A chara, - There is incontrovertible evidence of an orchestrated campaign of opposition to the Report on Irish Traditional Music of the Oireachtas Committee on Heritage and Irish Language. This campaign was launched at an event which was in receipt of State grants.
The campaign organisers circulated what they termed a "bootleg" copy of the report which was overprinted with abusive language and extensive misinformation - all of which has since been exposed and discredited. The campaign organisers gave written instructions to "copy this leaflet and pass around".
Based on the abuse and misinformation, a meeting to orchestrate the campaign was promised and instructions given to "comment publicly and loudly in papers and pubs ... and lobby your TD and Senator." To the credit of many of those present at the event they resented this unseemly activity at a cultural event. They regarded it as unethical and distanced themselves from it.
Whether intentional or otherwise, if the campaign had succeeded the only casualty would have been the Oireachtas Committee's far-reaching supportive recommendations for Irish traditional arts. These all-inclusive recommendations, which were adopted unanimously by the all-party committee, were probably the greatest official acknowledgement of traditional arts ever in the history of the State. The recommendations responded to aspirations expressed over the years by those cultural visionaries who laboured without reward or recognition. Included in the recommendations were such issues as education, development, promotion at national and international levels, funding, cross-Border co-operation and tourism. - Yours, etc., Senator Labhras O Murchu,
Caiseal Mumhan, Co Thiobraid Arann.