Senator Andrew Bartlett
Thursday, October 27, 2005
 
Wicklow Gaol, Australia and the Irish Parliament
Our second day in Dublin started with a breakfast meeting that Ursula Stephens had organised. She is involved in the Australian Parliamentary Friends of Schizophrenia, and was keen to meet up with community organisations and local members of the Irish parliament with an interest in mental health issues. We only had an hour, but it was a good chance to flag some issues and to reinforce the importance of increasing priority and awareness of mental health matters.

We then went down for a brief tour of the historic gaol in Wicklow, which is Senator Stephen’s birthplace (Wicklow, not the gaol). Like many places in Ireland, the gaol has a link to Australia, as many prisoners from there ended up being transported to Australia, and a section of the display there is specifically about the transportation of convicts, most of whom were petty criminals or Irish nationalists (which was the same thing as a criminal in those days of course).

After that, we had meetings back in Dublin, including a meeting with the Minister of State, Noel Treacy, a meeting with the Minister for Education and Science, Mary Hanafin and a discussion with the Parliament’s Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs. This was an interesting meeting, where the various members of the Committee, from a wide range of parties, asked us our views on a huge range of issues. There was one member in particular I liked, a Labour Party member named Michael Higgins, who managed to very politely ask a question touching on what seemed to be about 10 different matters – most of them highly controversial – including the Australian government’s decision to commit more troops to Iraq after the last election, the proposal to introduce laws allowing ‘preventative detention’ and government attitudes towards indigenous people in Australia. There was also a lot of interest expressed in Timor Leste, including the Timor Sea boundary controversy, and the poor human rights record of Burma.

We got to sit in their version of Question Time in their Lower House, which is called the Dáil Éireann. It was almost unrecognisable from the Australian version. Questions were asked and answers were given in almost total silence, and whilst there was political rhetoric in amongst it all, there actually seemed to be some degree of answer given. The day we were there was the day a major report was presented into allegations of sexual abuse against children in a local Diocese of the Catholic Church, which may have contributed to the sombre atmosphere of the few questions we witnessed.

After that, there was a function at the Ambassador’s residence with a range of people present who had an interest in or connection with Australia – an Irish version of the function we had in Ankara last week.

Next day we visited University College Dublin. We saw a few examples from a very interesting archive and also met with Professor Hilary Carey, the Professor of the Australian Studies Centre. Obviously, the existence of this centre is very valuable for Australia, but it is not resourced in any regular ongoing way from Australia, so it doesn’t produce as much benefit for Australia as it otherwise could. One of my fellow delegation members suggested I should hurry to finish my copy of the Latham Diaries that I’m reading so I could leave the copy behind to help update their resource library. Extra help for this Centre would certainly be welcomed and of obvious value.

After lunch with various people from the University (I sat next to their Professor of Canadian Studies, so among other things I talked about the global benefit of a country changing its flag), it was back to the Parliament, where we had meetings with Enda Kenny, leader of the main opposition party, Fine Gael, and Pat Rabbitte, the leader of the Labour Party, who will be running alongside Fine Gael at the next election as part of an alternative coalition government. We also met with Mary Harney, who is Deputy Prime Minister (Tánaiste), Minister for Health and Children and Leader of a smaller party called the Progressive Democrats.

We then sat in on part of the sittings of the Irish Senate (known as the Seanad), and attended a dinner hosted by the Speaker (known as the Ceann Comhairle). The evening was rounded off with a chance to talk with other members of parliament in the adjoining bar. Apart from being inside the parliamentary precincts, this seemed to be rather similar to bars in the suburbs surrounding Parliament House in Canberra as it seemed to be full of MPs and advisors, although there probably weren’t journos there, now I think of it. I wonder if you had a group of average Australians and average Irish people drinking together in a bar, who would go home earliest? The attitudes, conversational and social dynamics surrounding drinking seem to be quite similar.

Tomorrow there is a break from the political and parliamentary meetings, and a chance to see a few historical and cultural aspects of the surrounding counties, including a visit to Kilkenny Castle.

posted by Andrew Bartlett @ Thursday, October 27, 2005 Permalink
|


<< Home