Scottish Catholic Observer

The director of the Scottish Catholic Media Office made a bold and brave statement on religious bigotry in Scotland earlier this year. One of his key points was the role of organisations charged with combating sectarianism.

“Over the last ten years significant amounts of public money has been given to organisations offering anti-sectarianism training and information,” Peter Kearney said. “Most, if not all, Scottish schoolchildren have been given talks, workshops and leaflets on the subject.”

He cast doubt, however on the effectiveness of public funding for ‘one-size-fits-all’ anti-intolerance programmes saying: “It seems reasonable to question their efficacy and examine their value. Such approaches unless carefully focused on a measurable problem, can often reduce to nothing more than lowest common denominator platitudes.”

Shortly after Mr Kearney’s remarks the Scottish Government announced in March that a new funding package to the tune of approximately £500,000 would be made available for seven groups, including Sense over Sectarianism, Nil by Mouth and Show Racism the Red Card. The news came around the same time as First Minister Alex Salmond called a summit on sectarianism.

Unsurprisingly, Mr Kearney questioned whether this funding was good value for money for the taxpayer, or indeed the best way forward.

Good intentions

Show Racism the Red Card describes itself as an ‘anti-racism charity, which was established in January 1996.’ The aim of the organisation is to produce anti-racist educational resources, which harness the high profile of professional footballers to combat racism. In England they have been rightly lauded for their work in tackling racism in its various nefarious guises such as Islamaphobia.

Over the past year, using the amended title Show Bigotry the Red Card, the group has held seminars throughout Scotland, urging football fans to be rivals not enemies. I attended one of the group’s events at Dundee FC’s Dens Park Stadium and, aware of its work in England, I was hopeful of hearing an outline of its plans for tackling intolerance. I had no doubt that their intentions were good, but to quote a much-used phrase, the road to hell is often paved with them.

Lack of focus

The evening did not get off to the best start. The literature that had been left on the tables made no real mention of anti-Catholicism and anti-Irish racism, two close bedfellows which are pivotal—but often cached—in defining sectarianism in Scotland.

Proceedings began with a showing of the educational Rivals not Enemies DVD produced by the group. The film, it said, ‘aimed to raise awareness and to stimulate constructive debate on the issue of sectarianism and religious bigotry in and around Scottish football.’ However, to say it was well wide of the mark in its intended target is an understatement. As in the literature, there was no mention made of anti-Catholicism or anti-Irish racism.

Former Celtic FC midfielder Aiden McGeady, for example, was shown onscreen, but the racist abuse he suffered for his decision to play for the Republic of Ireland, was ignored. Similarly, anti-Catholicism never featured. The only time Catholicism was even mentioned was when one interviewee came out with the tired, offensive line that Catholic schools were a possible cause of sectarianism. Indeed, instead of acute targeting of the various facets of sectarianism in Scotland, the DVD served only to muddy the waters, with Motherwell FC and Northern Ireland international defender Stephen Craigan referring to the conflict in the North of Ireland rather than focusing on the situation in Scotland.

Misinformation

Some of the participants in Rivals not Enemies were an ill-advised choice for an anti-sectarian educational video. For example, former Scotland manager and current Aberdeen FC manager Craig Brown was one of the interviewees featured. In 1999, he was recorded by a former girlfriend singing the anti-Catholic ‘Billy Boys’ song on the phone. And former SFA chief executive Gordon Smith provided a contradiction to the title of the DVD—Rivals Not Enemies. In the book It’s Rangers For Me Mr Smith said: “Growing up in Ayrshire, the biggest factor I encountered in terms of the Catholic-Protestant divide was in school football.

“I think it is one of the saddest things in our society. I have nothing against Catholic schools, but there is no doubt in the West of Scotland it brings in an inclination right away to think of people being different.

“We played against schools with names like St Mary’s or St Peter’s and the games were very competitive. When you are competitive with someone you automatically think they are the enemy. That was the case with me.”

Leaving aside for a moment, the fact that he seems also to perpetrate the erroneous claim that education in schools is somehow responsible for sectarianism, he refers to Catholic schools’ football teams as ‘the enemy.’

