Last week, dozens of Irish national flags – 170 according to some of the people who claimed to have bought them and erected them – were removed by persons working for Cork City Council.
To compound matters, photographs of other people, not employees of the City Council it must be stressed, were circulated on social media which showed them erecting Palestinian flags at some of the same locations where the tricolours had been removed on the South Mall.
Photo: Anita Ward, X
I contacted Cork City Council to ask them “Under what City ordinance or regulation was the removal carried out?” and whether Councillors were “consulted about the removal or was the removal proposed by any members of the Council and if so was this discussed at any area committee meeting or full meeting of the Council?”
I also referred to the claims that “other flags appear to have been placed on some of the same lampposts,” and if “the council [will] be taking measures to remove those flags?”
In their response the Council stated that “Cork City Council arranged for the removal last week of more than 70 flags from public street lights which had been attached without permission.” The reason for this was that the “city council does not permit the attaching of any items to public street light poles, on health and safety grounds and to protect what is public infrastructure, unless previously approved by the city council ie: posters that comply with our postering protocol or election posters when elections have been called.”
The Council pointed out that “Section 19.1 of the Litter Pollution Act 1997 provides local authorities the power to remove unauthorised (erected without permission of the property owner) flags (or any other articles) from public places.”
With regard to whether the elected Councillors had been discussed or if the issue had been raised at any local committee or other meetings the Council told me that “Councillors were not consulted in advance about the work. Councillors are not usually consulted about routine operational matters like this.” That was confirmed by Councillors I contacted.
In relation to the claims by others that in some cases the tricolours had been almost immediately replaced by Palestinian flags I was told that “The city council will act in due course to remove any items attached without permission to public infrastructure.”
However, local people claim that those flags are still in situ so we must await to see how long “in due course” means.
The issue was briefly discussed at Monday’s full monthly meeting of Cork City Council. Northside Fianna Fáil Councillor, John Sheehan, asked the Council Executive Text of question from Cllr John Sheehan”To ask the Council Executive to outline the protocol for the flying of Flags of any kind on lamposts or Council owned property.” The response was basically the same as that provided to myself.
Independent Councillor Albert Deasy told Gript that he has no issues with the Council implementing litter regulations consistently but that “We need to ask why the Fly the Flag Movement exists in the first place. We as politicians need to recognise that people are alarmed that their world is changing but not for the better; that their identity is under threat; that their needs as citizens of this country are relegated to 2nd class. Poor and vulnerable people have to compete for housing, healthcare and education with an influx of even poorer people for basic services.
“So many Irish people feel that politicians are not representing their interests; that politicians keep talking down to them and labelling them; spending vast sums of money on International Protection – money citizens feel should be spent in addressing the needs of Irish people first and foremost.
After all, addressing the needs of Irish people first and foremost is what politicians are elected to do. When people see that they are failing them, people will put out a cry for help. Perhaps this is why people engage in this type of action but most politicians refuse to see that.”
There was a protest outside the Council meeting on Monday evening after which which local campaigner Derek Blighe said that it was disturbing that “the Irish government including local governments, can authorise the hanging of Palestinian, Ukrainian, Pakistani or any one of the many flavours of lgbt flag, but for some reason the Irish Tricolour is subject to removal and destruction at will, I believe this will be a line in the sand for many people.”
Green Party Councillor, Oliver Moran, told me that he was engaged with residents who are campaigning for lower speed limits and that the campaign “involved placing signs and posters on lampposts. These were eventually removed by city officials as well.”
Meanwhile, the people who placed the original flags have replaced many of them and intend to continue to do so. It will be interesting then to see if Cork City Council – which uniquely as far as I know – is intent on engaging in a low intensity ground war by continuing to remove flags and posters and whether the protocol is applied across the board.
One of the pleasures of travelling about the country at this time of year is to see the thousands of flags that festoon parts of cities, towns, villages and townlands as local clubs prepare for or celebrate county finals.
If other local authorities are going to follow Cork’s example perhaps this “triumphalism” and “marking of territory” – like the apparently provocative and ‘littering’ display of the national flag – may well become another totem to fall before diversity and fairness.