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Northern Ireland History > Sunningdale > Flashcards

Sunningdale Flashcards

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1
Q

When was Direct Rule introduced?

A

23 March 1972

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2
Q

How did Whitelaw plan to win the trust of the Catholic community?

A
  1. Restrain the British army
  2. Phase out internment
  3. See if he could persuade the IRA to end its violence
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3
Q

How did he plan against alienating Protestants?

A
  1. Restore order

2. Get police back into no-go areas IRA used to launch campaigns.

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4
Q

How did the IRA respond to the end of direct rule?

A

Stepped up violence:

  • -14 April 1972: Provos set off 30 bombs across the North
  • -Loyalist responded with bombs and torturing and killing Catholics
  • -Riots continued, car bombs etc
  • -May: 40 deaths, highest total per month to date
  • -29 May 1972: Official IRA called a ceasefire, but the Provos refused
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5
Q

How did Whitelaw try to foster peace?

A
  • -Released hundreds of internees, gave special category status to those who remained
  • -Diplock enquiry: replaced Special Powers Act with Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act in AUgust 1973
  • -Gave the RUC and the army extensive powers to question, search, arrest and detain people they suspected of violence
  • -Diplock courts: one judge, without a jury, to avoid intimidation of jury members
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6
Q

Talks with the Provisionals?

A
  • -John Hume and Provisionals
  • -Led to ceasefire on 26th June
  • -7 July: six Provos including McGuinness, Adams and MacStiofáin flown into London
  • -Demanded all remaining detainees be freed and Britain promise to leave NI within three years
  • -‘Impossible demands’
  • -Violence resumed
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7
Q

What was Bloody Friday?

A
  • -21 July 1972
  • -Belfast, 2:00 pm: bomb warnings began
  • -2:10 pm: bomb destroys a bus station
  • -3 more bombs in 30 minutes: hotel, railway station, tax offices
  • -2:48 pm: bomb destroys bus depot, killing 6
  • -Next 30 minutes: 12 more explosions, three dead, 130 injured
  • -Hoax warnings
  • -3 bombs in Derry, 16 elsewhere
  • -Gun battle between Provos and British army
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8
Q

What was Operation Motorman?

A
  • -Whitelaw used Bloody Friday outrage to launch Motorman
  • -Ended no’go areas in Derry and Belfast
  • -Extra troops used to dismantle the barricades on 30 July
  • -Parachute Regiment dealt with barriers in loyalist areas
  • -Little direct resistance
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9
Q

How did the Provisionals retaliate to Motorman?

A
  • -31 July
  • -3 car bombs in mixed, peaceful village of Claudy, Derry
  • -9 dead (5 Protestant, 4 Catholic), 30 injure
  • -July 1972: 92 dead, worst month of the troubles
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10
Q

How did the conflict affect the Republic?

A

People before:

  • -Believed in a United Ireland
  • -Saw partition as a British plot and the IRA as continuing the War of Independence
  • -Ignore the existence of the unionists, didn’t understand them
  • -Wanted to help northern Catholics fight discrimination

People after:

  • -Regular reporting made them better informed
  • -Began to understand that unionists could never be bombed into a United Ireland
  • -Realised that the British would love to leave
  • -United Ireland became less appealing as violence continued
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11
Q

How did Southern governments take a tougher line against the IRA?

A
  • -1972: closed down the Sinn Féin offices in Dublin
  • -1972: forbade RTÉ to broadcast interviews with IRA leaders
  • -Irish army and GardaÍ patrols stepped up along the border
  • -Strengthened the Offences against the State Act
    • –Special Criminal Court: three judges, no jury, for those accused of ‘subversive activity’
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12
Q

Why was 1972 a better year for Whitelaw to try and reach a settlement?

A
  • -Level of violence made moderates on both sides more eager for peace
  • -Irish government was more willing to discuss a new constitutional arrangement within NI than demand reunification
  • -Official IRA was on ceasefire, Motorman had reduced danger of Provos
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13
Q

What was the Border Poll?

A
  • -March 1973
  • -Referendum on the border
  • -Nationalists: engaged in a strike over internment boycotted it
  • -99% in favour of staying part of the UK
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14
Q

What was Whitelaw’s White Paper?

