Father of new deputy leader of the North’s Green Party was killed by the IRA in 1973
A POLITICS lecturer whose father was killed by the IRA when she was a child is to become the next deputy leader of the North’s Green Party.
Lesley Veronica said that while the party had a disappointing Assembly election, losing both their MLAs – former leader Clare Bailey and Rachels Woods – it relit the political fire in her belly to help the Greens grow. The party has been left with seven councillors across the six counties.
Ms Veronica emphasised she did not believe the results reflected a rejection of the Green Party, revealing they received a surge of new members after the election.
She described working well with leader Mal O’Hara, and wanting to help the party communicate that it is about more issues than the environment alone. Her father David Bingham was shot dead by the IRA in January 1973, when she was just four.
‘For me, that has definitely led to my interest in history and politics, that took a swing to the academic side because I teach politics, but it always stimulated my attraction to politics,’ she said.
Ms Veronica served on the Victims and Survivors Forum, which she described as a ‘humbling experience’. ‘I was in a room with some people who had had multiple traumatic events, yet we were able to come to a consensus, we were able to be respectful to each other,’ she said.
While she opposes the UK’s proposed legacy bill, which would see perpetrators offered an effective amnesty for cooperation with an information retrieval body, she is not pursuing justice herself.
‘I understand it matters a lot to other people, what one person needs or wants... it’s quite legitimate for somebody else to need or want something else,’ she said.
‘What I want to see is a real commitment that we never return there. I would honour the loss of my father and the impact it had on us – and it had an tremendously bad impact – but I would honour that more by trying to work for peace. I would love to see more work on a regional trauma network because we do have a massive problem with mental health which is undoubtedly related to the conflict and the post-conflict society.’ With speculation that Assembly elections could be called this winter while the DUP refuses to participate until the UK takes action against the Protocol, Ms Veronica blasted the situation as ‘ludicrous’. ‘We would really prefer not to [fight a second Assembly election], apart from anything else, it is a colossal waste of public money,’ she said. ‘It’s really ludicrous at this stage the executive has not been formed... it’s a dereliction of duty.’