I’m sure you have all heard by now of the statement made yesterday by Sinn Fein/IRA MLA Martina Anderson in which she called for immigrant workers to be dropped from employment statistics in Northern Ireland because they are the “wrong type of Catholics”. It is reassuring to see Sinn Fein/IRA living up to their slogan of “An Ireland of equals”, and is certainly a reminder that the racialist Republican ideology of De Valera’s day “hasn’t gone away you know”.Her statement has a relation to the area of policing (she is on the Policing board after all), as well as employment generally, and she would appear to be suggesting that the numbers of Catholics in the PSNI shown by the statistics are inaccurate because they do not distinguish between Irish Catholics and Catholics who have emigrated here more recently. She would seem to be suggesting that political ideology should also play a role in police recruitment (something which surely Sinn Fein/IRA of all people would cite as a reason why Nationalists had low confidence in the Police in the past!!).
It is unsurprising that there has been much adverse reaction to her statement, including accusations of “stunning undisguised bigotry” and the labelling of Sinn Fein/IRA as a “bunch of racists and fascists”. It’s hard to disagree with either of those.
According to Martina, if you’re not a White Republican then you’re not a REAL Catholic.
