The following are the texts of the three memos prepared by a Department of Foreign Affairs official, Ms Dympna Hayes, following meetings earlier this year with Prof Mary McAleese and Ms Brid Rodgers:
Conversation with Brid Rodgers. Lurgan, 3 April, 1997
I called on Brid Rodgers at her home near Lurgan to go through the current six-monthly list of vacancies on public bodies. Elections
1. In the course of conversation Ms Rodgers inevitably raised the question of the forthcoming elections. She described her own constituency, Upper Bann, as unwinnable for a nationalist. When I pointed out that there is a large nationalist minority of in or around 40 per cent in Upper Bann she was dismissive of any possibility that a nationalist could ever win the seat. She added that neither does Sinn Fein take the seat very seriously; their candidate, Bernadette O'Hagan, who is now in her 70s, is not a high-profile candidate in the area.
2. The SDLP are clearly at a funding disadvantage in their campaigning vis-a-vis Sinn Fein, who allegedly have some £10 million available to them. Sinn Fein carry out frequent public opinion polls within the constituencies and so are much more in tune with the electorate than is the SDLP. Ms Rodgers predicts that if there is a tactical ceasefire before the election, Martin McGuinness will `shade it' in Mid Ulster. Likewise the Alliance vote could swing the balance in favour of Alban Maginness in North Belfast and win the seat. In general Ms Rodgers feels that their poor campaign to date, coupled with the weak calibre of many of their candidates and specifically the three candidates for the three Tyrone seats, augurs badly for the party.
Coverage of SDLP in the Irish News
3. Ms Rodgers is concerned with the poor coverage available to the SDLP in the Irish News of late. She put this down to the fact that the editor-in-chief of the Irish News, Mr Jim Fitzpatrick, has recently formed an unofficial alliance with Father Alex Reid [a Redemptorist priest in Clonard monastery] and Mary McAleese of QUB. Referring to this group as the `triumvirate', Ms Rodgers described their main object as promoting a new nationalist consensus which owes more to Sinn Fein than the SDLP. All three are in regular touch with the Sinn Fein leadership and are in reality pushing the Sinn Fein agenda.
4. By way of example that the Irish News has become more pro-Sinn Fein, Ms Rodgers referred to Joe Byrne's recent article on Sinn Fein abstention, which had included a reference to the fact that it is procedurally impossible for Sinn Fein to attend Westminster on an ad-hoc basis, i.e. whenever they see an opportunity for a publicity coup. However, when the Irish News published the article that particular reference was omitted.
SDLP `Women in Politics' Conference
5. Ms Rodgers said that the SDLP's recent `Women in Politics' conference in the Wellington Park Hotel in Belfast had received excellent press coverage and had done much to highlight the subject. The conference was organised in conjunction with the European Socialist Party and was attended by women from all of the political parties, including the unionists. The conference concentrated on the poor performance of women in the formal political system in Northern Ireland, which transcends community and sectarian boundaries. She said that there was a certain irony in her own party leadership's exhortation that there should be more women participating at the senior level in politics given the lack of status of women in the SDLP.
D. Hayes 8th April, 1997
c.c. Secretary O hUiginn
Joint Secretary
Counsellors, Anglo-Irish
Mr Bassett
Conversation with Professor Mary McAleese, QUB Belfast 28 January 1997 `Nationalist' Donation to QUB
1. Ms McAleese had just come from a meeting with the Executive Council of QUB when we met, and was highly critical of the sectarian nature of the council and of the university's staff and administration in general. She and one of her colleagues, David Moore, who is from Dublin, had managed to secure a very large donation from a nationalist source. The donor was anxious to know how the money will be spent and had asked Ms McAleese for a general indication before making a final commitment.
When Ms McAleese presented this matter to the council she was immediately accused of trying to set preconditions and told that, this being the case, the university would be better off without the donation in question. By the end of the meeting, having pointed out that the request for a general indication of how the money will be spent could not by any stretch of the imagination be equated with a precondition and that, if this donation is lost because of the council's attitude it will certainly have a negative effect on any future donations from nationalist sources, Ms McAleese feels that she may have carried the meeting. She also made the point that her own credibility in any future fund-raising capacity would be badly affected if the potential donor received a negative response from the university.
2. Ms McAleese is in no doubt but that the only reason for this reaction from the Executive Council is because of the source of the donation. Donors from a unionist background who express a general interest in where their contribution is being spent are never subjected to this kind of aggression. The irony of the situation is that now the majority of the students and 30 per cent of the staff are Roman Catholics. She did admit that, of the latter category, only a very small proportion are willing to `stick their necks out' when the need arises. Ms McAleese was disappointed by the FEC's decision to equate the five signs in the Irish language with the National Anthem and that therefore the `offending' signs should be taken down.
Vice-Chancellorship
3. While she has not yet made up her mind, Ms McAleese is unlikely to go forward for the position of Vice-Chancellor. The recent struggles within the Senate and the possibility of finding herself in a similar fracas were enough to put her off competing for the post in question. The candidate most likely to succeed is Vincent McBrierty, who is a physics lecturer in Trinity College Dublin. Mr McBrierty, who is also a nationalist from Ardoyne, is well known to her and is someone with whom she could work well. Ms McAleese's final decision on her candidature will depend on the question of balance, i.e. the symbolic value from showing that she has not been `put back in her box' versus the danger of this personal gesture being `politicised'. She is also conscious of the danger of splitting McBrierty's support among the six-person Senate selection committee.
