks.  Some foolish flames neither burn nor shed light, but others blaze with life so fiercely that you can’t look at them without blinking, and if you approach, you shine in fire.

Coming out of the shadows

Sheila Gleeson of the Coalition of Irish Immigration Centers in the US addressed the Gateways to Tomorrow conference on behalf of the undocumented Irish.

She said: "Thanks for the opportunity to speak her on behalf of a segment of our Diaspora community who often have no voice. I’m talking about Irish immigrants who are living here in Boston and across the US without proper documentation. They live quietly and often fearfully in the shadows, not drawing attention to themselves. Every morning they wake up and risk everything because if they come to the attention of ICE for any reason they will be jailed and deported. They also live in fear of a phone call from home that will tell them that a parent or other family member has been taken ill or has died; knowing that traveling home is out of the question.

"A recent Irish Echo Article described “a distinct community within the Irish Diaspora here in the US”: They are young, employed, tax-paying, and usually resident in the U.S. for eight years or more. They also share one other trait, they are undocumented. Most of them came here in the 1990’s when times were different. Attitudes to immigrants were more favorable and work was plentiful. Over the years many set up businesses, got good jobs, met their future partners and as years went by it became increasingly difficult to leave.
"
In the meantime our immigration laws have gradually become more and more restrictive and punitive and opportunities to legalize have been reduced. There is widespread agreement that the immigration system needs to be reformed but negative attitudes towards immigrants have made finding a solution a difficult challenge to date.

"Numerous polls indicate that the majority of Americans favor a solution that involves justice and fairness for the immigrants involved. With President Obama and Congressional leaders in favor of reform we are cautiously optimistic that a resolution can be found soon.

"The rhetoric that has framed the immigration debate has been bitter and negative. What we need is a more civil, pragmatic approach that looks at the immigration system identifies the problems and recommends positive changes that will allow us to move forward.

"The “ask” today is that you all join the undocumented immigrant community here in Massachusetts and across the country whether they come from Donegal or Derry, Cork or Kerry. We need everyone on board on both sides of the Atlantic to help. We need to remember and revive the words that have always described immigrants; they are the workers, the builders, the entrepreneurs, the employers, the taxpayers.

"In the context of the Conference today - Building Bridges of commerce, education and friendship – there is a compelling and urgent need to build that bridge that will allow the undocumented members of our community to come out of the shadows."