By Msgr. Noel C. Burtenshaw

James Prior is leaving Northern Ireland. He is happy to be going. For almost four years he has represented the Westminister government in the Ulster Province. He did his job well. He is the very first to admit that his work among the violent factions of one of England’s last outposts was a failure.

Jim Prior was the most popular Northern Ireland Secretary in the last 15 violent years in the life of this province. He is an English farmer who has always kept his hand in politics. Mrs. Thatcher asked this firm, but considered fair, member of her government to take the Belfast job. He did so avidly.

“I believed I could find a solution,” he said in a recent interview, “but I don’t think that anymore. My work is finished here.”

Prior came to his job in Northern Ireland on a wind of great enthusiasm. The IRA were being curtailed in their violent activities. The British had learned how to cut the supply of arms. The arrests of leaders had taken dangerous men off the streets. Prior’s object was a reconciliation of the two warring communities – the Catholics who align themselves with the nationalist cause and a united Ireland, and the Protestants who look to continued union with Britain.

There are 40,000 British soldiers in the Ulster Province which is approximately the size of metro Atlanta. But for the most part they have become invisible. They stay in their barracks for the most part and only act in support of the police when extreme occasions demand it. That was how James Prior planned it. Get the people to trust the police and doing his job.

The other plan devised by Prior was representation. He would get Protestants and Catholics to elect moderate men and women to represent them in a regional government in Belfast.

He felt the plan would work. “He had this twofold attack in mind when he took the job,” says Joe Harris, a freelance writer who has lived in Ulster for many years, “and once more the people of Northern Ireland defied the bandaid offered as they searched for a total cure.”

The people of the province abandoned James Prior.

The Royal Ulster Constabulary – the RUC – were ordered by Prior to recruit Catholics for their force. They made every attempt to do so and completely failed. “The mistrust is too much,” says Andy McCarthy, who has lived in Belfast. “There is no reason why the minority in Ulster should trust the RUC. Their record of brutality over the past 60 years is a complete disaster. The community feels they merely stand ready to brutalize again.”

There were no takers for Prior’s plan. He appointed a Catholic to the position of second in command of the RUC and still got no response. The last explosion of violence which took place last month left one unarmed demonstrator dead. It was caused by the hasty action of the Ulster police. Sean Downs was killed by an RUC plastic bullet fired from a distance of three or four feet. The use of the plastic bullet from that distance is forbidden. The British press called the attack “a step backwards” for the peace process.

But Prior’s greatest failure was his attempt to have moderates on both sides elected. The community voted the very opposite. He was shattered when the Catholic people clearly and decisively voted support for the IRA by electing, by vast majorities, candidates from the Sinn Fein party which is the political arm of the Irish Republican Army (IRA).

After 15 years of violence and 64 years of British rule, the London government is finding, to their horror, that they are no closer to finding a peaceful solution now than they were at the very beginning.

However, until now, London has pointed to a Protestant majority which wanted their presence and a British public which supported their keeping the Ulster Province. They find, at this time, that the scene is changing.

Surveys, taken during the summer months, reveal that a majority of the English public would like to see an end to British involvement in Northern Ireland. Furthermore, 53 percent urged the government to begin talks to bring about a solution. Included in those talks should be the southern Irish government and, if necessary, the IRA, Sin Fein and all other interested parties. “Get out is their attitude,” says an editorial in one of England’s dailies, “and do it as quickly as possible.”

Another newspaper in England, The Daily Mirror, said in an editorial, “It is time to right the wrong and re-unite Ireland.”

It is being recognized in England that James Prior was, perhaps, the final effort and that this effort has proved to be a complete failure.

The Thatcher government is still strong although economic problems in Britain bring daily unrest. The present strike of coal miners is causing havoc to the ruling Tories. So should the government fail, should the Labor Party regain control, there is little doubt that, with support from the Liberal Party, changes would be implemented in Northern Ireland.

What would happen?

Many feel that a united Ireland would take place and the island would become what nationalists have dreamed of for 60 years, namely “a nation once again.” However, the Dublin government has certain reservations about that.

“If the world thinks that we would or could embrace a united Ireland knowing that one million Protestants are being forced against their will into being part of a new nation, then they are wrong.” So says a professional politician in the south. “If those Protestants decided to strike at the new nation in guerrilla fashion, can you imagine the chaos?”

Southern Ireland is also thinking economy. Their own economy is in tatters and the status in Northern Ireland is worse. Presently the South has an unemployment figure of fifteen percent; in the North it is twenty-two percent. Without a financial supplement from Britain, the Northern collapse would have happened many years ago.

So the disappearance of Jim Prior from the Secretariat in Belfast does not award victory or defeat to any side. Northern Ireland has never promised to fade out and solve itself in any easy fashion.

The jails are still full. Democratic rights are still suspended. Walls, Berlin style, are being erected to keep one community from another; constant cries of discrimination are being made. Some say the ingredient of leadership is missing. Maybe so. It just seems that James Prior was the best in a long time and no one listened to him.

The next step is anyone’s guess.

(Final in series of three articles)