The heirs of Ratcliffe and Cormac

 

The heirs of Ratcliffe and Cormac

In 1933, the old Stormont Parliament in Belfast purchased a large painting by the Dutch artist Peiter Van Der Meulen for the princely sum of £209 and four shillings. The large painting was said to show the arrival of  William of Orange in Ireland and its unveiling in front of members was eventful to say the least. The large painting did indeed seem to show William astride his horse but the cheers of the assembled unionist members of Parliament turned to uproar as they inspected the painting more closely. In the top left-hand corner, sitting on a cloud appeared to be Pope Innocent XI, blessing William. In front of his horse stood a Dominican Friar, replete with rosary beads.

Of course, any cursory reading of history will tell you that the Williamite wars in Ireland were part of a wider conflict in Europe at the time, known as the ‘Nine Years War.’ It pitted the French against a ‘Grand Alliance’ which included Germans, Austrians, William of Orange and the Papal States under Pope Innocent XI, all of whom all wanted to curtail French expansionism. Pope Innocent was on the side of those who opposed the French and as William of Orange was an ally in that struggle, he naturally wanted him to defeat King James in Ireland. Indeed, it has been noted that upon hearing of William’s victory, Pope Innocent ordered the bells of Rome to be rung in celebration.

The painting unveiled in Stormont that day in 1933 appeared to show this Papal support for William and it was a little too much for some to take. The mythology of 1690, the Boyne and Aughrim would have us believe that the Protestant forces of King William defeated the Catholic army of his father-in-law King James, but in reality, both armies had soldiers from both denominations among their troops. That a painting on display in the self-proclaimed, ‘Protestant parliament for a Protestant people’ demonstrated the Catholic church supporting William caused what some describe today as cognitive dissonance; that feeling that one’s thoughts and beliefs may not be based on firm evidence.

The painting was vandalised by Scottish visitors to the Parliament in May 1933. Mary Ratcliffe, wife of the leader of the Scottish Protestant League, Alexander Ratcliffe and Charles Forrester attacked it for its ‘Papish content.’ Mrs Radcliffe slashed it with a knife and Forrester threw red paint over the image of Pope Innocent. Both were arrested and fined £65. (Over £3000 in today’s money) The painting was restored, although mysteriously the Dominican Friar’s rosary beads were painted out during that process. It was then quietly stored away out of sight for decades.

Alexander Ratcliffe, the husband of the woman who slashed the painting, was the founder and leader of the Scottish Protestant League, a Glasgow based  political party which between the wars gained as much as 23% of the vote in local elections. He wrote such ‘classics’ as ‘The truth about the Jews,’ ‘Evolution: Hell with the lid off,’ and came from that dour Calvinistic tradition which saw life as a test to be endured. His abiding hatred though was of Catholicism and the Irish population of Scotland who he petitioned to be expelled from the country. In the end he became a fully-fledged fascist after visiting Nazi Germany in the late 1930s. He was still writing anti-Catholic and anti-Jewish pamphlets during the war and was among the first Holocaust-deniers in Europe.

In Edinburgh a sister party, the ‘Protestant Action Society arose with similar aims although the British Union of Fascists support for Irish unity saw the PAS attack their meetings. Their leader, John Cormac, became something of a rabble rouser and used the press to mobilise his supporters onto the streets. He also had a knack for self-promotion and when the Town Council bestowed the Freedom of the City to, among others, Australian Premier, Joseph Lyons, Cormac, realising Lyons was a Catholic disrupted the ceremony by shouting, ‘No Popery!’ and ‘Down with the Papes!’ He was ejected from the hall and a disapproving press described his outburst as ‘unseemly.’

When it was announced that the Catholics of Edinburgh were organising a Eucharistic Congress in the city in the summer of 1935, Cormac found a new avenue for inciting the mob. He forewarned what might happen and even wrote to the newspapers in advance saying…

‘When, and where the Popish Authorities openly propagate their blasphemous doctrine, we, the Protestants of Edinburgh will turn out in Protest. We are Protestant “Actionists” not jelly fish. If the papists are allowed to hold a Eucharistic Congress in June, 30, or 40 thousand, Protestants will know the reason why.’

After one of his rallies in the Usher Hall in Edinburgh, his audience were so roused by his fierce anti-Catholic rhetoric that some left the hall in an angry and confrontational mood. One newspaper reported their actions with the following words…

‘After the meeting the most disgraceful scenes were witnessed. Concerted attacks were made on a number of buses. Stones were thrown at them and their windows broken - and their occupants injured. One of the oldest and most respected Priests in the diocese was a passenger in one of the buses along with a number of his school children. All the windows of that bus were smashed and he himself was struck by a stone and narrowly escaped serious injury from a second missile. Other buses containing women and children were also attacked. A Priest walking on the street was struck by a man with a knuckle-duster or similar weapon and his face cut.  He took refuge in a passing motor car which was stoned and a lady passenger struck. An English Priest, a guest of Lord Moncrieff, was assaulted earlier in the evening, and a number of others were only saved by the intervention of Police or civilians.’

