Scottish Catholic Observer

Peter Kearney, director of the Scottish Catholic Media Office, said that the current ‘one size fits all’ approach of anti-sectarianism charities did not fully understand the nature of the problem or represent value for money to the public. He also said the refusal of the crown office to release information about sectarian attacks was deepening the problem.

Mr Kearney (right) has been lauded in recent weeks for sparking a public debate on anti-Catholicism in Scotland in the wake of the Scottish Football Association scandal that saw the organisation dismiss five staff members for distributing an offensive e-mail about Pope Benedict XVI.

Wrong approach

Mr Kearney told the SCO that charities, such as Nil by Mouth and Sense over Sectarianism that receive hundreds of thousands of pounds from the Scottish Government to reduce bigotry, were not taking the right approach.

“You have these organisations based in Glasgow, that take a one size fits all approach to the problem,” he said. “They say things like ‘intolerance is bad’ which is fine but that kind of vague approach doesn’t actually achieve much.

“There needs to be a more specific approach. One initiative I went to involved holding up a football shirt that was half-Celtic and half-Rangers. That is superficial and amounts to telling people to abandon their identity.”

The key to improving how we combat sectarianism, Mr Kearney believes, is to focus more on anti-Catholic bigotry and its consequences.

“If you want to understand anti-Semitism you need to speak to a Jewish person,” he said. “If you want to understand racism in Scotland you need to speak to a black or Asian person. So if you want to get to the root of anti-Catholicism in Scotland Catholics have to be involved and at the forefront. At present I don’t think the efforts being made represent value to the public.”

Crime statistics

Mr Kearney also said the Crown Office should reveal more details for crimes against Catholics.

“Since 2004 we’ve had the aggravated sectarianism offence but the Crown Office are not releasing the details of who has been the victims of this,” he explained. “They release the raw numbers of how many of these offences there has been but that is of no help in tackling the problem.

“The last time they did release a breakdown geographically of where the offences were happening and of what faith the victims were, we were able to show that Catholics were six times more likely to be a victim of such an attack then any other group.”

Mr Kearney went on to say that since his office revealed that information four years ago, no further breakdown has been produced.

“I think we need a lot more pressure to be brought to bear on the Crown Office, to release these figures so we know exactly where the problem is at its worse and can then target resources at it,” he said.

“Cardinal Keith O’Brien has twice asked for these figures to be released and we are still waiting.”

Government response

A Scottish Government spokesman said they were committed ‘ridding Scotland of all forms of religious bigotry and prejudice, whoever the victims are, and we are doing everything we can to eradicate it.’
“The Scottish Government supports a range of initiatives and approaches to tackling sectarianism,” he said. “This includes funding initiatives with schools and communities through Sense Over Sectarianism; initiatives with football supporters through Show Bigotry the Red Card; an initiative with adult prison inmates through the Iona Community; and an initiative in workplaces through Nil By Mouth. These activities demonstrate that we are continuing to develop work in new areas and are fully committed to ridding Scotland of sectarianism.”

— [email protected]