| Description | Interview with an unidentified man who is a shop steward at Shorts in Belfast. He talks about witnessing civil disturbances in Belfast during the 1920s, when he saw men being beaten and kicked, which influenced his political awareness. He remembers arguing with his parents, being thrown out of a Unionist meeting for speaking out for democracy and an end to sectarianism, and the unpopularity of his beliefs. He discusses his reasons for stopping church attendance, his involvement with the local Communist party and association with the class struggle, and visiting Moscow and Budapest as part of a trade union delegation in 1954. He talks about the religious and political attitudes of people who live in his area of South Belfast which he considers to be liberal Protestant, and goes on to talk about the activities of extreme Unionist groups and his pessimistic view of the future. He sees no easy way to gain civil and religious liberty for the whole of the population and there is certainly no organisation within the trade union movement that has these aims. He thinks that trade union leaders are held down by prejudice and fear of the consequences of being associated with the civil rights movement, and that the Labour leaders have lost contact with the people and the will to fight the opposition and to get the workers to carry out the instructions of progressive activists in England and take part in stoppages. He expresses his disappointment that students and civil rights movement leaders are not being allowed to take part in the annual May Day demonstration and talks about the police attitude towards left wing political groups. He goes on to talk in more detail about the internal politics of the trade union movement in Northern Ireland, gives his opinion about the importance of the civil rights movement in Derry and the lower levels of civil rights activism in Belfast, and the attitude of the Republic of Ireland government towards the civil rights movement (tracks 1-12).
Track 13: silence 5.53 mins
Total: 34.51 mins
Dubber's reference number: PLA KF549C0132580 |