A letter from a Protestant clergyman to the Scotsman newspaper laid these outrages at the door of Cormac. He wrote…

‘Those actions aroused the lowest form of bestial hate in the tatterdemalions (raggedly dressed folk) of Edinburgh who acclaim superiority to ‘Popery’ by howling foul blasphemy, attacking women, isolated groups of Catholic men and even Priests.’

When the Eucharistic Congress began on a fine June day, 170 buses brought Catholics to the city. It is estimated that some 15,000 attended the Congress in the leafy suburb of Morningside. They were met by a crowd of 20,000 demonstrators led by Cormac. Buses were stoned, people assaulted and Edinburgh’s Police force had their work cut out defending the men, women and children attending the religious gathering. The ensuing riot, in which the Police were not slow to deal with trouble makers, is one that modern, cosmopolitan Edinburgh would like to forget.

Archbishop McDonald wrote to the Secretary of State for Scotland and was himself clear that the mob had been incited by the ‘inflammatory language used by speakers like Cormac. He informed the Secretary of State that the Catholic men of Edinburgh were already forming defence committees and would defend their people. In fairness, the Police, the majority of the press, the courts and the civil authorities were hard on the bigots and many were brought to book. The Lord Provost, Louis Stewart Gumley, himself born in Dublin before moving to Edinburgh in his youth, said of the mob…

‘The sectarian spirit is a heady thing and some people seemed to have lost their moral and mental balance over this subject. Every honest minded British citizen deplores the Jew baiting in Nazi Germany, we want no baiting of Roman Catholics here. There is enough ill will in the world, and even in our own country without adding the fires of religious fanaticism to it.’

It was interesting to note that during an Orange Parade in Edinburgh in 2014, a Channel 4 news reporter asked Orangemen why the words ‘No Popery’ appeared on one of the banners. He was told, rather unconvincingly, that whilst the Orange Order abhorred the doctrine of the Catholic Church, it did not hate Catholics. A senior Orangeman then said that the banner should not have been there. Had the news reporter known his local history, he would have seen that the man pictured on the banner was none other than John Cormac, Orangeman and chief rabble rouser at the time of the Edinburgh riot of 1935.

The Orange Order has a somewhat uncomfortable time explaining its attitude towards Catholics and those of Irish extraction in Scotland. For the average Catholic in the street to see banners portraying men like Cormac or Bill Campbell, a Scottish UVF bomber who blew up Catholic pubs in Glasgow, is disconcerting. As is the playing of tunes at parades which pander to the element described as ‘tatterdemalions’ in 1935. Some may well be decent, evangelical Christians with no hate in their hearts for anyone but each year their parades lead to tasteless scenes it’s hard to reconcile with Christian love and tolerance.

I spoke to a Catholic friend recently who was caught up in one of this month’s parades in the Partick area of Glasgow. She found it both sad and intimidating. That’s the reality for some of our fellow Scots as the heirs of Ratcliffe and Cormac march through our streets.

 

 

A Beautiful Life

 

A Beautiful Life

Watching the articulate and intelligent Mick Lynch, General Secretary or the RMT, comprehensively school some of the lightweight, minor celebrities who pass as journalists these days has been both gratifying and amusing. Mick, the son of Irish parents, who left school as a sixteen- year-old to work in the building trade, knows his stuff. He also knows the historical and cultural context the trade union movement. When asked by one hapless interviewer who his hero was he replied…

‘James Connolly. Do you know who James Connolly is? He is an Irish, Socialist Republican and he educated himself and started non-sectarian trade unionism, in Ireland and was a hero of the Irish revolution.’

Mick Lynch is being lauded by those on the left in the UK for speaking truth to power in a way the Labour Party has avoided for 30 years. The smug elites are not fond of articulate advocates for the working class and we can expect the right-wing press to try and discredit Lynch in the same scurrilous manner they destroyed Jeremy Corbyn. Mr Lynch is unlikely to be cowed though by the childish comparison to a Thunderbirds puppet ‘evil mastermind’ but the fact the tabloids are trawling his Facebook page and looking through his bins is a sign that the usual suspects are looking to distract from the message by attacking the messenger.

James Connolly would have recognised these tactics from the more conservative forces in his day. His time living off the Falls Road in Belfast demonstrated clearly to him how carefully fostered sectarian divisions were used to keep the working class at each other’s throats; rather than seeing the real enemy which was exploiting both communities. When he saw the social and housing conditions both communities lived in, he described it as, ‘tuppence against tuppence ha’penny.’ He also witnessed a cynical Tory Party ‘play the Orange card’ in order to support their own selfish party-political interests in Westminster. In the end, the partition of Ireland which Connolly warned against became reality and his words spoken in the years before partition became prophetic…

‘Here in Ireland the proposal of the Government to consent to the partition of Ireland – the exclusion of certain counties in Ulster is causing a new line of cleavage. No one of the supporters of Home Rule accepts this proposal with anything like equanimity, but rather we are already hearing in Ulster rumours of a determination to resist it by all means. It is felt that the proposal to leave the Home-Rule minority at the mercy of an ignorant majority with the evil record of the orange party is a proposal that should never have been made, and that the establishment of such a scheme should be resisted with armed force if necessary. I entirely agree with those who think so; Belfast is bad enough as it is; what it would be under such rule the wildest imagination cannot conceive. Filled with the belief that they were after defeating the Imperial Government and the Nationalists combined, the Orangemen would have scant regards for the rights of the minority left at their mercy.’

