Jim Mortimer in Socialist Campaign Group News

Responding to Martin McGuinness's article in the April edition of Socialist Campaign Group News, former General Secretary of the Labour Party Jim Mortimer outlines Britain's historic role in northern Ireland.

He sees the recent power-sharing agreement between Sinn Fein and the DUP as of great significance 'not only for the people of the six counties but for the whole of Ireland and Britain.' In setting it in the wider context of Britain's historic colonial role in Ireland, he suggests the Northern Ireland Assembly established by the Good Friday Agreement is but one stage in the process of Britain withdrawing from the north and republicans achieving a united Ireland when he says, 'the ending of slavery did not end colonialism.'

Anyone who does not fully understand the effect Britain's colonial occupation had on Ireland are reminded by Mortimer that during the Great Irish Famine of 1845-49, 'grain and cattle were being exported to pay the rent due to [often absentee] landlords.' It was in response to this that Jim Larkin and James Connolly linked the cause of Ireland with the cause of labour, continued by Liam Mellows after Connolly's execution, and today by Sinn Fein seeking a 32 county democratic socialist republic. Whilst the Irish Labour Party stands head and shoulders above its British counterpart today, it is Sinn Fein's programme of challenging both north and south of the partition border that will drive this progressive process forward.