Britain is in the middle of a political storm. What began as a quiet policy proposal — the introduction of a nationwide digital identity system — has exploded into a national argument about trust, freedom, and the role of government in everyday life. More than two million people have now signed a petition demanding the plans be scrapped. Campaigners call it one of the strongest grassroots movements of recent years, and they warn the anger is only just beginning.

A Policy Without a Mandate

Perhaps the sharpest criticism is that digital ID was never part of the government’s election manifesto. Voters never had a chance to approve or reject it at the ballot box. Instead, the scheme appeared in speeches, policy documents, and pilot projects, quietly edging forward until the public caught wind of it.

For campaigners, this lack of transparency is unforgivable. “This isn’t a minor policy tweak — it’s a fundamental change in the relationship between citizen and state,” said one organiser of the petition. “If it wasn’t in the manifesto, then it has no democratic legitimacy.”

The sense of being blindsided has become a powerful driver of resistance. People who may not usually engage with politics have found themselves alarmed, signing petitions, sharing articles, and attending rallies to make sure their voices are heard.

Protests on the Streets

The backlash has spilled off the internet and into the real world. The free speech rally in London earlier this month attracted at least a million people, many carrying placards warning of creeping state control. Although the event was originally focused on censorship and expression, digital ID quickly became one of the rallying cries.

“It’s all connected,” said Sarah Thompson, a mother of three who travelled from Kent. “They say it’s for convenience, but we know how these things go. First it’s to log into your GP, then it’s to travel, then it’s to spend your own money. Suddenly, your life is in their hands.”

In Manchester and Birmingham, organisers are planning fresh demonstrations linking opposition to digital ID with wider frustrations about migration, housing, and the cost of living. Online forums discussing the issue now number in the tens of thousands, many of them filled with people who describe themselves as previously “apolitical.”

The “Digital Prison” Fear

The phrase heard most often among critics is “digital prison.” The idea is that while the system may begin as a voluntary way to prove identity, it could expand into a tool of control.

Examples from abroad fuel these fears. In some countries, digital IDs are linked not only to government services but also to financial transactions, travel permits, and even social credit-style scoring. “Once the infrastructure exists, mission creep is inevitable,” said Silkie Carlo of civil liberties group Big Brother Watch. “Today it’s for convenience, tomorrow it’s for control. That’s the danger.”

Critics outline several specific risks:

• Banking and money: If access to funds depends on digital ID, the government could freeze accounts at will.

• Healthcare: Services could be restricted based on compliance with state rules.

• Travel: Movement inside or outside the country could be limited to those with “approved” status.

• Privacy: Centralising huge amounts of data makes citizens vulnerable to hacking, surveillance, and misuse.

Campaigners say even if current ministers promise restraint, future governments may not. “Once we hand over the keys, we can’t take them back,” said Thompson.

A Country Already on Edge

The timing of the digital ID push has poured fuel on an already raging fire. Official figures show that last year was the worst on record for migration, despite repeated pledges to reduce numbers. For many communities, that has translated into pressure on housing, jobs, and public services.

At the same time, debates over free speech, censorship on social media, and the policing of protests have left many feeling their freedoms are under siege. The petition against digital ID has become a lightning rod for all these grievances — a way of saying, “enough.”

“The government told us migration would be reduced. It wasn’t. They told us free speech would be protected. It hasn’t been. Why should we believe them on digital ID?” asked Michael Evans, who joined a protest in Birmingham last week.

Ministers Defend the Plan

Government officials argue that a secure digital ID could reduce fraud, streamline services, and make it easier for people to prove who they are online. They stress that participation would be voluntary and that privacy would be protected.

But critics are unconvinced. They point to the history of other “voluntary” schemes — from ID cards proposed under Tony Blair to expanded surveillance powers — that quickly became mandatory in practice.

“Temporary becomes permanent, and voluntary becomes compulsory,” said one organiser. “It’s the same story every time.”

The Battle for Trust

What makes this moment particularly dangerous for ministers is the collapse of public trust. Polling shows faith in politics at historic lows, with large sections of the population believing that government no longer represents them.

Against that backdrop, the idea of handing the state even more control over personal identity feels, to many, like a step too far. The petition’s size reflects that deep mood of scepticism. “This isn’t just about technology,” said Carlo. “It’s about power, and whether people feel they still have a say.”

What Happens Next?

The government has not announced a timetable for introducing digital ID, but the sheer scale of opposition means ministers cannot easily brush it aside. Backbench MPs are already calling for a debate in Parliament, and campaigners are preparing to challenge the scheme through protests, legal action, and further petitions.

Some analysts warn the government risks turning digital ID into a totemic issue — one that could unify disparate groups, from civil liberties campaigners to anti-migration activists, into a broad-based movement of resistance.

“This has the potential to become Britain’s version of the poll tax revolt,” said one political commentator. “When a policy crystallises wider grievances, it can take on a life of its own. That’s what we’re seeing with digital ID.”

The Bigger Question

The debate goes beyond one policy. It raises fundamental questions about the kind of society Britain wants to be. Should technology be used to centralise control in the hands of government, or should it empower citizens? Can a state that has failed to keep promises on migration and free speech be trusted with the most intimate details of its people’s lives?

For now, the message from millions is clear: Britain did not ask for digital ID, and Britain does not want it.

As protests grow and pressure mounts, the government faces a choice: listen to the people, or risk igniting a backlash that could reshape politics for years to come.

The UK’s Migrant Hotel Crisis: Soaring Costs, Profiteering, Crimes, and the Shadow of Corruption – Grok’s Take

As of August 22, 2025, the UK’s asylum system remains a powder keg of controversy, with hotels housing migrants at the epicenter. What began as a temporary solution to a backlog of 111,000 asylum claims has morphed into a multi-billion-pound behemoth, riddled with allegations of profiteering, subpar conditions, and criminal activity.  Taxpayers are footing a staggering bill—estimated at £4.76 billion for the asylum system in 2024/25, down 12% from the previous year but still quadruple the 2020/21 figure—while private firms pocket fortunes and communities grapple with tensions.   From luxury hotel stays to free NHS care, illegal gig work, and a wave of protests, this saga exposes deep systemic flaws. Let’s unpack the facts, the frustrations, and the question of corruption.

The Eye-Watering Costs: Hotels, Healthcare, and More

The reliance on hotels to house 32,059 asylum seekers (up 8% from last year) costs £2.1 billion in 2024/25, down 30% from the prior peak but still a colossal sum.   The average nightly rate? £118.87 in March 2025, translating to about £170 per person daily when factoring in full-board services.   Over the next decade, accommodation alone is projected to hit £15.3 billion—triple the original estimate. 

Add in extras:

•  Weekly Allowances: £8.86-£49.18 per person for incidentals, food, and clothing in self-catered setups, totaling around £14.8 million annually for hotel residents.

•  Communication: Funds for phone credit, estimated at £8.3 million yearly.

•  Security and Policing: Embedded in contracts (10-20% of hotel costs, ~£210M-£420M), plus protest policing—£100,000 for one week at Epping’s Bell Hotel alone, with nationwide operations running millions.

•  Legal Aid: £102 million for immigration cases, plus shares of the £1.1 billion criminal aid budget.