Connolly did not live to see Ireland divided into two states. In the north, a ‘Protestant state for a Protestant people’ was proclaimed despite a third of the citizens being Catholics in 1922. There was intimidation, discrimination and blatant electoral Gerrymandering to maintain Unionist hegemony in places like Derry where 75% of the population was nationalist. In the south, the Catholic church was given influence and power far beyond what was healthy in any land. Connolly would have despaired. The working-class solidarity he so badly tried to foster was ripped apart and has yet to recover.

His revolution, based on the socialist principles he espoused all his life, died with him in the stonebreakers yard at Kilmainham jail. The conservative forces of church and commerce guided the Irish Free State in a different direction and perhaps reminds us of one of his more famous quotations…

‘If you remove the English Army tomorrow and hoist the green flag over Dublin Castle., unless you set about the organization of the Socialist Republic your efforts will be in vain. England will still rule you. She would rule you through her capitalists, through her landlords, through her financiers, through the whole array of commercial and individualist institutions she has planted in this country and watered with the tears of our mothers and the blood of our martyrs”

James Connolly would approve of Mick Lynch’s articulate defence of the interests of his union’s membership. He may also concede that the average worker today lives in far better social conditions than those he would have seen in the slums of the Cowgate, Dublin or Belfast but I’m sure he would echo the point that most of the gains made by ordinary people in areas such as the NHS, welfare, workers’ rights and housing, was made possible by ordinary people organising and fighting for them. We should not forget that Churchill’s Tory Party fought against the establishment of the NHS and voted against it 21 times, but the Labour landslide at the 1945 election saw the Bill passed in Parliament.

We may face a summer of discontent as inflation spirals and various workers groups strike to protect their standard of living. Mick Lynch pointed out the hypocrisy of bosses telling workers to tighten their belts while they rake it in with bloated salaries and huge bonuses. We live in an era where the rich are getting richer and many of the poorer folk in society are struggling. Who can blame them for demanding a fairer system? The traditional link between the trade unions and the Labour Party may not be what it once was, but the fact that many ordinary people support the railway workers and see the obvious bias in media reporting of the dispute is telling.

Mick Lynch’s hero, James Connolly paid the ultimate price for trying to change society for the better. His daughter Nora went to see him on the evening before he was shot and reported this exchange between Connolly and his wife Lilly…

‘When we got into see my father he said, ‘well Lilly, I suppose you know what this means?’ She said, ‘oh no, oh no not that.’ He said ‘yes, Lilly.’ She broke down then and she said, ‘what a beautiful life James, such a beautiful life.’ He said, ‘wasn’t it a full life Lilly and isn’t this a good end?’

James Connolly gave his life trying to create a fairer society and better conditions for those crushed by poverty. The sectarianism he despised so much means that even today, some in the land of his birth refuse to recognise him as the champion of the poor he was. He sought to bring about change by revolution rather than evolution and was in that regard, a man of his time, but his courage and self-sacrifice are undeniable, even to those who refute his politics.

Mick Lynch chose his political hero with the same intelligence and understanding he uses to demolish the journalists who interview him. Connolly was clear what he wanted to see in Ireland and indeed around the world, when he said…

‘The Irish people will only be free when they own everything from the plough to the stars.’

That dream may never become reality but it won’t stop many fighting for a fairer, more equal society.

 

The Right Thing

 

The Right Thing

Irish folk singer Christy Moore appeared on BBC Radio’s ‘Desert Island Discs’ programme some years ago and, being a fan of his music, I recall tuning in to hear it. Moore is known for his considerable musical skill and penning songs which reflect a left-wing political outlook on life. His music was a commentary on the times he lived through and in albums such as H-Block and The Spirit of Freedom, he made plain his views on the situation in the north of Ireland at that time. Indeed, the launch of his album ‘H Block at the Brazen Head pub in Dublin was raided by the Irish Special Branch in 1978 and all attending were quizzed by the Police. All of the albums were seized in the raid and Moore relates that years later he spoke to some of the detectives who were on the raid. Such was the ambiguity of the times, they said most of them kept a copy at home and it was among their most treasured possessions.

Christy spoke honestly about why he stopped being sympathetic to the armed struggle in the north. When asked why he stopped supporting the IRA he said, ‘I suppose Enniskillen, then Warrington and proxy bombs. It was just the end of the line for me.’  For a traditionally stuffy radio show, Moore’s contribution was honest and open especially about his politics, his health breakdowns and his struggles with alcohol and anger. These days he is in his seventies and is as busy as ever. I’ve seen him live on a few occasions and from the more raucous shows at the Barrowland to the more sedate nights at the Royal Concert Hall, he remains a fine performer.

