SDLP need to show leadership over Mccreesh Park
Party’s councillors should seek removal of hunger striker’s name
This year is the 40th anniversary of the IRA hunger strike and Sinn Fein are already planning their annual commemoration. They commemorate it every year, but every decade they make a special effort.
The year 2001 was one such year and for the 20th anniversary there was a varied programme of events.
As part of that programme, the 1981 Hunger Strike Commemoration Committee wrote to Newry and Mourne District Council asking councillors to rename the Patrick Street playpark as the Raymond Mccreesh Park, in honour of an IRA hunger striker.
That was 20 years ago this month and, in April 2001, the council voted to rename the playpark after the IRA gunman.
The renaming was supported by Sinn Fein and the SDLP, while unionists voted against it, but the decision was very much in the hands of the SDLP.
There were objections to this and, in February 2008, the Equality Commission corresponded with the council, pointing out the need to comply with its section 75 duties for equality and good relations.
The council carried out an equality impact assessment, which took four years, but in December 2012, councillors voted overwhelmingly to retain the name Raymond Mccreesh Park.
Sinn Fein, SDLP and independent councillors voted for it, with the exception of one SDLP councillor who abstained.
The Equality Commission came back into play and published a report in March 2014. This found that the council had breached a 2012 equality scheme commitment. It recommended that the council review the decision and report within 12 months.
There was another vote in February 2015, when a council committee voted by 15 votes to four to retain the name Raymond Mccreesh Park.
Sinn Fein and independent councillors voted for it, unionists voted against it and the SDLP went AWOL.
One SDLP member turned up, but abstained, while the rest stayed away. The senior SDLP councillor said he couldn’t be there.
The SDLP’S then-leader, Alasdair Mcdonnell, said his party was against the name Raymond Mccreesh Park.
Finally, in April 2016, Bea Worton, who was 88-years-old, brought the issue to court and sought a judicial review against both the council and the Equality Commission.
Her son, Kenneth, a father-of-two, had been murdered by the IRA in the Kingsmills massacre and Mccreesh had been found in possession of one of the guns used in that massacre.
Subsequently, the Equality Commission ordered that the council should vote again on the name of the playpark, but in April 2018 a motion to rename the park failed.
The following day, the focus was on the SDLP and a spokesman said that the party “does not support the naming of public spaces after those involved in the violence of the past”.
It also said that councillors “should bring a motion to rename” the park in Newry if the issue was not resolved.
In October 2018, a majority of councillors voted to declare the site “surplus to requirements” and dispose of it, a decision that was challenged in 2019 by someone who supported the name Raymond Mccreesh Park.
So, two years later and coming up to the 20th anniversary, I asked the council about it and was told: “Disposal of the former playpark has not, at this juncture, taken place. Newry, Mourne and Down District Council is still committed to undertake a public consultation at the appropriate time.”
We do not know how long any negotiation and consultation will take, or what the outcome will be, but it will certainly run past the 20th anniversary of that initial decision to rename thepark.
It’s a tortuous story with much procrastination and prevarication and it should be a source of shame to those who voted for the name Raymond Mccreesh Park, as well as the parties to which they belong.
The key party in this remains the SDLP, the second-largest party on the council, and, earlier this month, in another context, SDLP leader Colum Eastwood called on unionist politicians to “show leadership”.
So, whatever happens with the disposal, is it too much to ask the SDLP councillors to do the honourable thing and put forward a motion to remove the name Raymond Mccreesh Park?
Is it not time for the SDLP, including Colum Eastwood, to “show leadership”?