“A BANNER has been erected on Montgomery Road at the site of the divisive and controversial Irish Language school project. It reads, ‘Relocate Irish school to where it is needed, relocate Irish school to where it is wanted.’ Clear message on behalf of concerned local residents.”

So tweeted Moore Holmes on Thursday after the above-mentioned banner was put up on a fence surrounding the derelict East Belfast site where a new bunscoil – championed by the indefatigable Linda Ervine – is due to built.

Who is Moore Holmes? That’s the question that Squinter asks himself every time the guy pops up in public. And he has to say that he has no more idea of who the guy is than when Mooreso burst on the scene during the Irish Sea border protests. Or was it the flag protests. Loyal Ulster fury has melded into a homogeneous mass so effectively that it has became difficult, if not impossible, to remember what slight to the union gave birth to which new hero; what blow to the constitutional integrity of the Lower Newtownards Road animated which umbrella group.

Moore works in education. Or at least, Squinter thinks Moore works in education, because he’s only got a finite amount of information to work on. The unfortunate fellow is the butt of a lot of jokes on social media, referencing mostly his vainglorious and bombastic style or his unfortunate habit of making spelling and grammar rickies; and most of the jokes reference his career in education, which is considered relevant in relation to a person who has taken on the mantle of East Belfast Educator-in-Chief. And because Moore has never denied that he puts bread on the table via some sort of classroom-based day job, Squinter can only assume it’s true.

Judging by his tweet, Moore is obviously convinced that the best way to go in relation to opposing a new school which he claims the people of the Montgomery Road area don’t want is not by sitting down with the putative board of governors, the staff or the parents. It’s not by writing stern letters to the newspapers and it’s not by lobbying his MP or MLA.

Nope. The best way to get one’s message across when it comes to matters of cross-cutting community concern is to knock up a large banner containing a vaguely sinister message to the new school community and without the name of the person or persons making the point.

And Squinter can see how there might be a certain rough and ready, plain-speaking Ulsterman-type attraction in doing away with the distractions of diplomacy, pleasantries and politeness and getting right to the heart of the matter. But the question that keeps niggling away at Squinter is what would happen if those in favour of the Irish school, or those opposed to Moore’s enthusiasm for banner bulletins were to return the serve, as it were. Suppose Linda Ervine and her friends, or the aforementioned board of governors, teachers and parents were to communicate their thoughts in similar fashion.

Would Moore be happy when acting as playground monitor if he spotted a banner on the perimeter reading: ‘Honest to God, Moore, you do talk the biggest load of ballix’? Would he balk on returning home of an evening to find an anonymous banner on his garden fence reading: ‘There are more parents looking places in the new school than there are parents, Moore. So how do you work out that it’s not wanted, yih balloon ye?’ And on the first fall of winter snow, would his festive season be ruined if he went out to his car in the morning to find ‘Dry yer eyes ffs’ written in the snow on his windscreen?

As a relatively young man working in a sector which uses exciting new forms of connecting and learning, and in the age of social media and AI, it seems odd that Moore is so taken by such a primitive method of making oneself understood. With classrooms so reliant these days on whiteboards, laptops and tablets, might Moore be the guy to reverse that trend and bring us back to the good old days of more prescriptive pedagogy? How about if he put a banner on the classroom door reading ‘Joey, your handwriting is absolutely rubbish.’ Or one on the gym wall reading ‘Suzie, you couldn’t run past my granny.’

All of which is to say that an educationalist whose idea of remote communication is not a Zoom call but a nameless banner at an empty site might not be the best man to appoint as East Belfast’s Education Tsar. That a guy who thinks an anonymous sign telling kids and parents to keep out is an authentic representation of the people of the district is perhaps not the ideal person to be taking a lead from on matters educational.
Or maybe Moore knows who put the banner up and maybe that person or persons can be said to be perfectly representative of local feeling. Maybe it was a local community group inexplicably overcome by a bout of shyness. Maybe it was a collection of local academics angered by the incursion of Irish into their home patch but worried about getting into trouble if they put a name to their fury.