The county Antrim town of Ballymena has witnessed two nights of serious rioting, with targeted attacks against immigrants and ethnic minorities. Immigrants were forced out of their homes. Terrified ethnic minorities have resorted to putting stickers on the front doors in a desperate bid to distinguish themselves and avoid being attacked.
Last night, rioters threw masonry and petrol bombs at the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI), who responded with plastic bullets and water cannons. Smaller racist gatherings took place elsewhere in the North.
Militant Left strongly condemns these appalling racist attacks and calls for the unity of working-class people in Ballymena against all attempts to foster division.
The violent disturbances began following reports of the arrest of two teenagers charged with alleged sexual assault on another teenager in the Ballymena area.
Militant Left condemns all sexual violence. Gender based violence is at crisis levels. Around 98% of women in the North report having experienced gender based violence in their lifetime. There has been an increase in reports of violence and harassment against women, record low prosecutions for rape, and huge backlogs of cases waiting to be heard in court. Cuts to legal aid and finance for women’s shelters, for example, have seen huge increases in violence against women in every setting.
A vigil by local people took place in Ballymena on Tuesday night, which was reportedly peaceful. It appears that a split off from the protest attacked the homes of Romanian people. Homes were burnt out and immigrants were moved out of the area by the police.
Anti immigrant sentiment whipped up
These horrendous events did not take place in a vacuum. Anti-immigrant and racist propaganda and agitation by far right and populist right groups and parties, including on social media, has undoubtedly played a part in these outrageous scenes. Moreover, sections of the right-wing media and politicians are increasingly cultivating anti-immigrant sentiment to divert attention away from the real causes of social and economic crisis afflicting working class communities. Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s recent speech, where he referred to people in the UK feeling like “strangers,” was clearly playing to populist right anti-immigrant sentiments.
Militant Left supporters in the trade unions in the North are calling for the trade union movement to intervene urgently into this dangerously escalating situation; for mass action to foster the unity of working-class people against racism and all forms of division.
We welcome the counter protest called for this evening, 11th June, in Magherafelt town, in Mid Ulster, against the provocations of the far right ‘concerned parents’.
While it is welcome that the Northern Irish Committee of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions issued a statement condemning the racist attacks on Ballymena, the text falls short of what is needed. The populist right and racists are scapegoating immigrants and ethnic minorities for the crisis in housing, health and infrastructure. Immigrants are falsely blamed for the bosses’ attacks on wages and conditions.
Nor can we rely on the state, as the NIC-ICTU statement implies, to counter racist attacks and the far right protests. The presence of the PSNI did not prevent Tuesday’s burning out of immigrant families in Ballymena. And the police and other state agencies in the North have a long history of repression and deep alienation from big sections of society. Trade unions, such as NIPSA, have been to forefront in organising counter protests against the far right in Belfast city centre in recent months, including organising stewarding.
Role of organised workers’ movement
The organised workers’ movement in the North must urge workers not to be split along racist or ethnic lines, just as workers courageously united against sectarianism dividing communities many times in the past. The Ballymena area has a proud tradition of workers coming together in shows of class solidarity across the sectarian divisions. Ballymena Trades Union Council played an important role a few years ago to cut across rising tensions following targeting and deliberate misinformation about local migrant workers by racists.
Militant Left’s predecessors in the area, the Ballymena Labour and Trade Union Group/Young Socialists and Militant newspaper supporters, played a key role in similar actions during the ‘Troubles’ when mass working class action was need in the workplaces and communities to stop a slide towards all out sectarian conflict. Such demonstrations of class unity are urgently needed again in Ballymena and wider afield!
The trade union movement must also call for massive investment in social housing, the health service (Northern Ireland has the longest NHS waiting lines in the UK), for local youth services in working class areas, properly funded education, and quality apprenticeships.
As we approach the annual ‘marching season’, sectarian tensions will inevitably worsen. In the absence of the workers’ movement putting its stamp on developments, there is a real danger of escalating racist and sectarian violence.
Militant Left stands for the mass action by the organised workers’ movement against all forms of poisonous division and for the socialist transformation of society. This would see the needs of the majority are met, not the greed of the billionaires, eradicating poverty and want, and all forms of racism, sectarianism and discrimination.