A
  • -Northern Ireland Constitutional Proposals:
    • -Guaranteed that NI would remain part of the UK as long as the majority wanted that
    • -Proposed as Assembly elected by PR
    • -Assembly would set up a NI Executive (government), which couldn’t be ‘solely based on a single party’ if the part was supported ‘virtually entirely from only one section of a divided community;
    • -London govt would transfer control over health, education local govt etc.
    • -London would keep control over police, legal system and other difficult matters, perhaps to be transferred if the Executive was successful
    • -Council of Ireland
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15
Q

What were the responses to the White Paper?

A
  • -SDLP welcomed power-sharing and Council of Ireland
  • -Republicans rejected it as reinforcing partition
  • -Faulkner and the moderates were cautiously welcoming
  • -27 March, Ulster Unionist Council accepted it
  • -Paisley, Craig and the Orange Order condemned it completely for power-sharing and links to the republic
  • -Craig left UUP to set up Vanguard party
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16
Q

How did elections to the Assembly progress?

A
  • -28 June
  • -Republicans told nationalists not to vote
  • -SDLP, NILP, Alliance went into the campaign
  • -DUP and Vanguard campaigned against
  • -Faulkner urged UUP politicians to pledge in support of campaign, not all did (led by Harry West)
17
Q

What were the results of the election? (Sunningdale)

A
  • -Assembly voted in
  • -Faulkner only got 24 seats
  • -Showed deep visions in NI politics
18
Q

What did preliminary discussions achieve? (Sunningdale)

A
  • -DUP and Vanguard members: obstructive tactics, sit-ins, physical attacks, name-calling
  • -Clear majority in Assembly in favour of negotiated settlement
  • -Two key stages to negotiations established:
    • -Getting parties from both side to agree to set up the power-sharing Executive
    • -Getting agreement between the Executive, Irish and British govts on the role of the Council of Ireland
19
Q

How did talks on the Executive progress?

A
  • -Stormont, 5 October
  • -6 Unionist reps led by Faulkner
  • -6 SDLP reps led by Fitt
  • -3 from Alliance
  • -Chaired by Whitelaw
20
Q

What was agreed on the Executive?

A
  • -Easy to agree in principle on the Executive
  • -Harder to divide up ministerial positions
  • -Faulkner: Unionists must have a majority for Protestants to trust the Executive
  • -11 ministers: 6 Unionists, 4 SDLP, 1 Alliance
21
Q

What did the Executive agree about the Council of Ireland?

A
  • -Idea of Council of Ireland accepted
  • -Faulkner wanted a Council with reps of the North and South govts to deal with issues like tourism
  • -Hume wanted reps from the Dáil and the Assembly, wider powers like control of policing
  • -Whitelaw backed SDLP, hoping this would enable them to outmanoeuvre the IRA
  • -Faulkner accepted this reluctantly
  • -SDLP agreed to end rents and rate strike against internment
22
Q

Why was Whitelaw replaced?

A
  • -To deal with trade unions in London

- -Francis Pym had no experience of the intricacies of NI

23
Q

What was the Irish delegation at Sunningdale like?

A
  • -Taoiseach Liam Cosgrave
  • -Garret FitzGerald of Fine Gel and Conor Cruise O’Brien of Labour
  • -Saw CoI as a token body dealing with uncontroversial cross-border isues
  • -Hume persuaded them it should have real powers, said the Unionists were too weak and divided to argue
24
Q

How did Sunningdale negotiations progress?

A
  • -Held at Sunningdale, Berkshire
  • -Heath chaired: impatient with unionists, admired Hume, supported idea of expanding CoI powers
  • -SDLP’s Paddy Devlin, Cruise O’Brien: unwise to squeeze unionists too much
  • -Faulkner and the British hoped the Irish would agree to several things in exchange for CoI:
    • -Guarantee to extradite IRA members: impossible because judges had the power to extradite and no democracy could command judges
    • -Remove Articles 2 and 3 saying the South more could rule all of Ireland: impossible because a referendum was required to change a Constitution, Fianna Fáil would oppose it and the referendum would fail. Anyway the articles were symbolic
    • -Irish govt gave Faulkner a verbal commitment to more co-operation on policing and a statement that they recognised NI’s right to remain in the UK if the majority wanted it
  • -Conference ended on 9 December
25
Q

When did the Executive take over?