When I played for my Catholic school team in Ayrshire, I can honestly say that we wanted to defeat the then St Michael’s Academy in Kilwinning for example, just as much as we wanted to defeat schools such as Greenwood Academy in Irvine. Maybe we had a better grip on the ‘rivals not enemies’ mantra than Mr Smith.

Old Firm label

Lastly but by no means least, the Show Bigotry the Red Card DVD constantly refers to Celtic and Rangers as the single entity the ‘Old Firm.’ This label, like the term sectarianism itself, is an umbrella term that hinders tackling the problem of religious bigotry and racism in Scotland.

To separate the strands of sectarianism in order to properly tackle the problem, this term has to be dropped and religious bigotry or racism problems that may or may not afflict both or either club have to be dealt with in a focused manner.

Using this blanket term for two very different football clubs suggests both clubs had a decades-long policy of not signing a player based on their faith and ergo there were two teams, one for Catholics and one for Protestants. However, Celtic FC have always signed players irrespective of race, religion or creed. In spite of this, in some quarters Celtic are still perceived as ‘the Catholic club.’ And thus the ‘two sides of the same coin’ argument is trotted out at regular intervals on the subject of sectarianism.

Better debate

The debate that followed the DVD viewing at the Show Racism the Red Card event in Dundee was equally disappointing. Comments from the floor ranged from: isolating religious bigotry as merely a ‘west coast problem,’ comparing the figure of Neil Lennon to that of Ian Paisley and one, poignantly from a police officer, who when talking on the subject of sectarian symbols, misguidedly referred to the banner of Irish socialism, the Starry Plough, as one such symbol.

My challenge of the perception that anti-Irish racism was not merely a ‘west coast problem’— in which I highlighted the case of Aiden McGeady, who was abused at football grounds, the length and breadth of Scotland (as Neil Lennon was as a player), suggesting that it may have been a contributing factor in his decision to leave Celtic last summer—was dismissed. Panelist and Clyde FC manager Jim Duffy in particular laughed off the claim, blaming solely financial reasons for the player’s departure. There was a general reluctance from the panel to accept the existence of, or decisively tackle, anti-Catholicism and anti-Irish racism. If this is reflective of the attitude of the Show Racism the Red Card itself, was it really wise for the Scottish Government to give them such a substantial financial injection to continue with anti-sectarian work?

Way forward

There needs to be acceptance of both anti-Catholicism and anti-Irish racism as a major part of the sectarian problem in Scotland in order to gain an understanding of it. That does not just apply to anti-sectarian groups, but also workplaces, within the media in Scotland, and perhaps most importantly the police, who are charged with enforcing anti-sectarian legislation.

Education is a key facet in tackling sectarianism in Scotland, but if anti-sectarian groups are themselves ill-informed, their focus will be skewed or even absent and they will ultimately fail to have any impact.

Now is the time to seek a more informed way forward on bigotry

Before Monday’s debate at Edinburgh University, PROFESSOR TOM DEVINE offers the SCO great insight into the wider problems at play in our society

The recent disgraceful episode of ‘bombs in the post’ has produced unprecedented soul-searching about this country’s age-old problem of sectarianism. It has led to claim and counter claim, assertion and counter-assertion and much hand wringing in public and private. The sheer criminality and wickedness of the acts involved demands no less a response to these seismic events and also to the related broader context of brazen sectarian chants at football matches and the vile content of various internet sites. How the nation now deals with this problem will be crucial, not only to the social harmony and civilised life of the country in the future but to the reputation of Scotland abroad.

We should all be clear that the world is now fully aware about our sinister little secret. When the extraordinary story of potentially lethal devices being sent to the manager of a football club and a few of its high-profile supporters broke recently, the news rapidly spread across the globe. Soccer is a world-wide craze and it was inevitable that these horrific incidents associated with the game would excite enormous interest. The Associated Press Agency, with a possible readership of two billion people worldwide, was among the first to report the sorry saga. Its story was then reprinted in several hundred daily newspapers across four continents. Now is the time to seek a way forward that will be intellectually rigorous, honest and thoroughly based on representative evidence. There is no doubt that the forces of law and order, which have attracted substantial criticism in recent weeks, have now learnt their lesson and have publicly announced that they intend to move towards enforcement with much more vigour.

