IT wasn’t demographics that lost Drumcree for Loyal Ulster. It wasn’t two-tier policing or the Good Friday Agreement. It was good old-fashioned hubris.
The jig that Ian Paisley and David Trimble danced outside Carleton Orange Hall in Portadown after the 1995 march wasn’t in fact a jig, but as Shinbone Star editor Maxwell Scott tells James Stewart at the end of the classic 1962 western The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.” (Incidentally, Scott was played by Carleton Young, although I have no proof as of yet that the street or the Orange hall were named after him.)
So no actual jig, but Paisley and Trimble and the thousands who cheered them to the rafters most definitely performed a metaphorical dance on the twin concepts of compromise and sensitivity, and while two more years of bitterness, intransigence and death were to follow, the Garvaghy Road march was doomed from the second the two leaders of unionism decided that it was more important to stick it to the Taigs for the cameras than to build on the progress that had brought the march about.
28 years later, not only have no lessons been learned, but it was a case of ‘Hold my beer, Ian and Dave’ for the pan-unionist front that gathered outside the High Court in the wake of the Parades Commission throwing in its hand.
TUV and DUP figures knocked each other aside in their efforts to get to the nearest camera where their breathlessly delighted interviews gave the distinct impression that the Brethren were going to walk up the Garvaghy Road the next morning with Breandán Mac Cionnaith, John Finucane, Naomi Long and Colum Eastwood lashed to pillars and forced to watch. I haven’t seen Loyal Ulster so ecstatically mistaken since the Brexit referendum.
Meanwhile, as its contribution to lowering the temperature and persuading the Garvaghy residents that perhaps it’s time to talk, the Portadown Orangemen gave a medal to Jamie Bryson. Let me just repeat that: The Portadown Orangemen gave a medal to Jamie Bryson. On the High Court steps. While the residents of the Garvaghy Road looked on from their living rooms in the area etched on the medal.
Now there may be something more likely than that to ensure that the chances of Portadown District marching up Garvaghy are even more forlorn than they were before the court case, but if there is I can’t think what it is. And back home after he’d wrung the excitement pee out of his Buzz Lightyear trunks, Jamie added the High Court ruling to a list of victories that he claims Loyal Ulster has won in recent times, including stopping Casement, stopping the Irish language, and stopping the building of a new A5. Just in case there might be the odd observer who actually believes unionist politicians and the Brethren when they say Drumcree is about civil and religious liberty, Jamie was good enough to remind everybody that it’s about the culture war he’s just self-published a book about; that keeping a road that has claimed 57 lives and 1,200 in 10 years is important because a lot of those who want it replaced are GAA people.
Let’s be very clear about this: The only way the Orange Order is getting back up the Garvaghy Road is on the say-so of the people who live along it. Firstly, because nothing has changed in the 28 years since the Brethren were told to go get their shine box. Secondly, because the PSNI is not going to force them up it as they are completely incapable of doing so without bringing back the British army to give them a hand. And bringing back the British army to re-enact the Battle of the Somme in North Armagh would have the same effect on the peace process as putting the UDR in charge of security at Stormont.
It's simply not going to happen; for the reasons I’ve just outlined, yes, but for the much more important reason that newbies Chris Bryant and Andy Burnham need a crisis in what Chris calls Ahlstah and Andy calls Oolstah like they need a hole in the head. With his embarrassingly inept and speedily withdrawn “off the table” comment, the Prime Minister has shown that when it comes to Ireland he’s about as sure-footed as a baby giraffe on ice; but he’s surrounded by people who are only too aware that a reboot of the late-90s would be a massive distraction as he bids to become the first British PM in 20 years not to be found out before conference.
In the Republic of Garvaghy, the people who live there have the power – and that’s how it should be in any Republic. If they agree to sit down with the Orange – unlikely since on Monday night the Brethren went full Billy Big Balls – they’re agreeing to a return to the ancien régime. The Orange and its motley band of sponsors and enablers (who have their own discreet agendas) don’t want to sit down with the residents to discuss anything except another parade along Garvaghy. A small parade. A bandless parade. A parade with elephants. A parade with floats. Even perhaps a final parade. It doesn’t matter.
The old men of Portadown District want just enough to allow them to hand out more medals. Just enough for them to make a new banner telling the story in embroidered picture and word of how they won the day at Drumcree. Just enough to allow them to say that here they stood because they could do no other and here they finally triumphed. They want a win they can’t claim for themselves; a win that can’t and won’t again be handed to them by the British state and its various armed agents; they want a win to be handed to them by the people they tried to humiliate in the late-90s; the people they tried again to humiliate last week.
Don’t do it, Garvaghy. I’ve written the statement for you and I’m not charging for it: “Thanks a lot for the offer, lads. But we’re grand.”
It's 28 long and lovely years since the Orange Order’s traditional parade was knocked back at Drumcree/ Garvaghy.
In words the Brethren will surely understand, I reckon that makes it a traditional no.
