Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-06-11-Speech-1-032"
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"en.20010611.3.1-032"2
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"Madam President, one thing that makes my heart very glad is to hear the last unreconstructed Tory of the seventeenth century agree at last that freedom is a good thing for Ireland.
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I extend the hand of friendship to Roger. I welcome his conversion. I say to him – because he does not have a great understanding of history – that historically, a ‘Tory’ means somebody who is hunted: ‘tóraidhe’, a hunted one. I am beginning to think that Roger and those of his political party are feeling a little bit that way since last weekend. The
were Anglo-Irish people who were expelled from their land on account of their religion. They refused to go and were loyal to the king. I hope that Roger is enlightened now. I certainly hope that we have bridged the gap between us.
Edmund Burke, a great British parliamentarian, said: "All that is necessary for evil to triumph is that good people do nothing". Evil triumphed last weekend, not in the person of those people who went out and mistakenly voted for the wrong side, but of those who told them lies and deceived them. They are the people who cadged money from abroad in the interests of breaking up the solidarity of the people of Europe and spent it to tell lies to the Irish people, while the Irish government – and, unfortunately, the opposition – were so complacent that we thought everybody would trust us. I want the people of this House to know that every major newspaper supported a ‘yes’ for eastern Europe. I want this House to know that a large number of the people who voted ‘no’ believed that they were doing no damage to the interests of the eastern European countries.
I have one disagreement with my colleagues Mr Andrews and Mr Gallagher about the generosity and special merits of the people of Ireland. I believe we are different. We have a slightly different culture and a very different history. Yet we are the same as everybody else here. We have good people and bad people. We accept democracy nevertheless, because it is the only way. As the Jacobites said after the Battle of the Boyne, "Change kings and we will fight you over again", and I believe we will win the next time."@en1
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"Laughter and applause)"1
"tóraidhe"1
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