Letter: A sectarian caucus group within the Labour Party stops it organising in Northern Ireland
A letter from Dr Clifford Smyth:
As a former Chairman of the Campaign for Equal Citizenship I am all too familiar with strident efforts local voters and union activists in Northern Ireland have made to persuade the Labour Party to organise in Northern Ireland.
This enduring scandal turns on a sectarian caucus or lobby group within the Labour Party which is anti-Ulster and pro Irish unification and that, despite the ‘consent principle’.
In the recent general election the Labour Party did not contest a single one of this region's 18 constituencies because of the power of sectarianism within labour to enforce this unjust boycott again the very working-class folk who build the bon-fires, ‘sectarian’ or otherwise.
Unless the Secretary of State is happy to be described as a hypocrite, he should put labour participation in the political life of Northern Ireland near the top of his ‘to do’, list.
Dr Clifford Smyth, Belfast BT6