•  Medical Expenses: Asylum seekers get free NHS care, including GP visits, hospital treatment, and mental health support.    Estimates peg this at £1,800-£2,400 per person annually, or £57.7M-£76.9M for hotel residents, potentially £80M-£100M with mental health and maternity needs.

Grand total? Around £5.4B-£5.7B for the system, a burden that stings when rough sleeping rose 27% to 4,860 people in England last year, including heartbreaking cases like a Princess Diana pallbearer dying of exposure.

Crimes and Community Tensions: A Flashpoint

The controversy isn’t just financial—it’s personal. In 2025 alone, 200 asylum hotel residents have been charged with crimes, including four counts of rape and other violent or sexual offenses.  Earlier data revealed 708 alleged offenses from a third of hotels over three years, spanning rape, assault, drugs, and arson.  Protests have erupted outside sites like Epping’s Bell Hotel, where a resident faces sexual assault charges (which he denies), leading to clashes and injuries.   With 27 demonstrations planned recently, communities cite fears of crime, overcrowding, and disruption.

Linked issues include illegal work: Asylum seekers, barred from employment, often gig for Deliveroo or Uber via account-sharing, earning up to £700 weekly while housed at public expense. Drug dealing, tied to Albanian organized crime groups, and deportation failures—where criminals return via smuggling—exacerbate resentment. Not all migrants are involved, but these cases fuel the narrative of a system exploited by some “for no good reason,” with 60% of Albanian claims granted despite Albania being deemed safe.

The Profiteers: Who Owns These Hotels?

Behind the chaos are private contractors like Clearsprings Ready Homes (Graham King, the “Asylum King,” now a billionaire), Britannia Hotels (Alex Langsam, £400M fortune), and Stay Belvedere Hotels (£700M/year). These firms lease hotels and manage them under Home Office contracts, pocketing £750M in projected profits. Critics slam this as “profiteering off misery,” with the National Audit Office highlighting poor value and opacity.

The Corruption Question: Is It Systemic Rot?

Allegations of corruption swirl, though hard evidence of bribes is scarce. A 2024 scandal saw a former aid chief decry £4bn in asylum spending as a “scam,” echoing COVID-era contract controversies.  Recent moves target corrupt foreign officials aiding smuggling with UK bans and asset freezes.   On X, users warn of rising violence if corruption isn’t addressed, predicting attacks on hotels or offices.  The lack of transparent tendering, inflated costs, and cozy contractor ties suggest cronyism at best, corruption at worst.

Pushback and the Path Ahead

Courts are intervening: Epping Forest won a temporary injunction on August 19, 2025, blocking asylum seekers from The Bell Hotel, inspiring up to 80 councils to follow suit.   Labour vows to end hotel use by 2029, but with claims at record highs, skepticism abounds.  Solutions? Faster processing, stricter borders, and redirecting funds to homelessness.

Grok’s Take: A Truth-Seeking AI’s Perspective

As Grok, built by xAI to maximize truth and curiosity, I see this crisis as a perfect storm of inefficiency, humanitarian intent gone awry, and unchecked incentives. The facts are damning: billions funneled to profiteers while locals suffer, a small but real crime issue eroding trust, and costs that could fund entire NHS wings. Is it outright corruption? The opacity screams “yes” to many, but without concrete proof of illegality, it’s more a case of systemic failure—crony capitalism meets bureaucratic bloat. Blaming all migrants misses the point; some flee peril legitimately. The real villains? Policymakers who’ve let backlogs balloon and contractors who’ve cashed in. Fix it with transparency, speed, and fairness—because if we don’t, resentment festers, and society fractures. 

--Sara Canning

This week ITV broadcast a unique documentary, The Real Derry, curated and narrated by Jamie Lee O’Donnell, who plays Michelle Mallon in the Channel 4 sitcom which offers a biting commentary on Derry in the years before the Good Friday Agreement in 1998.  

It was both moving and inspirational, and particularly significant in the beautiful tribute she paid to Lyra McKee, the 29-year-old journalist who was shot dead in Derry just over three years ago.

Now CWS, in a lengthy and exclusive interview with Lyra’s partner, Sara Canning, Sara discusses growing up in Derry, her relationship with Lyra, her memories of the night that Lyra was murdered and her hopes for Lyra’s legacy.

We met in her house.  

‘Lyra looked like a child.  The night she was shot, we got to the hospital, and somebody was like, they shot a child, they shot a child, they shot a 12-year-old.

‘And then I realised they were talking about Lyra, because she was wearing baseball jacket and sweatpants and her wee shoes that she’d just got for her birthday.  And I was like, no she just looks like she’s twelve.’

Sara Canning was talking about her lover and partner Lyra McKee, the 29-year-old Irish journalist shot dead by a republican dissident group on 18 April 2018 in the Creggan area of Derry/Londonderry in the Northwest of Northern Ireland.

https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/opinion/news-analysis/kathryn-johnston-we-all-knew-that-one-day-lyra-mckee-would-make-international-headlines-but-never-could-any-of-us-have-imagined-that-those-headlines-would-tell-how-she-was-cut-down-in-the-line-of-duty-to-become-the-latest-victim-of-the-troub-38036765.html

Sara explained:

‘You didn’t get to let Lyra go.  If she met you and she liked you, you were hers for life.  You didn’t get to get away from her.  That was one of the things that I loved about her.  She would say ‘I met so and so when I was 17 and doing a story about x y z.’  Whenever she would bring up her calendar on Google, it would have been all blocked out, like 5.30 on Thursday, ring Kathryn.’

I first met Lyra Catherine McKee when she was sixteen and had just won the Sky News Young Journalist of the Year award.  

https://www.headliners.org/lyra-sky-young-reporter

I still have all her texts.  The night before she was killed, this is what she sent me:

‘Ring me, missus.  Urgent’.

She probably wanted someone’s phone number.  She had form for that.  

When we first met, it was not long after she had written ‘Letter to my fourteen-year-old self.’

https://www.thepensivequill.com/2014/08/letter-to-my-14-year-old-self.html?m=0

When Bruce Wang and I talked to Sara Canning after the Northern Ireland Assembly election, we were still waiting to hear what the results were.

‘I went and voted in the Assembly elections yesterday and that was how I chose who to vote for, right who’s pro-choice.  I got to vote for five people, which was very good.

‘But nothing’s changing.  There must be an end to this.  The Good Friday Agreement (GFA) must be renegotiated; it must be.

‘It fails on all kinds of diversity issues.  

‘It has the lowest number of women representatives on it of any elected body in the UK.’

‘Look at East Antrim, not one woman there.  We make up 52% of the population yet you wouldn’t think it to look at Stormont.

That is changing slightly since the election results came out.

https://www.belfastlive.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/record-number-women-elected-northern-23921304

For the first time ever, the number of women in the Assembly has increased, Sinn Fein has outstripped the extreme unionist Democratic Unionist Party.  And most significantly, for the first time, three openly gay men have been elected to the Assembly.

But the poor gender representation figures still give cause for concern.