The reason I’m talking about Christy Moore today is that he came on a journey with so many people of his generation. He saw the very real injustices of what was going on in Northern Ireland and commented on them in his life and music. In the end the violence and the cruelties of those times led him to the conclusion that there had to be a better way. Christy’s appearance on the show came at a time when the peace process was starting to bear fruit and Martin McGuinness and Iain Paisley were working together to make a better future for the people they represented.

Those of us who have regularly attended Celtic games over the course of our lives have met a lot of great folk from the six counties who lived through things we on the other side of the water can scarce imagine. I used to sit by an older chap in the Jock Stein stand, who hailed from Belfast and we’d talk regularly about his experiences growing up and living through the Troubles. He spoke not only of the violence and injustice he saw but also of the spirit, resilience and decency of so many people just trying to get by in a horrendous situation. He was old enough to have watched Belfast Celtic play but his heart was always with their cousins in Glasgow. His journey to watch Celtic began  in the early hours of the morning and took a coach and a ferry to get him to the hallowed ground he loved so much. He never once bad mouthed anyone but rather told his tales of the things he and his community endured with a kind of weary sadness. When peace came in the late 90s, he told me the best thing about it was not worrying about his children whenever they went out.

The peace has endured despite the efforts of a misguided few to try and return to the past. Of course, the scars are still there, especially for the older generation who endured things we can only imagine. It will take generations for the hurt to subside and the truth to emerge about what really went on in those years. Some, alas will never find justice for their loved ones and will live with that all their days but at least there is compensation in the fact that their children and grandchildren will know better days.

My grandfather, whose name I bear, fought for Irish freedom when he returned from the trenches of World War One. In my memory, he is the grey-haired old chap who sang, ‘The Rose Of Tralee’ at family parties. It would be hard to imagine that old gentleman as a young man with a rifle in his hand but he did what he thought was the right thing in his own life.

Doing the right thing is, I guess, the point of today’s article. We saw images of Celtic supporters in Las Vegas singing about the IRA this week and the tabloids made a big fuss because of the presence of a few celebrity Celtic fans. There has been an upsurge in such songs in recent years, especially at away games and much as I don’t have a problem with people singing songs which reflect their heritage and outlook, I do question the necessity to sing them at Scottish football matches or linked events. If you choose to sing such songs then you accept the damage it does to Celtic’s reputation.

Celtic have fans from all walks of life and the ideals the club was built on should be borne in mind by all who follow the Hoops. The team was integrated from its earliest years and rejected the narrow-minded sectarianism others adopted. The support is increasingly diverse and some of my best friends who follow Celtic are neither of Irish extraction nor Catholics. We are a broad church now and should avoid anything which might make our fellow supporters uncomfortable.

I’ve written such words before and have been called childish names by a mostly younger element with no real knowledge of what occurred during the darker days of the troubles. If wanting Celtic to be an inclusive, modern club makes me a ‘soup taker’ then that’s fine by me but at least get a good book or two about the troubles and educate yourself first. They were dark times and no one came out of them unsullied; not the paramilitaries, not the security forces and certainly not the politicians on all sides who failed miserably.

We in Scotland were thankfully spared the things they endured despite the efforts of a misguided few to import the troubles here. We can be thankful for that and hope our cousins across the north channel have many years of peace ahead. As Seamus Heaney wrote…

‘History says, Don’t hope
On this side of the grave,
But then, once in a lifetime
The longed-for tidal wave
Of justice can rise up,
And hope and history rhyme.’

Yer ain folk

 

Yer ain folk

Some years ago, I attended a sports dinner at a masonic hall in Glasgow. I was keen to listen to two greats of Scottish football, Tommy Gemmell and Willie Henderson, regale us with tales of their days as players. It was, in fairness, a terrific event with much laughter and poignancy as the two ex-pros brought to life the golden age of Scottish football. During the interval, I lined up to buy some drinks at the small bar and got into conversation with a middle-aged chap. We discussed the stories the two old players had been telling and had a laugh as we waited to be served. As the conversation ended, he leaned closer to me and said, ‘enjoy the rest of your night, pal. It’s great being wi yer ain folk, none of that manky mob around.’ At that moment, my brother called to me, ‘Pat, make that three lagers.’ The man’s face changed completely when he heard my name and he looked the other way obviously mortified.

As tales of everyday sectarianism go, it’s pretty tame stuff. We’ve all seen and heard much worse but it illustrates that people are more open, more themselves when they think they are among their ‘ain folk.’ This was illustrated fully in that despicable video circulating online of people in an Orange Hall in County Down singing and laughing about a young Irish woman who was murdered on her honeymoon. As examples of moral degradation go, it was pretty near the bottom of the barrel. How many other such examples of sectarian stupidity are kept hidden because people are among their ‘ain folk?’

