[The obvious emerdence contains an undisguised attack Confrontation…]

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The obvious emerdence contains an undisguised attack Confrontation as RUC men block Sinn Fein demonstration John emeraence of growing resistance to British military rule in the. sectarian six-county statelet in the North of Ireland, coupled with continuing militancy of the working class in the South, is causing havoc among bourgeois politicians of every stripe.

Jack Lynch, Prime Minster of the 26-county "free state" also attracted considerable support in the last election by posing as a supporter of a united Ireland, has set out in recent weeks to tone down his empty bombast to a more cautious level.

• In a speech to his Fianna Fail: party colleagues chiefly remarkable for its open hostility to the working class in the 26 counties (now in the throes of a major 'post office strike in pursuit of a 30-37% pay claim) Lynch pulled back from his previous tub-thumping attacks on the British government.

Lame

Instead he lamely called for new British 'initiatives" in the six counties.

Clearly the prospect that any even vaguely anti imperialist speech at this juncture could only fuel an already growing struggle against British imperialism in the North has daunted Lynch.

He knows that his servile capitalist regime clings to power in part through the continued repressive role of the British army in holding back the struggle for national liberation and an Irish workers' republic.

Another Irish bourgeois politician who recognises this fact of life is Fine Gael leader Garret Fitzgerald, who recently unveiled a new party policy document Ireland-Our Future Together amid a fanfare of press publicity Partition Fitzgerald's "new" plan is to continue partition, with the establishment of a new government in Belfast to function alongside one in Dublin and forming a confederate set-up, jointly tackling security, foreign affairs, and some economic questions.

Alongside its sophisticated attempt to fudge the issue of national liberation which is at stake in the imperialist-ruled six counties, Fitzgerald's plan Jack Lynch Lister contains an undisguised attack on the republican struggle, described às "the continued violence of a discredited handful of men".

But unfortunately for all of British imperialism's apologists, the continued violence that has been hitting the news. recently, has been: that meted out by defenders of British rulewhether they be the bestial Protestant murder squad, the "Shankhill Butchers" or the beserk British soldier shot dead by his colleagues after pointing his rifle not at an Irish Catholic but at an army NCO-and pulling the trigger.

PHOTO: Andrew Wiard, Report Scargill psychiatrist has now pointed out that the pressures that led to Trooper Maggs' frenzy are far from unique.

And he quoted the case of another Trooper, Jeffrey Ridiey, who joined the army with hopes of serving in the Catering Corps, only to find himself assigned to a tank division and serving in occupied Northern Ireland. He is now under psychiatric care.

Of course no effort is being spared by British imperialism to protect these licensed thugs and murderers from the consequences of their actions-and perhaps the clearest case in point is that of the two SAS men who have now supposedly been charged with the murder of 16-year-old John Boyle last year.

There is no way of knowing if the assassins themselves were in court or have really been charged at all, since the proceedings witnessed the extraordinary sight of seven unidentified men in plain clothes entering the dock and standing silent as the charges were read out.

And since the two unkown. men named Tempedly and Bohan were remanded in military custody the whole affair is emerging as a total mockery of even British "justice"

Clearly in this case the SAS is relying heavily on from its chief ally- Labour's Minister for Tortur Roy Mason.

But Mason himself increasing pressure on number of fronts.' in the occupied six counties a number of large and militant demonstrations have been successfully mobilised by the IRA against the continued maltreatment of republican prisoners in 'H' Block at the Long Kesh concentration camp and in support of their demand for a restoration of political status.

Mason's campaign

And in Britain Mason has felt obliged to launch his own propaganda campaign defending his methods of repressionover and above the regular propaganda pumped out by the Tory press.

Opinion polls are beginning to register a majority of British people in favour of withdrawing troops from Ireland. And now even leading Liberal Party politicians John Pardoe and Cyril Smith have jumped on to the Troops Out bandwagon in the hopes of attracting some alienated Irish Labour votes.

The young Liberals have now gone so far as to declare support for the United Troops Out Movement (UTOM).

But more important from the standpoint of the struggle in the Labour movement, the February issue of Irish Free Press reports that there are moves afoot within the Labour Party bureaucracy to remove Mason:

"At least twice last year officials from Labour's headquarters in Transport House have urged Labour ministers to transfer Roy Mason to another cabinet position before any General Election is held, arguing that this is the minimum concassion needed to halt the erosion of Labour's support among the Irish community"

Scargill

Yet, despite these opportunistic manoeuvres, the scandalous fact is that no campaign to remove Mason is being waged openly by any section of the Labour Party or trade union bureaucracy.

Indeed Yorks NUM President Arthur Scargill, whose headquarters are in Mason's constituency of Barnsley, and whose union sponsors him as an MP, has had the two-faced cheek, to sign a UTOM Christmas card to Long Kesh prisoners while not lifting a finger to remove Mason.

Now is the time to take up a fight on this question in every body of the labour movement -so that the issue of British imperialist repression in Ireland figures at the forefront of the political discussion in the run up By Socialist Press Reporter to the 1979 election.

Fighting for Mason's removal and the kicking out of the pro-imperialist Callaghan/Healey leadership must be coupled with the demand for the immediate withdrawal of British Troops from Ireland to make way for the self-determination of the Irish people. the labour movement to kick out Roy Mason and the rest of the right wing Callaghan-Healey cabinet.

Matthew Jones, a school student from Glasgow outlined