The First Minister himself has also solemnly promised that in future there will be ‘zero tolerance’ of sectarian behaviour. All of this is to the good and represents a significant step forward. But, it might also be asked, is it good enough? There are several problems associated with the development of a robust, sustainable and realistic policy on this complex subject. No consensus exists, for instance, on the definition of the term ‘sectarianism,’ a word that platitudinously slips off the tongue of politicians and commentators with little clear understanding with listeners. Again, though academic research can provide a guide to the patterns of the last century, precious little has been published so far on the key period after 1990. We can only really move beyond assertion to careful argument and then policy-framing on the basis of hard evidence. The current debate has been lively but virtually bereft of impartially-verifiable fact.

Ironically, some much needed evidence does exist, but for reasons which are difficult to understand, given the pressing nature of this serious social issue, it has  not yet been released into the public domain where it can be analysed and interpreted. Since the Criminal Justice Scotland) Act 2003, Section 74, an additional penalty can be imposed if  offences are ‘aggravated by religious prejudice,’ that is ‘if an offender evinces towards the victim of the offence malice and ill-will based on the victim’s membership of a religious group.’ Apart from anything else, that is an excellent definition of sectarian intent which commentators could do well to adopt in future discussion. Even more, crucially, the implementation of the act has resulted in a huge archive of data on annual numbers of offences and the religious affiliation of both offenders and victims, together with information where and where indictable offences were committed. It is most unfortunate that almost all of this invaluable evidence, gathered for over a decade and more, has not been yet presented in public. It has been left untouched without being either analysed or published. Why this should be so is a mystery, especially since absolute transparency ought to be the watchword if the Augean stable is to be thoroughly cleansed once and for all.

It is now to the great credit of the current Solicitor General that in early March this year he convinced the Scottish Cabinet, among a number of initiatives, that these data should be released after analysis by civil servants, though no timeframe has yet been set for publication. The information lying in these files could, of course, be potentially explosive.

The Cardinal Archbishop of Edinburgh and other senior Catholics have claimed that the Scottish problem is not ‘sectarianism’ at all but, in the words of Keith O’Brien, ‘blatant anti-Catholicism.’ This accusation was partly based on an earlier and limited  review  of the files covering an 18 month period in 2004-5. On the basis of this snapshot, the Catholic Church’s survey of the data concluded that Catholics were five to six times more likely to be victims of such offences than those of other religions. What will the longer-run series reveal? If the results are similar, the Scottish Government may have to consider a root and branch review of its ‘anti-sectarian’ strategies.

At the same time it is important to remember historical context and perspective in the current febrile atmosphere. Scotland has come a very long way in recent years in eliminating structural and institutional sectarianism. Labour market discrimination, which does affect all life chances from employment to health, has been consigned to the past since the 1970s. In 2004, for instance, only four cases in Scotland brought under the UK Employment (Religion or Belief), among the many administered  by employment tribunals, had even the slightest sectarian connotation. Scots of Irish Catholic descent finally achieved occupational parity with their fellow Scots in the 1990s, though this was nearly a full century after their Irish American cousins did so in the US. A large Catholic professional class, fully integrated into the life of the nation, has emerged over the past three decades. Indeed, the two current senior law officers in Scotland, charged with the implementation of anti-sectarian legislation, the Lord Advocate and the Solicitor General, are both Catholics. And there can be little doubt that Pope Benedict XVI on his visit last year was warmly welcomed by Scots of all denominations and none.

The need now is to maintain that progress in order to combat remaining prejudice and bigotry which is much more difficult to achieve than legislating for non-discriminatory employment practices. Perhaps it is not widely known within our country that Scotland is now the only jurisdiction across the globe where Irish Catholics and Protestants settled in past generations that has an anti-sectarian strategy in place. Why this is the case will be one question among several other important issues which will be examined by an expert panel drawn from  Edinburgh University at a high-profile event to be held there this Monday at 6pm under the title Sectarianism in Scotland: Myth or Reality? The objective is to determine what we know and what we still need to know about this complex subject from the perspective of academic research.

There has been much speculation, misinformation and myth-making in the media about sectarianism. This event will try to get to to the heart of the matter in a spirit of intellectual honesty and understanding.

Book your place in advance at www.shca.ed.ac.uk/ centres/scdt/events.htm#Sectarianism23051. Venue details will be e-mailed to registered parties.