Of course, decent people of all hues condemned the incident unequivocally. Linfield Football Club terminated their relationship with a coach who took part in the vile singalong. The club, long associated with the unionist community in Belfast, has tried hard in recent years to educate the less enlightened element among their supporters but just as with Rangers in Scotland, there are those who don’t want to change. Linfield’s biting and severe statement made clear their abhorrence of the naked sectarianism on display in the Orange hall and are to be commended for speaking out.

A couple of those involved have apologised for their actions although some have suggested the only thing they are truly sorry about is being caught. In the age where camera phones are ubiquitous, there is a steady stream of videos of people being ‘themselves’ when they think no one is watching or they’re among their own kind.

The Orange order has said it will investigate the goings on at the Orange hall and take disciplinary action if necessary. The nature of the organisation suggests this is a bit like marking your own homework. There is surely a manifest flaw in an organisation which will not tolerate Catholicism nor accept Catholic members, investigating patently anti- Catholic behaviour? This wasn’t just bad taste, this song was written by an adult, learned and known by multiple people in the room and target solely at a young woman and her family because of their background. There is a deep flaw in the psyche of people who can’t accept others because they are different from them, even in relatively small ways.

If these videos which slip out onto the internet now and then teach us one thing, it is that some hide their hatreds behind a mask of respectability but sometimes that mask slips and we see their true face. Perhaps the tsunami of disgust and criticism coming their way now will teach them the lesson that more and more people reject this sort of behaviour. I hope they learn and grow as human beings but perhaps some will just learn to keep the video phones off in future. One Irish newspaper put it succinctly….

‘Congratulations to those who sang that vile song about Michaela McAreavey: you’ve successfully united the public and all politicians and commentators in utter revulsion against you. For all of us who have seen the video, it was hard to feel anything other than disgust watching a group of men, in a room decorated with Union flags and Orange Order paintings, join in chorus to sing a horrible and insulting tune they all clearly knew so well. They laughed and joked with each other and raised their arms in celebration.’

Human beings seem tribal by nature, perhaps a remnant of our hunter-gatherer past and in places where disparate groups have been forced to live together by history or by chance, there will always be some who blame the ‘other’ for some misfortune. The legacy of Ireland’s history from colonisation, plantation, partition and the horrors of conflict, have left deep wounds that are far from healed. That being said, we are all human beings and we know in our hearts that some things are just plain wrong.

Of course, no individual and no community should smugly think they don’t have their share of fools and knaves among their number. I’ve written recently about a small minority of Celtic fans who seem not to care a jot about the principles the club stands for and seek to revive tired old songs rejected by the bulk of the support before they were born. It’s up to us all to live up to the best ideals of our club and say no to intolerance of any sort. We Celtic fans know well the feeling of comfort and comradeship being together creates. It is a powerful bond that has been moulded through the generations and has come through some hard times. I hope that being among our ‘ain folk’ is never an excuse for denigrating others. As a wise man once said…

‘ Integrity is doing the right thing-even when no one is watching.’

We could add to that… even when you’re just with your ‘ain folk.’

If you know the history

 

If you know the history

I’m sure the throngs of mostly young Celtic Supporters who flooded the area around Glasgow Cross to celebrate Celtic’s championship last weekend were blissfully unaware of the history which surrounds that part of Glasgow. The traditional Mercat cross, the small octagonal building which some more athletic Celtic fans scaled on Saturday, was once at the heart of Glasgow’s medieval market area and was, in common with similar buildings in other towns, the symbolic centre of the city. The actual building, despite being described as a national treasure by some, is in fact a 1930 replica of a much older building demolished by the city fathers in 1659.

Close to the Mercat building, was the sight of the gallows where St John Ogilvie was martyred for his faith in March 1615. Ogilvie was an undercover Jesuit Priest who returned to Scotland to minister to the few Catholics left after the reformation. He refused to name the secret Catholics he visited despite being tortured and kept awake for days by being jabbed by daggers. During his trial, he refused to acknowledge the King’s supremacy on religious matters, saying would, ‘ no more acknowledge him than an old hat.’ His last words as they hanged him in public were, ‘If there are any hidden Catholics, let them pray for me but the prayers of heretics I will not have.’ As he swung out to meet his maker, he cast his rosary into the watching crowd. According to legend, the man who caught it became a devout Catholic.

To the south of the Mercat Cross is the Saltmarket area, which in the mid-19^th century this was known as District 14 and was one of the most deplorable slums in Europe. Into the ramshackle, overcrowded and insanitary dwellings of District 14, unscrupulous landlords crammed thousands of migrant Irish and many Scots cleared from the Highlands. One history book describes the area with the following words…..  ‘District 14 was a human cesspit, a concentration camp of filth and disease.’ Those drinking and cavorting in the spring sunshine last week would on the whole have been unaware of the misery of many of their forebears endured just a few hundred yards away.