A
  • -1 Jan 1974
  • -Brian Faulkner as Chief Minister
  • -Gerry Fitt as Deput
26
Q

How did unionists oppose the Executive taking power?

A
  • -6 December 1973: Orange Order, Vanguard, DUP, dissident unionists formed the United Ulster Unionist Council to resist power-sharing and CoI
  • -UUC called a meeting for 4 Jan: motion opposing the CoI passed, Faulkner resigned as leader of UUP
  • -Faulkner set up Unionist Part of NI: still had supporters, could have gained more if he could show some results
  • -Agreement did not bring peace: IRA and Loyalist paramilitaries continued killing
27
Q

What problems arose in the Republic?

A
  • -Kevin Boland, former FF minister, took case to the Supreme Court claiming that Sunningdale was unconstitutional because it recognised NI
  • -Damaged Faulkner:
    • -To win, Irish govt had to make a strong case for articles 2 and 3, undermining the claim that they were symbolic
    • -During the case Cosgrave couldn’t issue statement he promise Faulkner until March 13th which was too late
28
Q

How did the British General Election damage Sunningdale?

A
  • -Industrial unrest in Britain, Heath called sudden election for 28th Feb:
    • -Ignored please from Pym, Fitt and Faulkner that it would be disastrous for Executive
  • -UUUC treated election as a referendum on Sunningdale
  • -Dublin is only a Sunningdale away
  • -UUUC won 11/12 Westminster seats: Faulkner couldn’t claim to govern NI
  • -Labour returned to power, Harold Wilson as PM
  • -Merlyn Rees as Northern Secretary: indecisive
  • -Labour not as committed to Sunningdale as Tories
29
Q

What as the UWC?

A
  • -Ulster Workers’ Council
  • -NI workforce almost entirely Protestant
  • -UWC: loyalist workers in shipbuilding, engineering and electricity generation
  • -15 May: Assembly passed a vote of confidence in the Executive, UWC called a strike
30
Q

How did the UWC Strike progress?

A
  • -Loyalist paramilitaries became involved: ‘tartan gangs’ intimidated people into striking, sent men into factories to make them close
  • -Blocked roads with barricades of burnt-out cars and buses: youths armed with clubs turned back lorries with milk, groceries and petrol
  • -So many buses were hijacked the service was cancelled
  • -Strikers cut electricity output by 60%: more factories closed, people had no lights or cookers, endangered people in hospitals and sewage plants
31
Q

What were the reactions to the UWC Strike?

A
  • -British army and RUC stood by: some chatted with strikers
  • -Many Protestants supported the strike
  • -UWC arranged some supplies to get through, grocers, bakers and chemists opened for a few hours/day, social welfare payments reached pensioners: did not alienate their own people
  • -17 May: 2 car bombs in Dublin and Monaghan, killed 32
  • -Highest casualty total for any one day, suspected to be loyalists
32
Q

What was the govt response to the UWC Strike?

A
  • -Executive didn’t control army or RUC
  • -Rees failed to use them to stop the strike: attempt to occupy power stations might lead to sabotage, army couldn’t take on a large section of the Protestant population
  • -Harold Wilson, 25 May: strikers ‘sponging’ off Britain
  • -Offended everyone, even nationalists
  • -Faulkner tried to get the SDLP and Irish govt to reduce CoI powers: agreed to postpone it by a year but it was too late
  • -Executive resigned
33
Q

Why did Sunningdale fail?

A
  • -Nationalists blamed Rees unwillingness to use police and army to stop the strike (quick response might have stopped it)
  • -Nationalists suspected the British army was opposed to power-sharing and wanted to see it fail (senior officers didn’t want to take on loyalists and IRA at the same time)
  • -Labour govt in London was unenthusiastic, because only a majority of Protestants supported it
  • -UWC
  • -Boland
34
Q

Why did unionists back the UWC strike?

A
  • -They feared the CoI was intended to lead them into a united Ireland. Fears reinforced by Boland, speeches about Irish unity from SDLP and southern politicians.
  • -17th Jan: Logue, SDLP @Trinity: “trundling unionists to a United Ireland”
  • -Some deeply disliked power-sharing; blamed Fitt and Currie for fall of Stormont, wouldn’t accept them in govt

Northern Ireland History (2 decks)

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