WE look back at the stories that were making the headlines this week in the Andersonstown News in 1982
National H-Block/Armagh Committee march and rally on the Falls Road and Andersonstown Road, March 1982
New heat schemes rejected
HOUSING Executive contractors have been refused admission to homes in the Upper Andersonstown area when it was learned that they intended to install a closed fire and only one radiator per house, rather than the full central heating that was expected.
For several years the Housing authority had been implementing a policy whereby full central heating was being installed in Executive homes. However, recently a decision was taken to install only ‘a closed room heater with a heat leak radiator’ in houses which have open fires. This radiator is to be placed in either the bathroom or the main bedroom.
What is particularly infuriating for residents in the area around Ramoan, Tullagh and Rossnareen, is that there are several exceptions to this new Executive policy. At least four estates, Malinmore and Seymour Hill, Finaghy Estates and Knocknagoney, Old Holywood Road, will be getting full central heating. This will consist of a fire and up to eight radiators for each house, and a fire and up to six radiators for flats. Ballymurphy is also an exception to the Executive policy. However, in Ballymurphy only three radiators are being placed in each house.
According to the spokesman from the Executive, these exceptions fall into one of two categories. They are, he said, either areas where the majority of homes have already received full central heating or where “long standing commitments” have been made by the Executive to local people.
A number of weeks ago a group of tenants from Upper Andersonstown came together to press for full central heating in the area. This group is supporting the action of the majority of residents who have refused to allow the Executive to install the closed fire and radiator. However, they stress that it is up to every householder to make their own decision on the matter.
A local community worker who has been following recent events believes “the tenants have little to gain from accepting the closed fire and radiator”.
“Anyone who accepts this initial offer will have to use the more costly smokeless fuel in their closed fire but for their added expenses they will only be receiving extra heat from one radiator.”
Marie Connolly, Margaret Knocker, Geraldine Connolly and Eileen McMenamy at the Iveagh Community Centre, March 1982
Editorial
THE disenfranchised people of Ireland can take no joy from the election of Mr Haughey as Taoiseach of the 26 County State. He heads a party which operates solely in the 26 Counties and which has consistently opted for the disfranchisement of a large section of the Irish people, namely the voters in the Six Counties who have become the outcasts of society in Ireland and the untouchables of Western Europe.
Mr Haughey and his predecessors have had numerous opportunities to include the people of the Six Counties in the electoral process but have refused to do so.
If they had been really serious about uniting the Irish people, they would never have accepted the limitation put on democratic government in Ireland by the British and which negates the basic democratic principal of government by the people for the people.
We would go further than this, and say that this denial of basic democratic rights to all the people of Ireland has led to the present turmoil and strife and untold suffering in the Six Counties, and will continue to, as long as democracy is refused the Irish people.
To elaborate further on this there, it could be argued that the greatest threat to a democratic solution in Ireland at the moment is the SDLP who seem to be conniving with the British government for a return of a undemocratic devolved government on the old Stormont model.
To opt for any sort of devolved government is to opt for decades of strife in Ireland and the abandonment for a generation at least of proper democratic settlement.
In recent months there has been much talk of political crusades but we maintain that the only worthwhile crusade to engage in at the moment is the initiation of a campaign for the democratic solution of our British problem.
As we have said before, let this latest election in the 26 Counties be the last one to be conducted under a truncated and undemocratic electoral system.
TOGETHER: Sisters Margaret, Eilish and Patricia at an event in Iveagh Community Centre
Row over siting of new youth club
Community activist Liam Hunter has reacted angrily to objections raised against the siting of new premises for Lenadoon’s St Oliver Plunkett Youth Club. Local OAPs have spoken out against the siting of the club just this week.
The BELB proposed to move the club out of the mobile huts in which it is now based to permanent premises near the Buncrana Flats. Mr Hunter lashed out at claims by a local social worker, Mrs McIlroy, that old people in the flats will be “harassed and inconvenienced” by young people using the new club. Mrs McIlroy’s disapproval of the new youth club’s siting was reported in last week’s Andersonstown News.
Delighted Liam Hunter says that he is “absolutely delighted to hear that the youth club is going ahead”.
“It is essential that young people have somewhere to go other than to the street corners,” he added. Liam feels that the green beside Buncrana flats is an ideal spot for the new club and that the OAPs have nothing to fear from the young people who will use it. Permanent Mr Hunter, himself an ex-SDLP councillor (he failed to get re-elected when he stood on an independent ticket last May) is adamant that the Oliver Plunkett Club will get its new premises.
Said Liam: “The residents of this area fought long and hard to get a permanent building for the local youth club and I am prepared to get the people behind me to ensure it goes ahead.”
Mr Hunger will be calling on all the councillors of Area D to back his stance on the new club building.
In a letter to the Andersonstown News this week, pensioners in the Buncrana Flats spoke of “boys of 14 years and upwards, drinking in the porches.” The old people ask “what would it be like with a youth club?”
National H-Block/Armagh Committee march and rally on the Falls Road and Andersonstown Road, March 1982