Many of the building in the Trongate and Glasgow Cross area would have been familiar to Brother Walfrid, Celtic’s founding father. What would he have made of the thousands of Celtic fans singing their victory songs and cavorting around the Mercat building? Well, he was a man of his time and would doubtless have frowned upon the amount of drinking going on and some of the more uncouth behaviour. Many Victorian clergymen were keen that their people abstained from alcohol as drunkenness reflected badly on their community and could be a real scourge in some communities. Indeed, the problems caused by alcohol in the Irish community in Victorian Glasgow were such that the Police vehicles sent to deal with drunks were often called ‘Paddy wagons.’ There were big temperance movements in all the main churches in the 19^th century and often a wagon with a band on it would tour poorer areas drumming up interest in abstaining from drink. Thus, the term, ‘jumping on the bandwagon’ was first coined.

The good Brother might also be disappointed that so many have abandoned the faith which he and so many others took great solace in. To be a Catholic in Victorian Britain, was to be an outsider. Distrust of Catholicism was widespread in the UK and in more Calvinistic countries like Scotland, the old faith was considered tantamount to superstition and actively discriminated against. For the poor and often despised Irish flooding into Scotland’s industrial cities in the wake of the great hunger, the faith they held was an important part of their identity and a source of comfort to some in their hard lives.

Evangelical groups were very active seeking to proselytise the new arrivals in cities like Glasgow and would, ironically, offer soup after their services to poor Catholics. Celtic FC club was, in part set up to give the Catholic community the means to feed their own people and prevent them being converted away from their faith as many were during the dark days of An Gorta Mor in Ireland.

Brother Walfrid would be satisfied that his people had risen from the wretched conditions of 150 years ago to take their place in every level and strata of Scottish society. The progeny of those migrants in nineteenth century Glasgow used education to improve themselves and make better lives for their children and grandchildren. If they are still more likely to live in areas of deprivation than the general population, it is at least in greatly improved conditions than those Walfrid would have seen during his time in Glasgow.

The success of his club would have delighted him too. Its magnificent stadium stands like a beacon in the east end of the city. A reminder that a marginalised community overcame many obstacles to take its place in society. He’d be satisfied too that it continues its charitable work and has through its Foundation raised millions of pounds for worthy causes. He might also smile to see that many, many supporters of Celtic come from out-with the founding community. The very name ‘Celtic’ (Which he pronounced ‘Keltic’) was symbolic of the common heritage the Irish and Scots shared and his club was, he hoped, a bridge to help the Irish assimilate into Scottish society more successfully. That many of that Scottish community with no Irish heritage are avid supporters of his club would delight him. As would the fact that fans who come from Italian, Polish, Asian and many other backgrounds choose to call Celtic their club.

Scottish society has changed for the better in so many ways since Walfrid launched Celtic in the late Victorian era. Healthcare, housing, social security and education have all improved dramatically and life expectancy has increased greatly. In 1888, just over 10,000 people were recorded as having died in Glasgow. Of those around 50% were children under 5 years of age. Thankfully the conditions which made this tragedy happen have been swept away. One report into the contrast in the lives of Glasgow’s poor and more affluent people stated that…

‘Everyday experience, regardless of income, was shaped by ill-health. Life for the poor in overcrowded, industrial cities such as Glasgow was especially likely to be influenced by sickness and early death. Indeed, between the 1820s and 1830s the average age of death in Glasgow, already low at about 42 years for men and 45 for women, fell by about five years. It only recovered to early 19th century levels in the 1880s, when killer diseases such as typhus were finally brought under control. Poor nutrition led to chronic states of physical inefficiency among the working population. A School Board survey of 1906 revealed that a 14-year-old boy living in a poor area of Glasgow was, on average, 4 inches shorter than a similar-aged child from the city's West End. If you walked through the busy streets of this teeming city, the rich were easily differentiated from the poor because they were tall.’

Walfrid would be satisfied that so much has changed for the better since his time and would perhaps have a wry smile as he saw his club still so successful 134 years after it played its first match.

As the victory songs of Celtic supporters echoed off the walls of the Trongate, the words ‘and if you know the history’ were perhaps most poignant. The migrant Irish of 160 years ago were now Scots. Proud of their roots but at home in their native city. It has been quite a journey, but they made it.

 

 

The Glass Ceiling

 

The Glass Ceiling

One of the things you notice about all of the clubs who hold records for most domestic trophy wins in their history, is that they tend to come from smaller footballing nations. Thus, many of those in the so called ‘big five’ European football leagues would doubtless sneer at a club like Rangers boasting of 55 titles as some sort of European or world record. Real Madrid, for instance, has won over 20 European and world titles, as well as many domestic honours. Can we compare the two? I’d say not because we aren’t comparing like with like given the relative strength of competition in both leagues and at the top level in European football.