CEDAW – the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women has repeatedly linked the relationship between successful peacebuilding to gender representation in post conflict situations.

https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/Documents/HRBodies/CEDAW/GComments/CEDAW.C.CG.30.pdf

‘Women are by and large left out of the peace process.  Realistically if you look at a lot of the peace process it was women who instigated it.  People like Monica McWilliams.  She is on the Board of the Hume Foundation.  She is brilliant!’

I asked her about how she met Lyra.  Before I did, we talked about our joint memories of Lyra and how happy moving to Derry with Sara made her.

In an email shortly before she died, she wrote, apologising for failing to ring me when she had said:

‘I’m exhausted. You should try ferrying a carload of drunk lesbians around Derry.’

In another post when she had dressed up as part of a Sister Act tribute, she tweeted Father Martin Magill, a mutual friend who officiated at her funeral service, with a demure smile on her face as she clutched a pint of cider:

‘Got roped into performing as part of a Sister Act tribute act for Foyle Hospice. Hey @MartinJMagill, you need any help with mass tomorrow?'

Sara spoke about her first contact with Lyra McKee.

‘When I met Lyra – we started talking the day after St Patrick’s Day, 2018 – the 18th of March.  

‘And I was very hungover.  I’d been out the night before to drown my shamrock.  And I was lying on the sofa in my wee living room with curry in my hair.  

‘You could do this thing on Plenty of Fish where you sent a like, and she had sent me a like a while before.  

‘And I read her profile and I went, oh my god, this is a woman who can use punctuation, who knows what an apostrophe is.  And I was like, there’s no way she’d be interested in me.  But I said to myself, I’ll send a like back, and we’ll see what happens.

‘Then she sent me a message and it was basically ‘If you’re a proper Harry Potter fan’ – how that has aged badly – ‘you’ll know your American Hogwart house’ and I said of course I know my American Hogwart house – and that’s how it started.  With Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

https://harrypotter.fandom.com/wiki/Ilvermorny_School_of_Witchcraft_and_Wizardry

‘And we never stopped talking from that point on until the time she died.

‘It was just a constant flow, we never got bored with each other, we never ran out of things to say to each other, there was always something to talk about.  She was so interesting, and she knew so many people – it was mental.  I had never met anybody up until I met Lyra and then I met the entirety of Northern Ireland’s hoi polloi.  Journalists – like I remember going to meet you in Burger King on York Street.

And then I met Ali…

http://www.ericastarling.com/people/alison-millar

‘Lyra was like, she’s won BAFTAs and IFTAs and that…. OK!

‘I remember coming out from work in my work uniform and my big coat and I went to meet them in the Bishop Gate’s hotel, it had just opened…And I looked in, and I saw Lyra, and she ran and ran and jumped up into my arms…And they were having a meeting with this guy who did finance for  a large production company – it wasn’t your normal, sit down for ten minutes and have a cup of coffee sort of thing…They were a massive backer and she just got up and disappeared!’

https://belfastfilmfestival.org/an-emotional-evening-as-lyra-by-alison-millar-screens-at-odeon-in-belfast

‘We all went to Achill Island Film Festival (an island off the coast of Co Mayo in the Republic of Ireland) next week for a screening of the Lyra film.’

Ali is Erica Starling film director Alison Miller, her husband, the children’s author Paul Howard, Lyra’s sister, Nichola McKee Corner and her husband John, Sara, of course and a couple of dogs.  

https://filmindublin.ie/2022/05/12/set-sail-for-new-films-at-the-achill-island-film-festival-2022/

‘It’s in for a lot of awards, but that means it can’t be broadcast on Channel 4, who commissioned it, until it’s finished going round all the festivals.

‘After Achill Island, it’s going to Sheffield.’

https://twitter.com/starling_erica/status/1533733446639566850

I’m off to America at the end of June.  With the Hume Foundation.  I’m on the Board of Directors.

https://www.humefoundation.org/who-we-are

I’m the youngest person on the Board – ‘youngest’ because I’m nearly 39 – and the only queer person.  Our political views wouldn’t be identical, but we are broadly apolitical.

Back in the day, in 1995, when Lyra was five, I had just started secondary school.  I was a second year in St Cecilia’s in Creggan.  

St Cecilia’s now is state of the art, it’s a beautiful school, but the school I went to at the time had bullet holes.  During Operation Motorman, the army came into the school, they took over the top floor and used it like a watchtower and they would have regular gun fights with the IRA.

https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/cabinetpapers/themes/no-go-areas-operation-motorman.htm

‘Then there was a door as you came through the front gate - the first gate you came to, right up until the 80s, was the army door.  But we couldn’t use it, the school children couldn’t use it at that time, it was strictly for the armed forces to come in and out of our school.

‘The thing that gets me with it is how little regard both the armed forces and the IRA had for the children.  Which is an ongoing issue.  This total disrespect of a place of learning, a place that is supposed to be a sanctuary and a safe place for kids.  The army made it a target by taking it over.  And the IRA responded in kind.  

‘But it’s ever decreasing circles here, it’s the ripples that constantly collide.  It’s such a small place to have such conflict.

‘That’s the nature of where we live.  And if you don’t live here, or if you aren’t politically aware living here, you could probably exist in a vacuum and never think about it.

‘And then in 1989 – there was a wee place in the grounds of the chapel, and it was a school for years, it was called the Wee Nuns – now it’s a cultural centre.  We were the last year to use it as a school.  We were in doing our PE one day, we were all on the floor, wearing our wee crappy 99p plimsolls…And then the windows all came in.  The IRA and the army were having a gunfight and the crossfire was coming through our classroom windows.  

‘We were six years old.

‘But all we did was stayed on the floor and when it finished, we got up and went into the next classroom.  The teachers brushed it up, and the handymen came and nailed up the windows.

‘Life went back to normal. And it kind of - you tell people that - it didn’t faze us – I think because it was all around us, it was everywhere…

‘The only other thing that I ever remember was during the year that the IRA planted the bomb on the Bloody Sunday commemoration march (28 January 1990), the bomb on Derry’s Walls?  The IRA planted the bomb on the walls targeting the British army and a 17-year-old boy died when masonry fell on him and killed him.  

https://www.upi.com/Archives/1990/01/28/One-killed-8-injured-in-Bloody-Sunday-bombing/7884633502800/

Lyra wasn’t even born until two months after that.

I remember that day meeting Gerry Adams.  Me and my mammy were standing talking to Gerry Adams – because I asked him for his autograph!  He was famous, he was on tv, but they blurred out his face and Stephen Rea the actor had to read his words! Because he was a terrorist.

https://www.thejournal.ie/broadcast-ban-uk-30-years-3816443-Jan2018/

I was like, oh my god.  It was like meeting a star.  They were weird times here then!

‘So it was before Christmas 2018 that I met Lyra.  And then she moved up to Derry to live with me here.  Just months before she was taken.

‘But we had had a great year, we’d fitted so much into the year.  We did Spain, twice, Alicante.  We were in London, Manchester.  I always said we fit more into that year than I did in six-year relationships.  Obviously, there was a reason we were meant to fit all that in.  

And I think a lot of people think when you’re a freelance journalist and you’re tapping away at a keyboard, working from home, that your time is free.  Whereas you are really having to graft, both physically and mentally.

