In the D\u00e1il today, Dublin South West TD, Se\u00e1n Crowe, highlighted the needfor an all-party and cross community response to the recent flags protests in the North and the violence which has accompanied them.<\/p>\n
Crowe, who is also a member of the Joint Committee on the Implementation of the Good Friday Agreement, raised the subject by entering it under topical issues.<\/p>\n
Deputy Crowe said:<\/p>\n
\u201cBelfast is a changing and shared city, and it is no longer dominated by unionism. The issue of flags and symbols at Belfast City Hall is a sensitive one, but this doesn\u2019t mean it can or should be ignored.<\/p>\n
\u201cBelfast City Hall is a shared workplace and under equality legislation it must provide a good and harmonious working environment. Employees and those who use the City Hall, must have their cultural and political identities respected, and not be made feel isolated or marginalised due to their identities.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe vast majority of the loyalist protests taking place are illegal and they are being orchestrated by the UVF and BNP figures. In the last week these protests have attacked interface areas. Once again we have seen the Short Strand community targeted by fascists and bigots, with sectarian attacks led by the UVF and BNP.<\/p>\n
\u201cUnionists talking amongst themselves will not solve this issue and create mutual respect for people\u2019s national identity and culture. That can only come when inclusive talks, with representatives from the whole community, take place. There needs to be an open discussion on how people\u2019s national identity can be respected and valued.<\/p>\n
\u201cEquality and mutual respect needs to be at the core of any move forward on identity and symbols. There can be no return to one party and unequal rule.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe loyalist rioting needs to stop and there needs to be collective action from across society to push ahead with peace and reconciliation work throughout the North\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In the D\u00e1il today, Dublin South West TD, Se\u00e1n Crowe, highlighted the needfor an all-party and cross community response to the recent flags protests in the North and the violence which has accompanied them. Crowe, who is also a member of the Joint Committee on the Implementation of the Good Friday Agreement, raised the subject […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[5],"class_list":["post-37","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general-news","tag-belfast"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":114,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37\/revisions\/114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}