Ask most people in Northern Ireland to describe east Belfast and they will usually give you a variation on the theme that it was once a vibrant heartland of unionism and loyalism. For good measure, they’ll also throw in comments about loyalist paramilitarism and drug-dealing, along with areas of deprivation, educational underachievement, interface rivalries and criminality. Some will also remind you that it was once regarded as the brightest jewel in unionism’s electoral crown, although at the general election in July the pro-union vote was only 4,500 more than the non-union vote.
That’s because east Belfast has changed since the Belfast Agreement. Parts of the area have become a mecca for young professionals and their families. It is also mixed, with Polish, Lithuanian and smatterings of Irish heard as you walk the pavements, along with some Asian languages. Catholics, who would rarely have moved into the area pre-1998, are also moving in, along with adherents to other religions and atheists such as myself.
On the Cregagh Road, one of the best-known thoroughfares in Belfast and a major artery into the city, there is now an integrated primary school, voted for by parents and governors three years ago, with hardly an eyebrow raised in protest by unionist party representatives. About half a mile away, on another heartland loyalist road, the Turas Irish Language project has been promoting Irish through night classes and cultural events. It attracts all sorts, including quite a few from Protestant/unionist backgrounds.
Yet, the first classes attracted protests from loyalist elements, who viewed the project as some sort of intrusion into their area: “like an invasion”, is how one person described it to me. The arrival of a GAA pitch attracted further hostility, as well as a series of security alerts and hoaxes. And now, “Relocate Irish School To Where It Is Needed” banners have been placed on the fencing around a site earmarked for an Irish language primary school. Indeed, a delegation from the Loyalist Communities Council – established in 2015 to assist in the transition of loyalist paramilitarism into entirely peaceful structures – met the DUP Minister for Education a few weeks ago and asked him to intervene and scrap the plans to build the school.
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What fuels this fear that loyalism – not all of it, by the way – seems to have about the Irish language and the GAA in east Belfast? Neither will make a button of difference to the identity of a single unionist or loyalist in the area. I know that because I am a unionist who lives in east Belfast. None of them will be required to speak or read the language, or to play any sport – I know that because not one person in east Belfast has ever claimed they were being forced to do so.
That said, one person did try to persuade me that it was all part of a long-term strategy by Sinn Féin to weaken unionism as an electoral force in the parliamentary constituency, and refused, quite loudly as it happens, to accept my argument that such a strategy, even if it existed, would take decades to pull off. His argument was fatally undermined when he admitted to not living in east Belfast.
There is, I think, something else fuelling the fear. There are parts of loyalist east Belfast which believe they have been left behind by the 1998 agreement. They read and hear about the progress which Sinn Féin and republicanism generally seem to have made; they hear the language of two-tier policing, two-tier judiciary; two-tier equality; two-tier prioritisation and two-tier media. Worse, they hear it from their own community leaders and political representatives.
Faux victories over imagined enemies do nothing to provide better housing, jobs, exam results, leisure, shopping and recreational facilities or the sense of pride that every community needs
It’s a “poor-us” mentality which manages to draw attention from the reality that if loyalists are not the recipients of better housing, education, employment et al, then it is because of the failings of their own politicians: failings which stretch back for decades. Feeding the line that there is some sort of existential threat from the Irish language, or the presence of a new school or sports pitch, is exactly the same sort of line which a previous generation of unionist leaders fed their working-class electoral base.
Unionism has always cast itself as a conservative vehicle. And since the very beginning, the assorted leaderships have worked hard to prevent the rise of genuinely working-class vehicles; primarily, it has to be said, because they feared a split in the unionist vote. They still fear that split. As David Ervine, a former loyalist paramilitary who played a key role in the 1994 ceasefire, told me: “The big-house unionist doesn’t want the terrace-house unionist to have a significant input into strategy on socioeconomic issues. Better to let them blame others for deprivation and underachievement.”
East Belfast is already benefitting from growing diversity. Unionists and loyalists should be embracing change. They should be prioritising societal integration rather than the same-old insulation. There is nothing to fear from exposure to the new and non-threatening. Loyalists, in particular, should stop listening to those who push fear of change and fear of others. That’s a strategy which has led to electoral decline, because the pro-union vote has already drifted to Alliance and other politicians in significant numbers.
Maybe those who organise the protests about change in East Belfast – and in every other part of Northern Ireland – would be better focusing on how to address and resolve the long-standing concerns of working-class loyalism. Faux victories over imagined enemies do nothing to provide better housing, jobs, exam results, leisure, shopping and recreational facilities or the sense of pride that every community needs.
Stop fuelling fears. Stop picking pointless battles. Instead, build confidence and campaign for the changes which would make real differences to their lives.
Alex Kane is a commentator based in East Belfast. He was formerly director of communications for the Ulster Unionist Party
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