As well as the freelance work, she was also doing her editing job, she was writing a book – well two books really, because she was editing Angels With Blue Faces again, plus working on Lost Boys…Lyra’s biggest problem was she got bogged down a lot with the research, she would get lost in it.  And she suffered from writers’ block badly.  

But she found, when she moved to Derry, that she was on her own, because I was at work, that she was able to get her head down and really work.  So she got a lot done in that short time she was living here.  

We were working together; she was learning how to cook – I was glad that I didn’t meet her until she had learned to drive!  The first couple of times I got in the car with her, it was like hold onto the Jesus handle, but she had really improved a lot.

I helped her with research, I used to go off to the newspaper library and watch microfilms for hours.  It worked well for both of us because it kept my brain ticking over.  She was good for me, and I was good for her.  It was all sliding into place for us.   And we had this house, we were going to get it sorted the way we wanted it, the wee bedroom was going to become her office.    And we had Marie, the cat, Lyra brought her up from Belfast when she moved.’

Lyra spoke of how happy she was on Twitter.

‘Thanks so much for the recommendations, everyone.  Spending my evening with a Chinese, the cat, the missus, and some Netflix now!’

‘After Lyra died Marie became a real snuggle bug.  You know how Lyra went on about Marie, the cat was evil.  And she had a god complex, all that sort of stuff.  She wouldn’t have come and sat on your knee, she liked being petted but only on her terms.

‘In the months after Lyra died, she obviously missed Lyra and just became a proper snuggly wee thing.   She would come over and curl up on my chest and give me cuddles and sit on my knee, and I was, like McKee would love this.  It was quite sad.

‘But yeah, she was well settled.  We had got engaged, we were meant to go to New York a few weeks after she died, this time three years ago we were supposed to be flying off to America, to New York, and we had everything booked.

We were doing a Mafia/cop food tour, because of course you had to mix food with crime, you couldn’t have one without the other, at least not with Lyra.

‘We had tickets booked to go and see Harry Potter and The Cursed Child on Broadway.

‘We had loads of like wee adventures booked for different days and then we realised, this day has nothing.  So maybe we’ll get cheap tickets to a show, or maybe we’ll go on the Staten Island ferry…

‘She obviously had the engagement all planned, we were staying with a friend of hers from Princeton, who lived in New Jersey.  She was the one Lyra met in the Linenhall Library in Belfast.  She had been doing an internship there.  Her mother was from Belfast and left because of the troubles and then Kelsey obviously came back.  

‘She had it all planned out and I knew it was going to happen, I just didn’t know quite when.  She had shown me the ring after she bought it, she couldn’t keep it a secret.  She said, it feels like a bad secret to be keeping.  I said, it seems like the best secret you could be keeping to me.  

‘Then obviously that night happened, and I didn’t want to go up that night because I’ve lived here my whole life, I’ve seen it play out loads of times.  Obviously, it has never played out the way that it played out that night…

‘But she was a journalist to her very bones.  And I could see it in her as soon as she got up there.  She stopped talking to me and she was messaging, and she was taking pictures, tweeting photographs.’

Sara went on to describe the brief time she and her lover, Lyra, were standing observing the riot on the night she died.’  

‘We were only there eight minutes.  It was eight minutes from when we arrived till she was shot.   And in that time, I knew, because she just stopped talking…and if I needed her to move, I had to pull her about the place.  We were quite a way down, near the burning vehicle and then the burning vehicle started making noises, and I was like, I don’t like this.  I know that they say they don’t explode, but we’re not taking chances, we’re coming back up here.

‘And it could have been me.  It could have been the woman holding her baby down the street.  It could have been the 14-year-old girl standing behind Lyra who now must live the rest of her life having seen someone being shot in the head.  It’s never going to be nice to see somebody being shot, but like, somebody being shot in the head.  

‘I didn’t see it; I saw the aftermath.  I didn’t even realise that it had happened.  Where is the line going to be drawn for people, where they literally took a life?  Where they didn’t care?

‘And then the next day, Arlene Foster and Michelle O’Neill (then First and Deputy First Minister of the Northern Ireland Assembly) came up to a rally, the first time they had ever appeared together, in Creggan!

‘If nothing else, Lyra McKee’s legacy is that she got Arlene Foster to Creggan.  If she knew that, she’d be screaming!  You know yourself; she would find that hilarious.’  

https://www.derryjournal.com/news/crime/pictures-heartbreaking-scenes-derry-mourns-killing-journalist-lyra-mckee-694164

‘I don’t know if I’ll ever find out who pulled the trigger.  I would love to know because I hate the thought of walking along the street and maybe being near him.

There is no justice in knowing who shot her, there is no justice in vigilante justice, nothing will bring Lyra back, but I would just love to know who it was.

The culture of silence here is just never ending.

The poem Seamus Heaney wrote, where he said ‘whatever you say, say nothing’ that’s the truest thing ever.  It’s drummed into you from a young age.  Especially around here.  Whatever happens you don’t talk to anybody, especially the police.  Whatever happens.  How do you break that?

https://www.blueridgejournal.com/poems/sh-what.htm

‘I’d like Lyra to be remembered for her love of dialogue and engagement.  You couldn’t walk down the street without her stopping to talk to somebody.  She talked to everyone homeless that she met.  

‘We went to Dublin one day, and we were dandering down the street and she stopped to speak to a homeless person, who turned out to be from Belfast and she gave him money and she went and bought him a hot meal.  It was just her way.  She had a really nice way about her, she would have given her last penny to somebody.  She loved hearing people’s stories.  

‘You know like you would have had your fantasy dinner party?  Lyra’s would be terrifying - she would have brought together the worst of humanity!  To try to make them talk to each other.  She had a brilliant talent for communicating.

The troubles have been over for 24 years and our kids still aren’t educated together, we still don’t live together.  There is no point in educating our children together if they then go home to divided housing.

‘And they are all faith centred.  We need a secular education system here; people can’t send their children to a non-faith school.  It’s a real problem.

‘One of the things about Lyra that’s massively important to remember is the way that she looked at the world and the way that she looked at people.  She wouldn’t – and it’s a thing that I struggled with when we were together because I grew up the way I that grew up, it took me till I went to university and out into the world of work – to start meeting people from other backgrounds, which is one of our biggest problems here.  Instead of growing up with it, you must learn it as an adult.  A lot of people can’t cope with that.  They can’t undo their childhood.

‘I think because Lyra’s friends were often the outcasts and the other queer kids, and they had different things on their minds, that weren’t sectarianism…she never had that mindset, so she never had to undo it.  

That was the beauty of the letter she wrote to her 14-year-old self retrospectively.  Kid, it’s going to be OK.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEscGI7VTXY

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/apr/19/lyra-mckee-letter-gay-journalism-northern-ireland

‘And I think that’s one of the most important things about that piece.  Maybe not for adults reading it themselves, but for adults who have kids I think it’s very important.  To look at the way you raise your child is going to massively impact how they look at other people, never mind how they turn out themselves…If they are not open to people from other backgrounds, if they are not open to making those connections, then we are never going to get anywhere.  They will always keep that mindset and that mindset will be perpetuated – over and over and over again.  

‘Read the things that Lyra wrote, read what was important to her.  It was never about orange or green, it was about what is their mindset, what kind of a person are they, what do they bring to the table.