Scotland has played organised football since the inception of the Scottish Cup in 1873. The league followed in 1890 with Celtic among the founder members. Indeed, Celtic remain the only Scottish club to have played its entire history in the top division. In the early days of Scottish football, clubs such as Queens Park and Renton would challenge for honours but the adoption of professionalism meant that the clubs with bigger supports could pay more and began to out-perform the early giants of the game. Both Maley’s Celtic and Struth’s Rangers, accumulated a vast array of honours and only the post-World War Two football boom, which saw crowds of 65,000 at the Edinburgh derby or a 45,000 crowd into Pittodrie for a cup tie with Hearts, allowed the competition to be truly open.

Despite Celtic’s astonishing success in the period between 1965-75, there was a sense right into the 1980s that a number of clubs could win the league each season. Consider the fact that had Hearts not bottled it at Dens Park in 1986, they would have joined Celtic, Aberdeen, Dundee United and  Rangers as Champions in that decade. Indeed, Scotland would have had 5 different champions between 1982-87. However, a huge change was on the horizon and was to  begin the decline of provincial clubs believing they had a chance in the title race. It began with a relatively unknown footballer in Belgium called Jean-Marc Bosman.

Bosman challenged the right of football clubs to hold a player’s registration or demand a fee for them once their contracts were over. In every other profession in the EU, he argued, once you complete a contract you are free to move on to another employer with no fee being due. Anything blocking this was an obstruction of trade. The judges agreed with him and football was changed forever. Money then became the prime motivator for many players who were virtually owned by their clubs before the Bosman ruling. Could Aberdeen have held onto players like Miller or Strachan for the years they did, had the Bosman ruling been in effect? Could Dundee United, who often put teenage stars on exceptionally long contracts, have held on to Narey, Sturrock or Heggarty had an agent been there whispering in players ears of the money on offer elsewhere? The fact that the clubs had almost complete control of a player’s destiny, meant provincial clubs could hold onto talented players until they, the club, decided otherwise and thus build decent sides.

The Bosman ruling was a wake-up call to many Scottish clubs and led to typical  Scottish humour of the terraces. One fan remarked to me at the time of the Bosman decision with typical earthy humour, ‘players can just leave when their contract is up? Yer baws man!’ The phrase, ‘leaving on a Bosman’ entered the football lexicon and players started signing shorter contracts with an eye on a better deal or a lucrative move when it was over. To a degree there had always been a food chain in football with the better players ending up at bigger clubs but the Bosman ruling accelerated this and Scotland’s medium sized clubs were increasingly losing talent to leagues which paid more money. This was most brutally demonstrated when Aberdeen lost striker, Adam Rooney, to Salford City in 2018. He was reportedly paid £4000 per week to play in non-league English football. That a top Scottish club could lose a player to a club in the 5th tier in England is astonishing but money talks.

After the Bosman ruling was settled in the courts in 1995, taking with it the ‘three foreigners’ rule, a huge influx of foreign players began in the big leagues of Europe. The football agent became an important figure and by 1999, Chelsea became the first side in the UK to field a side made up entirely of foreigners. Scotland wasn’t immune to this influx and many foreign players joined our clubs. Some undoubtedly added to the quality of the league but many were journeymen who simply blocked places in the team and stifled the development of home-grown youngsters. It was judged cheaper by some clubs to bring in a foreign player than invest properly in youth systems.

Jean Marc Bosman himself said of the changes to football after the ruling which bears his name…

‘Now the 25 or so richest clubs transfer players for astronomical sums and smaller clubs cannot afford to buy at those prices. So, the 25 pull further and further away from the rest, deepening the gap between big and small. That was not the aim of the Bosman ruling.’

The very nature of football’s rapacious and unfettered capitalism saw this gulf developing everywhere as the good footballers followed the money. In Germany, Bayern Munich completed an unheard of ten in a row this season. In Italy, Juventus completed nine straight titles a couple of years back. In Spain Barcelona and Real Madrid have won all but 6 titles in the past 35 years. In England few would bet on anyone other than Manchester City or Liverpool for the title. While here in Scotland, no one outside the big two has won the league for 37 years. Is there an appetite to watch a game so stacked in favour of the big clubs both domestically and in Europe?

With the same clubs turning up in the latter stages of the Champions League year after year, some have lost interest. UEFA will doubtless pander to the demands of these ‘elite’ clubs fearing they’d go their own way if they didn’t, so the whole flow of the game is geared to suit them. Thus, we have the anomaly of Celtic and Rangers being too big (financially) for Scotland, yet too small to seriously contemplate having any chance of winning the Champions league. We tell ourselves that taking part is the important thing and accept the glass ceiling hemming us in just as Scottish clubs accept they’ll never dethrone the big two.

In the first half of my life, six different clubs won the Scottish Championship. In the second half it has been just two. I can’t see that changing in the near future unless there is a revolution in our game. Some suggest a wages cap and a cap on transfer fees might be one way to spread the talent more equitably, but it would fall in the courts just as the argument against free movement of players did in the Bosman case. Others suggest that the prize money and TV money accrued by Scottish football should be distributed equally rather than based on where you finish in the league. With Celtic and Rangers attracting up to ten times the attendance of some of their rivals, the gulf would remain.