Peace Process
4. Ms McAleese is in regular contact with both John Hume and Gerry Adams. She has recently tried to convince Mr Adams that his interpretation of Hume's Sunday Independent article is too narrow, particularly regarding the reference to Sinn Fein's policy of abstention. The fact that Mr Adams considers the article, which was drafted and published without any prior consultation, as a public insult to himself, is another factor mitigating [sic] against a more constructive approach to the issue. In any event, Mr Adams has recently said to Ms McAleese that there cannot be a ceasefire now. She also mentioned in passing that she presumed that Sir Patrick Mayhew's speech at a dinner in Limavady the previous night, when he said that the IRA will never be safe while the campaign of violence continued, is the British government's response to Sinn Fein's recent initiative.
Elections
5. On a personal level Ms McAleese has no interest in participating in the upcoming elections in `any shape or form' in the absence of an SDLP-Sinn Fein joint election platform. She expects that the elections will return the status-quo in terms of overall community representation. The most interesting angle will be the direction of the nationalist vote. Ms McAleese is of the view that Sinn Fein will gain a lot of ground from the SDLP. Most nationalists equate the SDLP with John Hume and John Hume is now firmly attached to the Hume-Adams process in the nationalist psyche. Now for the first time many middle-class voters, especially first generation middle-class nationalists like herself, will be able to countenance voting for Sinn Fein as continuing to support John Hume while, at the same time, landing a more direct swipe at the British government. She believes that the Major government, because of their dependence on the unionists, has actively set out to keep Sinn Fein out of the process and that they bear all the blame for the present impasse.
Composition of student population at QUB
6. The constant claim that QUB is being over-run by Southern students is certainly not true given that there is a cap of 700 in place. There are c.12,000 students in total so the 700 limit is quite restrictive. There are, of course, far more Southerners in Coleraine than in Queens. She confirmed the drain of Protestant students to England and particularly to Scotland - she has heard an estimate that up to 40 per cent of students in Dundee University are from Northern Ireland but would be surprised if the percentage is that high. This trend has been growing over the last two decades and we are probably facing a situation where all of the professions in Northern Ireland, and not just law, will be dominated by Catholics.
Dympna Hayes 31 January 1997
c.c. Secretary O hUiginn
Joint secretary
Counsellors A.I.
Meeting with Prof Mary McAleese QUB
I had dinner with Mary McAleese in Belfast. A number of points of interest arose in the course of a very general conversation.
Vice Chancellor at QUB
1. Ms McAleese is not surprised that the shortlist of Vice Chancellor at QUB has gone completely outside the local scene and excluded people like Vincent McBrierty of TCD: (while she insisted that she had never seriously rated her own chances it was quite obvious that she is disappointed at her own failure to make the shortlist). She will be happy enough if the Australian on the list (who she believes is named Fell), who is well respected, is successful. Whoever gets the job, her main hope is that the learning curve will be short, and that the decision to clear out all the `deadwood' at senior management will be taken sooner rather than later.
General Election
2. She was very pleased with Sinn Fein's performance in the general election and confident that they will perform even better in the local elections; she expects Mick Murphy, the Sinn Fein candidate in Rostrevor, her own constituency, to pick up a seat this time. The new Labour government had produced a great boost for Sinn Fein's election prospects by arranging the meeting between Sinn Fein and the NIO officials on the same day as the local elections. A lot of new voters in the nationalist community came out and voted for Sinn Fein in the general election (she did accept the point that a lot of those voters had also supported the SDLP even if that support didn't translate into seats).
Ms McAleese feels that a lot of the `new' Sinn Fein support has come from the young middle-aged and upwardly mobile nationalists rather than first-time voters, and that they see Sinn Fein as far more likely to deliver on the political front than the SDLP. She attributed the SDLP's failure to pick up either of the Mid Ulster or West Tyrone [seats] in part to their poor PR. The same tired old faces continue to front for the SDLP while Sinn Fein publicise a range of candidates who all look young and fresh by comparison.
3. She has not had much contact with Adams since the election although she returned from London last Monday evening on the same flight as Adams and McGuinness. Both of them were in great form and had thoroughly enjoyed their visit to Westminster! (A well-known and highly successful consultant from Touche Ross whom Ms McAleese had known for many years was seated beside her on the plane and proceeded to ignore her for the rest of the journey after hearing her exchange with the Sinn Fein leaders.) She is confident that there will be another IRA ceasefire in the near future and that this time Sinn Fein will agree to go into the talks only if they receive guarantees on the timing of their entry into and on the duration of the talks and on `decommissioning'. After the specified duration of the talks has passed and, in the strong likelihood that the talks will not produce an agreed outcome, the `torch' will go back to the two governments, who will propose a solution as set out in the Framework Document.
Mo Mowlam
4. She has met Mo Mowlam once or twice socially but could not say that she knows her. That said, Ms McAleese said that the number of people who are described and describe themselves as `key advisers' of the new Secretary of State are as numerous as chips of wood from the `true cross'; for example, Vincent Hanna, Quintin Oliver, Brendan O'Leary. In this regard she would be very happy if the rumour about Brendan O'Leary, who is currently Professor at the LSE, and whom she considers to be very bright, is true.
RTE Broadcasting into Northern Ireland
5. I asked Ms McAleese in her capacity as board member of Channel 4 if the issue of RTE broadcasts in Northern Ireland had ever been raised. She replied in the negative. She was unaware that there are any proposals to boost the RTE signal from Clermont Carn and said that she could not recall any instance where the subject of the availability of RTE in Northern Ireland, even on Cable TV, had ever been discussed formally or in the margins of Channel 4 board meetings.
D. Hayes 26 May 1997
c.c. Secretary O hUiginn
Joint Secretary
Counsellors A.I.