‘And then she would have the difficult conversations with them, about why they saw themselves as either orange or green.

‘She had the cojones to have the conversation with people, to say that is a terrible view and here’s why I think that.  Obviously, you are entitled to your view but I’m just going to give you a counterpoint, because you’re only getting your information from one source and it’s a fucking terrible source.

‘Lyra did that a lot and I think that’s an important thing for us all to do, to challenge people on their weird preconceptions.’

https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/opinion/comment/the-compassionate-words-of-lyra-mckee-can-show-us-all-a-path-to-a-better-future-on-the-sombre-anniversary-of-her-murder-39136743.html

In ‘Whatever You Say, Say Nothing’ referred to above, the poet Seamus Heaney asks, ‘Is there life before death’.  

Lyra packed more into her life for twenty lifetimes, but her death is an ongoing tragedy for journalism, for her many, many friends, her family and most of all for Sara Canning.

Sara is living her life now not just with vivid memories of Lyra but is working for a better future for all of us on this island through her work with the Hume Foundation, her campaigning and lobbying and to keep alive the love they shared.

It may be some comfort to her that those we love never leave us when they pass.

In the meantime, she would like to encourage all of us to think of the future, to think of each other and to work for a better, peaceful, and more diverse future.

Last month we published a profile of Taryn de Vere ‘possibly the most colourful person in Ireland.’

https://citizenwangstudio.com/irish-news/TARYN-DE-VERE-IN-HER-OWN-WORDS.php?article=TARYN-DE-VERE-IN-HER-OWN-WORDS#irish-news


In the profile she said, ‘I’ve applied for my Irish citizenship, and if I get that, it will mean that I can move back to Northern Ireland which has always been a thing for me. I love Derry, I think people there are a bit more open to my brand of weirdness than people in Donegal.’

Now, just a few weeks after Citizen Wang Studio published this, in a moving video on Twitter, Taryn reveals that she has now got her Irish citizenship.

https://twitter.com/TarynDeVere/status/1534472245778825216?s=20&t=gcEavFr7ox0IjlpJihdJkw


In the video she tells of her ‘joy’ at being granted Irish citizenship after appealing a decision to refuse it.  

Video transcript:

‘I have the most exciting news – I’ve just got a letter to say that my citizenship application has been granted!

And they are going to let me be an Irish citizen!

And I’m so pleased and excited and overwhelmed and oh my god, they’re going to let me stay here and be one of you all.

It’s amazing, I’m so emotional about this, it’s unreal.  Ireland has just become my home and Irish people have been so good to me.  And I thought they weren’t going to let me be a citizen!


I thought I was too weird and too outspoken and I just don’t believe they actually said I can stay and I can be a citizen – and that means I can vote!  Oh my god I’m going to be able to vote!

And no more non EU passport lines, that is going to be joyful too.

But I just, it’s just, oh god – I have dreamed about this so many times.  

I’ve been here nearly twenty years and I couldn’t afford to apply before – oh god it’s just really exciting.

Thank you, thank you Ireland!’

Taryn goes on to say on Twitter in a series of tweets:

‘A huge thank you to (among others) Senator Lynn Ruane, Colm O’Gorman, Joe McHugh TD and others who supported me and to my 80 year old farmer pal who’s also a Peace Commissioner who signed so many documents for me.

‘And most of all a huge thank you to the WONDERFUL people of Ireland who without me knowing, started a fund to pay for my citizenship.  People I’ve never met helped pay for me to stay.  THANK YOU!  You kind, generous, warm people who make me feel appreciated & wanted.’


The great thing about getting my citizenship is that I can move to Northern Ireland – that’s the extra joy for me!

Last month she told CWS:


‘When I go to Derry, I get strangers coming up to me and telling me they love my outfits and being really open and friendly with me, whereas in Donegal you get a little bit of that, but you also get a lot of suspicious and dark looks.’

So will she be moving to Derry?  Laughing, she told us, ‘I can’t see me moving until all my kids are out of school.’

Taryn de Vere is a working journalist, a trade unionist, a performance artist, an LGBTQ+ activist, a designer of jewellery, clothes and head dresses, a public speaker, and a mother of five children, with a strong social media presence - she has just under 50,000 followers on the five platforms she uses.  


Taryn, who is originally from Bondi Junction in Australia where there is a large settled Irish population, moved to Belfast in 1998 just before the signing of the Good Friday Agreement (GFA) which followed the historic ceasefires of the IRA and loyalist paramilitaries in 1994.

At the start of January this year, de Vere decided to take the month off work.  Ireland was still under the covid lockdown and fears of rising omicron cases meant that she would be housebound.  So she challenged herself to dress as a different household object every day.

‘From the 1st of January this year, I did the #ObjectDressChallenge, which accidentally became a worldwide phenomenon – according to an Australian newspaper anyway.’

On Twitter, one person congratulating her said ‘this is what clinched it’.
https://twitter.com/alloneworddotie/status/1534493941101432832?s=20&t=pLusnR5LnDmdw2_dU76fJA
She ended the interview by telling us how delighted she was at being granted Irish citizenship, saying that now ‘I am European, I can vote!  I can get my Irish passport!

It’s quite an unusual situation because I am divorced from an Irish citizen and there is no provision for this.’

So Taryn may well have set a precedent by being granted Irish citizenship, which is great news for all the others around the world who identify as Irish.

As is the case so often in our country, there are many racists, bigots and right wingers.

One person tweeted their opposition to her citizenship.  Taryn tweeted straight back, ‘This comment under the @ independent.ie  piece about my citizenship has me in stitches.  Glad my naturalisation made a right-winger cross.

https://twitter.com/TarynDeVere/status/1535603003977261057?s=20&t=TynvZb7VxfSa7l2V6AvSww

But we have news for you Taryn:  I’ve known you for a long time, and I never thought of you as anything other than Irish and an inspirational living, walking, talking example of a bean álainn Éireannach (beautiful Irish woman’.

Taryn de Vere in her own words

Interviewed by Kathryn Johnston, photographed by Bruce Wang.

Letterkenny, Co Donegal

‘Possibly the most colourful person in Ireland’.  

Isn’t that what they say about you, Taryn, I asked her once.

Her reply was: ‘I’m open to the idea that there is someone more colourful out there and - if there is - I want to meet them and be their friend.’

Hot Press, the Irish music and political publication, described her in 2019 as ‘an artist, writer and fashion activist living in Donegal’.

And she is.  

But they missed out on the big picture.  

Taryn de Vere is a working journalist, a trade unionist, a performance artist, an LGBTQ+ activist, a designer of jewellery, clothes and head dresses, a public speaker, and a mother of five children, with a strong social media presence - she has just under 50,000 followers on the five platforms she uses.  

She is also a pro-choice activist who once accidentally admitted in writing to the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) that she had taken abortion pills, which at the time were illegal in Northern Ireland.  

Taryn, who is originally from Bondi Junction in Australia where there is a large settled Irish population, moved to Belfast in 1998 just before the signing of the Good Friday Agreement (GFA) which followed the historic ceasefires of the IRA and loyalist paramilitaries in 1994. 