So, the big two continue, locked in their loveless embrace like a married couple who dislike each other but have nowhere else to go. They are the chief selling point of Scottish football as their multi-layered rivalry is uniquely fierce. Their supporters consider finishing second to be a disastrous season and the clubs bestride the SPFL like two giants in a playground. What stops them becoming bored with this situation is getting the better of each other and their jousts with better quality opponents in Europe.

That is not to say I am anything less than delighted with Celtic’s championship win this season because I am, I just wish we could find a way to level the playing field and smash the glass ceiling both at home and in Europe. We’d all benefit from a more competitive league. Wouldn’t we?

 

Give him the tools

 

Give him the tools

In September of last year Celtic lost at Livingston to a goal in the 25^th minute of the game by Andrew Shinnie. Celtic languished in sixth place in the title race after losing three of their opening six games. It was clear that Ange Postecoglou knew what he wanted from his team and wouldn’t be diverted from playing his non-stop, quick passing style of play. They had 79% possession and 16 shots on goal on that day at the Tony Macaroni Arena and couldn’t find the net. Some said they were lightweight and lacking real punch up front. Others suggested Postecoglou’s style of play wasn’t suited to the rough and tumble of the Scottish game. Most Celtic supporters could see what he was trying to do though and were prepared to back him while he constructed a team. There were encouraging signs of progress in those early weeks of the season. I wrote myself at the time…

‘I’m excited by the start Postecoglou has made at Celtic and the improvements we have seen in the few months he has been here. He deserves time, patience and two or three transfer windows to transform Celtic into the side we all want them to be. Rome wasn’t built in day and good football teams are nurtured and built over several seasons and not a few months. Give Ange the tools he needs and I remain convinced he’ll do the job well.’

Ange’s way of dealing with the media also endeared him to the fans. He saw through their negativity and easily sidestepped the snares they set for him. He shook his head at preposterous suggestions the league was over in September by saying to the reporter involved, ‘You like to call it early here. Nothing is decided this early in the season.’ He has since proved that to be the case. Celtic will no doubt have told him about how the media in this country works and not to put to much stock into what the so called ‘pundits’ say. The word ‘pundit’ comes from the Sanskrit word ‘pandit’ which in India means a wise man or teacher. Once he listens to the likes of Kris Boyd, he’ll understand that they’re not all wise.

Watching the improvement in the side since that loss at Livingston has been very encouraging. Celtic have now gone 30 league games without defeat and if Ange has made errors along the way, he acknowledges them and learns from them. He possibly does regret not using Kyogo through the middle in the match they lost 1-0 at Ibrox. Once Kyogo switched in the second half, Celtic could easily have snatched a draw. Odsonne Edouard looked disinterested that day as he awaited his move to England but the money his sale brought in, along with that received for Kris Ajer, was spent wisely by Postecoglou. His recruitment has been very successful when contrasted to that of recent seasons, which was at best patchy.

Postecoglou famously said after a loss in Europe, ‘there is no plan B, if plan A isn’t working, then we need to do plan A better!’ As the season progressed, it was obvious that his team was doing things better. They secured victories at Pittodrie, Easter Road, Tynecastle and Ibrox as they overcame a deficit which was seven points at one time to climb to the top of the league. Their 3-0 thrashing of Rangers at Celtic Park in February was perhaps the epitome of what Ange is trying to do. In the first half of that game, Celtic played the sort of fast, attacking football that simply swept their opponents away. It was display full of pace and movement and one which let Rangers know that their predicated stroll to the title wouldn’t be happening.

Yesterday’s 4-1 win all but completes a remarkable turn around this season and the plaudits for Celtic’s 52^nd championship win should be laid at the feet of Ange Postecoglou. This is a man who stepped off a plane last summer with little more than his suitcases and a head full of ideas about how the game should be played. He had no backroom staff of his own but this vastly experienced coach quickly assessed what needed to be done to revive Celtic after last season’s shambolic goings on. After making the worst start in a league campaign since 1998, Postecoglou organised and galvanised his side and made rapid progress with the much needed rebuild.

He has said that this is merely phase one of the reconstruction of Celtic. If that is the case then Celtic fans can rightly feel excited about what the future holds. The team will find itself in the Champions League in the autumn for the first time in a few years and much as it looks a daunting prospect for his new side, he’ll doubtless approach it with his usual confidence. This young team is inexperienced at that level and will need learn fast in the big boys’ playground but most fans will be happy if the club makes a good fist of it.

Celtic is on the up, Scottish football is on the up and there are some exciting times ahead. With Ange at the helm, we can be confident as we approach the future.  His mantra will be the same in the season ahead as it was this year…

“Just get it into your heads: we never stop. We never stop. We’ll stop at half-time and we’ll stop at the end of the game when we celebrate. But during the game, we don’t stop”

That’s the sort of boss I want in the dugout and the training pitch. Give this man the tools and he’ll do the job.