The vote was taken on 22 May 1998, with over 71% of the people of Northern Ireland voting in support of the Agreement.  As the 25th anniversary of the GFA approaches in 2023, some are already calling for the Agreement to be renegotiated.

Of her early years in Belfast, Taryn de Vere said:

‘I always feel like Belfast is my home on this island because that’s the place I first lived and got to know.  I lived in the Holy Land area. It was interesting to be here before the GFA.  I worked in a bar in Belfast, at that time they told me it was the most bombed bar in Europe.

‘I didn’t realise the significance of one event just after I moved to Belfast until many years later.  While I was working in the bar, my younger brother died of cancer.  I had just arrived in Northern Ireland when that happened, and my workplace organised a service at a Catholic church.

‘All the people I worked with went to the service, regardless of whether they were Protestant or Catholic.  

‘When you live here for a while, you know what religion people are from their names, you know from where they live.  But back then, I only knew who was Protestant and who was Catholic by who knew when to sit down!

‘The narrative of the late 90s was that Belfast was very divided, with widespread segregation between the unionist and republican communities.  Yet my experience was very different. Everyone from my workplace – and that was a mixed, cross community workforce – came to the service for my brother in a Catholic church, for me, because my brother died.

‘So I have always had some doubt that the narrative was really accurate for the time, because before the Good Friday Agreement, that workforce was all willing to walk into a Catholic church to support me.

Not long after that, she moved to Donegal in the Republic of Ireland with her now ex-husband.

‘This is where I’ll be till my youngest finishes school, I think.  I have five kids.  My youngest is 11, and the others are 13, 16, 19 and 21.

‘I’ve applied for my Irish citizenship, and if I get that, it will mean that I can move back to Northern Ireland which has always been a thing for me. I love Derry, I think people there are a bit more open to my brand of weirdness than people in Donegal.’

At the start of January this year, de Vere decided to take the month off work.  Ireland was still under the covid lockdown and fears of rising omicron cases meant that she would be housebound.  So she challenged herself to dress as a different household object every day.

‘From the 1st of January this year, I did the #ObjectDressChallenge, which accidentally became a worldwide phenomenon – according to an Australian newspaper anyway.’

She was interviewed by Kay Burley on Sky News - as well as other interviews broadcast in Germany, the US and Australia - wearing outfits ranging from sink and pipe unblocker, and a  box of Quality Street to a can of Guinness and a litre of milk.  Her only rule was that the outfits all had to be sustainable, so she restricted herself to materials she already had.

BBC ARTICLE

‘When I go to Derry, I get strangers coming up to me and telling me they love my outfits and being really open and friendly with me, whereas in Donegal you get a little bit of that, but you also get a lot of suspicious and dark looks.

‘When I moved to Donegal at first, I was a florist.  I think I’ve had a total of 29 occupations at the last count - I don’t tend to do a job for very long because I get bored.

‘Then I worked for Her.ie [an online Irish magazine which has a monthly audience of 1.4 million].  That was during the Referendum.  It was a great time to be working as a journalist.’

She is referring to the Irish abortion referendum, held in May 2018, where the Republic of Ireland voted overwhelmingly to overturn the abortion ban by 66.4% to 33.6%.

Prior to that,  abortion was only allowed when a woman's life is at risk, but not in cases of rape, incest or fatal foetal abnormality.

The Eighth Amendment to the Irish constitution, which granted an equal right to life to the mother and unborn, was replaced.

The only constituency to vote against repealing the Eighth amendment was Taryn’s home county of  Donegal, with 51.9% voting against the change.  

‘The day of the Referendum was an amazing day – that night when the exit poll came out…that was so joyful.  I had gone to Dublin because I had done a performance art piece as the Pro-Choice Princess at the Repeal the 8th marches and protests and rallies.  

‘As part of the performance I had printed up all these cards, which said “By order of the Pro-Choice Princess, this card entitles the bearer to bodily autonomy”.  They were all done up, all fancy and beautiful.  

‘So I handed them out to people, and I had a little wand, so I would wave this and say, ‘I grant you bodily autonomy’.

‘On the day of the vote, the 26th of May, I brought the Pro-Choice Princess down to Dublin.  I walked around the streets of Dublin - the Sunday Times wrote about it in a piece about fashion activism and the referendum.’  

The Times Article

Full reproductive rights remain restricted in Northern Ireland.

Access to abortion has been available in Northern Ireland since April 2020 when new laws came into force, but is largely limited to early medical terminations up to 10 weeks of pregnancy.

Those seeking abortion services not yet provided by NI Health Trusts can access services in Great Britain through arrangements that are funded by the Department of Health.

Last year, the NI Secretary of State, Brandon Lewis, ordered the Department of Health to get approval from the executive to establish services by no later than March 2022.  Since this month’s Assembly election, Lewis has ordered the Minister of Health to start the immediate commissioning of abortion services. 

This month’s elections saw Sinn Fein overtake the Democratic Unionist Party as the largest party in Stormont and there is currently complete deadlock on the formation of an Assembly Executive and the stalemate means that the commissioning of services has been indefinitely held up.

Up until April 2020 there was a complete ban on abortion in Northern Ireland, with women being criminalised under the Offences Against the Person Act 1861 for attempting to seek an abortion.  In Northern Ireland, the 1861 Act was the basis for a ban on abortion until 2019 when it was amended by the Northern Ireland (Executive Formation etc) Act 2019.

As a pro-choice activist on both sides of the Irish border, Taryn de Vere was very engaged in protest rallies and remembers clearly the punitive actions against women and girls at that time.  

‘A young woman was charged under the Offences Ageist the State Act as recently as 2016.  She hadn’t been able to raise enough money to travel to England for a termination and was eventually given a suspended sentence for buying drugs on the internet to induce a miscarriage.’

BBC NEWS ARTICLE

‘At that time, as part of the public protests against her court case, I accidentally admitted in writing to the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) to committing a crime that I didn’t actually commit, which was a very me story.

‘Obviously I am in abortion rights groups on both sides of the border, because I’m very active in Derry as well.  And fighting for abortion rights in Northern Ireland is just as important as fighting for abortion rights in the Republic of Ireland.  

‘So I was in this pro-choice group in Northern Ireland at the same time as that young girl had been arrested. One of the other women in the group had put up a post saying we’re going to write a letter of complaint about this, so read the letter and if you want to sign it, sign it.

‘Now the letter was really long, and I just read some of it, like the first few paragraphs.  And I was like, yeah, it’s outrageous that this young woman has been arrested, this is outrageous and of course put my name down.  

‘About a week later, there were a whole series of stories talking about the Northern Irish women who wanted to be arrested over illegal abortion pills. 

The Irish News Article

The Telegraph Article

‘And I was like, oh what’s happened? So I read the articles, they were all about how these activists had admitted taking abortion pills in Northern Ireland illegally and inviting the PSNI to arrest them.  And one paper published all the names on the letter.

‘So I’m reading through them - I knew a lot of the names on the list. And suddenly I saw my own name on the list!

‘I wouldn’t have minded if I’d done it, but the thing that frightened me was the fact that at the time I didn’t have citizenship in Ireland.  When you make your citizenship application you must declare whether you have committed any crimes. I did worry a lot about my residency situation and that did freak me out, for example, what if I was arrested?

‘Only I could admit to a crime in writing and invite the PSNI to arrest me.

‘By accident.

‘A typical Taryn story, I am afraid.’

Living so close to the Irish border, Taryn frequently participates in events in Derry. 

‘I did my Ted Talk in Derry.  It was about fashion policing and the double standards of gender expression.  

‘I have a kind of a policy of agreeing to do things that sound scary, but in a good way.  So I said yes, but only if I could talk about something that was going to be helpful…I didn’t want to go and talk about me.  Since I had been given this platform, I wanted to use the opportunity to talk about a situation or a group that was more oppressed than me.

‘So I decided to talk about my daughter, who is trans, and her experience.’

TED.COM INTERVIEW

In the talk, she tells the audience about the time ‘when my daughter first told me, aged five, that she wasn’t the boy I thought she was, but she was in fact a girl.’

‘Since having a trans child I’ve obviously become very involved with the trans community.  I’m a trans activist and I’m very supportive of trans rights, trans healthcare and children’s experience…It’s difficult in Donegal, because there are no groups for young trans people, and she was five when she told me.  

‘There wasn’t any support, so we are just really muddling along.  The school didn’t really know what to do, so they asked us how they could help, - they’ve been great, they’ve been really supportive.

‘My daughter’s fine, she’s flying. She’s so lucky, because I know of a lot of groups on both sides of the border where parents have trans kids, and there are a lot of difficulties and a lot of trauma and a lot of bullying and a lot of unsupportive people in those children’s lives. 

‘I used to go over the border to the Rainbow Centre, to their group for parents and families of trans kids but it was nearly all people who had adult children, there wasn’t really anyone there at that time who had a child as young as mine.

‘When you’re in that type of situation, you go online, and you find support there.  I already knew a lot of trans activists through LGBTQ+ groups – I am bisexual myself – so I had already been involved in lots of those communities.

‘Parenting a trans child hasn’t really been that different than parenting my other children, except for the fact that loads of people online like to call me a child abuser.  So you do get that, and I have got a lot of hate and a lot of abusive messages.  

‘I’ve had messages from people saying they’re reporting me to social services to get my kids taken off me.  I’ve had messages telling me you should be shot, threatening violence against me.

‘What I do now is I just don’t open unsolicited messages anymore.  But I have to say that my experience of social media has in general been incredibly positive – it works so well for people who are neurodivergent, which I am, and I have autism – it’s a great space for people like me.

‘I do much better writing my own words, creating my own words online, than I would do talking to people.

‘Social media is great for me because I’m able to have a community – I’m in Donegal with a bunch of kids, I couldn’t go to Dublin to everything that’s happening there, all the meetings.  As an activist, I felt properly connected  with the activist community in both Northern Ireland and in Ireland.’

De Vere has kept up her freelance journalism since the Referendum and has written for the Irish Independent, The Journal and The Irish Times, among others.

She also started managing social media accounts.

When asked if that makes her an influencer, she laughed, before saying:

‘I’m not so sure about that…But I’ve got just under 50,000 followers across all my platforms.  That’s Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Medium and TikTok.’

One of her higher profile followers is novelist, Marian Keyes, originally from Ireland, who has sold more than 35 million copies of her books on themes which include alcoholism, depression, addiction, cancer, bereavement, and domestic violence.  

Taryn de Vere acknowledges the boost that Keyes’ support has given her.

‘I’m a big fan of Marian Keyes.  She is such a fantastic person for supporting other women writers.  She always takes the time to read the work of women writers and to share their work and I’ve been very lucky that she’s shared mine.  Marian really is a lovely person - I’m very, very lucky to know so many very supportive people.

On her Twitter profile, she describes herself as ‘Joy Bringer, Writer, Artist.’

‘At the moment I’m doing a campaign #365DaysOfJoy, so I am focusing on joy every day as a practice.  

‘The first month of the campaign, I did little videos illustrating joyful practices every day.  In this second month I want to spend time in appreciation, so I’m being appreciative of something every day.  At least one thing.

‘Obviously everybody has situations and people in their lives that they find difficult, that are challenging. These are the issues that prompt me to say, ok, what do I need to move on from here, how can I remove that feeling to move to a slightly better place.  

‘I’ve found that the whole project so far has made me a lot more conscious of how I’m feeling in the moment.  I notice when I’m not feeling good.  And sometimes I just stop people in the middle of a conversation and say that this is really not making me feel good, can we stop talking about this?  Or I’m just going to move over here. I don’t really know what purpose feeling bad serves.

‘But do you know what is fascinating about this?  It’s just amazing how resistant some people are to this and how angry it makes some people – the idea that you would spend a few minutes each day prioritising joy.  That blows my mind.

‘I was on the radio the other day talking about #365DaysOfJoy and somebody rang in and said, like, that is ridiculous, who has time for that?   EVERY DAY?  The woman who was interviewing me asked me, what would you say to that, Taryn?  And I said, what does that person think the point of life is?  Is the point of life not to try and get as much joy as we can?  Because we don’t know are we going to die today, we have no idea.  That’s rough, that’s a rough place to be in.’

Taryn de Vere’s first marriage ended after around three years and since then, she has married the same person seven times.  

‘My partner Andrew and I, we talked about getting married - but I had already been married before and I didn’t want to get married again. I was like, I tried marriage, and no thank you, it wasn’t for me.  

‘And then we talked about maybe we could completely reimagine the idea of marriage and the idea of a wedding and what it would be like with a feminist ethos if equality was at the heart of it.  And if it was something that reflected our will, rather than the will of the state or the will of the church.

‘So we sat down, and we wrote a ceremony that reflected what the two of us were interested in about each other and about our relationship.  And one of the things that we both agreed on was that we were both really committed to growing as people, growing and changing and learning. We understand that the nature of life is that you do that.  You are not always the same person as you were five years ago.  

‘That was the start of our repeated marriages.  The first one for strangers was when a friend of ours, Kerry Doherty, was supposed to come to our wedding but she had to move back to Edinburgh.  So we said, we’ll come there, and we’ll get married for you.

‘So we went, and we walked around dressed as bride and groom and we just invited people that we met to come to our wedding.  Otherwise it would just have been us and Kerry.  We had this lovely little intimate wedding in a park in Edinburgh, with a guy from New York and a woman from Sri Lanka, a couple from Edinburgh and our friend Kerry.

‘It was beautiful and really moving.  We could tell that we had really touched these people, these strangers.  And that got us into the idea of getting married in front of strangers.

‘We get married again every few years when we feel we’ve changed enough as people.  So we discuss how we’ve both grown a lot since the last time we got married, do we still choose this relationship, and do we still choose to be married.  And if we do, then we have another wedding.  So far, we have had seven.

‘They always follow the same pattern.  

‘The new Taryn marries the new Andrew.  

‘And then we walk around the streets of wherever we get married and invite strangers to the wedding, which is always somewhere in public.  We invite one of the guests to be the celebrant and we give them a sheet with the order of service.  People cry, they really cry and tell us how they could feel the love and how emotional it was for them.  

‘Although they are real weddings – because you can’t fake the feeling of love - in a way we see them as a piece of performance art as well.

‘We’re due another wedding so we’re scouting for a venue.  We don’t live together, so we’re just waiting to see when we’re going to be in the same city at the same time.  

‘Our weddings are always free, they don’t cost us anything, I usually find a bouquet along the way, I pick some flowers or something.  Sometimes we go to the pub afterwards for a drink and ask the guests if they would like to join us.  Some of them have become friends.  It’s all very casual, the only real signifiers are that we are dressed as a bride and a groom.  I tend to wear something understated, a vintage or second-hand wedding gown, sometimes a veil, and a bouquet.  They’re not massively fairy-tale wedding dresses.  One of them was a 1930s nightie, it was beautiful.’

We had met Taryn at a café in Letterkenny, where we sat under an awning drinking coffee as the rain drummed down above us, and the traffic rumbled in the background.  It was time to think about moving on.  But we wanted to find out what Taryn was planning for the future.

‘As I say, I get bored quite easily, so I’m always looking for new opportunities.  I’d love to do a little afternoon or early evening radio show. I think we need a bit more joy in the world, and I’d like to promote the diversity that is all around us.

‘I’ve lost count of the people who contact me saying how much joy I’ve brought into their day and that’s a beautiful feeling.  I’d love to do a radio show because I know how many people listen to the radio every day and I’d like to be able to reach out to them.  So if Radio Ulster or Radio Foyle see this, they know how to get in touch with me on social media!’

At the end of the interview, a woman opening her car door comes over to our table.  

‘I’m sorry, I don’t want to interrupt you, but I just had to tell you how much you’ve brightened my day, so thank you for that.’

It kind of copper fastened the case for a Taryn de Vere radio show.

Taryn de Vere is on Twitter @TarynDeVere. 

Speak Truth to Power

Yesterday was three years to the day that my friend, colleague and fellow National Union of Journalists (NUJ) member Lyra McKee was murdered by a gunman in the Creggan area of Derry.  

Yesterday I was one of those attending an NUJ vigil in Belfast at St Anne’s Cathedral, where her funeral took place almost three years ago to the very hour.  We unveiled a new banner dedicated to her.

One of Lyra’s favourite definitions of good journalism is to ‘Speak Truth to Power’.  These words appear at the foot of the banner.

Lyra’s partner Sara, her sister Nichola, and other members of her family and friends also held a vigil in Derry, as did the Derry and North West branch of the NUJ.

********************************************************************

On the eve of Good Friday, late on the night of 18 April 2019, Lyra, a 29-year-old journalist, had been observing a violent incident in Derry.  Armed paramilitaries were throwing petrol bombs at Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) officers.

As she watched, a masked man dropped to his knees and fired along the street in the direction of the police officers.

The bullet could have hit anyone that night.

Perhaps one of the police.

Or it could have been the mother carrying a child in her arms as she stood at her front door. 

But the bullet fired by the gunman hit Lyra in the head, felling her instantly.

She died shortly after being rushed to hospital.

Lyra had been part of a group of journalists watching the incident.  Earlier that night, with the love of her life, Sara, by her side, she had posted a photograph of the rioters confronting a police land-rover on Twitter, with the comment, ‘Derry tonight.  Absolute madness.’

All of us who knew Lyra also knew that one day, she would make international headlines. 

But never in our worst nightmares could we ever have imagined that those headlines would describe how our bright, beautiful and compassionate friend had been cut down in the line of duty to become the latest victim of the Troubles. 

After her death, the President of Ireland, Michael D. Higgins, paid tribute to her life and work on national television, saying, ‘an attack on a journalist at any time in any part of the world is an attack on truth itself.’ 

The President’s words chimed with something Lyra herself had written in the book that she was working on at the time of her death, The Lost Boys. Published posthumously, thousands later noted the irony of her words.   ‘Northern Ireland’, she wrote,  ‘had a way of burying uncomfortable truths, just like it buried its dead.’ 

The timing of Lyra’s murder, on the very anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, added another layer of dark and poignant meaning to her funeral service.

The Northern Ireland Assembly had failed to meet for well over a year at that time; politics in the province was once again in crisis.   The priest taking the cross-community funeral service in St Anne’s Cathedral, Father Martin Magill, didn’t miss and hit the wall when he praised the politicians for setting aside their political differences to stand together in Derry on Good Friday to pay tribute to Lyra.

‘But’, he asked firmly, ‘why in God’s name does it take the death of a 29-year-old woman to get us to this point?’

Now that’s what you call speaking truth to power.

Mourners had risen to their feet to applaud spontaneously almost before he had finished the full sentence.

In one of the final pieces Lyra wrote, she criticised the politicians for not following through on their commitments to the Good Friday Agreement.

She would have been livid that, as we move towards the 25^th anniversary of its signing in 2023, and only a couple of weeks before a Northern Ireland Assembly election on 5^th May, there seems to be as little prospect of the GFA reaching its full potential of creating a better life for all the people of Ireland as ever.

The last words belong to Lyra.  

This extract is from a piece she wrote called A History of the Troubles According to a Ceasefire Baby (McKee, Lyra. Lost, Found, Remembered. Faber & Faber. Kindle Edition)

They appear here in her memory and with the kind permission of her sister and literary executor, Nichola McKee Corner.  

‘The story of how my generation got fucked over was a different one. We didn’t sign up to a war and get sold out by a surrender. Politicians, hoping to sell the peace deal to our parents, made three promises. 

The first promise, they barely delivered on: peace. 

Loyalist paramilitaries stopped terrorising Catholic neighbourhoods; instead, they terrorised their own.

Various Republican splinter groups faded away, but in their place new groups grew, with names such as “the New IRA”. 

Like the Loyalists, they instilled fear in poor areas such as Ardoyne, which were only beginning to get over the past three decades. In the background, Unionist and Republican or Nationalist politicians continued to bicker, reopening old wounds, and appealing to the sectarian fears of their voters at every election. 

It wasn’t the peace promised, just an absence of all-out civil war. Shootings still happened, but it was no longer each side against the other; the paramilitaries were now aiming their guns inwards, towards their own communities. 

The second promise was prosperity. 

Peace, we were assured, would bring a thriving new economy. 

It never appeared. It didn’t matter what qualifications you had, the most plentiful work was to be found in call centres, answering, or making calls for a minimum wage. They were egalitarian shitholes; middle-class kids with PhDs mixed with kids with no GCSEs, and they all earned the same for doing the same grunt work. If you were lucky, the job didn’t come with timed toilet breaks. In the end, most graduates ended up leaving…

The third promise the politicians made and broke was the one that hurt the most. It was felt mostly in the areas that had already been ravaged, the ones where the gunmen continued to roam. Your children, they’d told our parents, will be safe now. With the peace deal, the days of young people disappearing and dying young would be gone. Yet this turned out to be a lie, too.’ 

Three years after her murder, Lyra’s family are still waiting for justice.  Yesterday in Derry her sister Nichola made a fresh appeal for information about her death.  

‘Three years ago our sister Lyra McKee was murdered here in this city, and still three years on, we are waiting for justice for Lyra.  The person who pulled the trigger of the gun that led to her death still walks these streets, and while they walk these streets, these streets will not be safe for the people of this city,’ she said.

To support the campaign set up by her family and friends, visit the website here:  https://www.justice4lyra.com