91�ȱ�

For the rest of the 1970s and the early 1980s, successive British governments attempted, without success, to solve the Northern Ireland problem.

At the same time, although the levels of violence lessened due to improved security measures, the PIRA launched a campaign of violence in Britain, exploding bombs in towns and cities such as Guildford and Birmingham.

During these years, the Westminster government introduced policies designed to defeat the paramilitary campaigns.

These new policies included:

• Ulsterisation: Increasing the size of the UDR and RUC, while reducing the numbers of British Army troops on the streets of Northern Ireland.
• Criminalisation: Ending special category status for those convicted of terrorist crimes after March 1976. Anyone convicted after that date would be treated in the same way as other criminals. They would be sent to a new prison - consisting of H-shaped blocks - which had been built at the Maze outside Belfast.

Republican prisoners hated criminalisation.

They believed themselves to be "freedom fighters" rather than criminals.

In order to oppose criminalisation they:

• Wore blankets rather than prison clothes This was known as the blanket protest.
• Then, in 1978, they started to smear their excrement on the walls of their cells rather than slop out. This was known as the dirty protest.

Neither action resulted in the end of criminalisation, even though, by the end of 1980, nearly 40 per cent of republican prisoners were involved.

Nor did public protests or attacks on prison guards fare any better in terms of getting special category status back.

On 27 October 1980, seven republican prisoners intensified the campaign against criminalisation by beginning a hunger strike.

After 52 days, the strike was ended as the prisoners wrongly believed that an agreement had been made with the government relating to the wearing of non-prison issue clothes.

On 1 March 1981, the PIRA prisoners’ officer commanding (OC), Bobby Sands, refused food.

Unlike the 1980 strike, this time only Sands began the strike; he was to be joined by a new hunger striker each week.

Sands believed that in this way the strike would lead to a prisoner dying each week, thus increasing the pressure on the British Government (now led by Margaret Thatcher) to end criminalisation.

Although the hunger strike gained huge publicity, it did not change government policy.

On 5 March 1981, Frank Maguire, the MP for Fermanagh-South Tyrone, died.

As there was no law precluding prisoners becoming an MP, republicans saw their chance to increase pressure on the British and Bobby Sands was put forward as a republican candidate for the seat.

On the 40th day of his strike, Sands, standing as an Anti-H Block candidate, was elected to Westminster.

His election campaign made news headlines across the world.

Even though Sands was now an MP, the British government remained determined not to give the prisoners what they were demanding, despite huge amounts of international pressure.

On 5 May, Sands died and over the next three and a half months, nine other prisoners lost their lives through hunger strike.

In the same five-month period, 61 people died as a result of the violence that broke out following each hunger striker’s death.

Throughout this time no concessions were granted.

As time went on, without any concessions being granted, the families of those men still on hunger strike began to intervene to stop further deaths.

On 3 October 1981, the hunger strike was called off.

Within a few days of the strike’s end, the British government announced that:

1. Prisoners could wear their own clothes.
2. More prison visits would be allowed.
3. Prisoners would be allowed to spend more time together during the day.
4. It would reinstate the 50 per cent reduction in length of sentence. This concession had been lost by those prisoners involved in the protests against criminalisation.

These concessions resulted in the protests in favour of special category status all but ending by late October 1981.

The 1981 Hunger Strike had a number of important consequences:

1. A greater level of nationalist hostility towards the British Government.
2. An increase in support for the PIRA.
3. An increase in the levels of paramilitary violence.

As a result, Thatcher’s government was coming under pressure from:

• Unionists, who believed that Thatcher was not doing enough to stop either the growth in PIRA membership or levels of violence.
• The Dublin Government, which believed that a new political solution was needed to bring the PIRA’s campaign to an end.

Bobby Sands’ election as an MP (and the election of another republican, Owen Carron, for the same seat after Sands’ death) suggested to republicans that becoming involved in politics might help them achieve their objectives by other methods.

Therefore, in November 1981, Sinn Féin adopted the strategy of using both politics and violence to achieve its aims.

This approach was called the Armalite and Ballot Box strategy.

The Armalite was a type of rifle used by the PIRA at this time.

Sinn Féin’s new approach soon seemed to be working.

It won seats and more votes in a number of elections. These included:

1. Elections for a new Assembly, held in October 1982.
2. The 1983 General Election (where party leader Gerry Adams was elected MP for West Belfast).
3. Local government elections, held in 1985.

The increase in Sinn Féin’s electoral support concerned both the British and Irish governments and the SDLP.

Both governments were worried that Sinn Féin might become Northern Ireland’s largest nationalist party if something was not done.

At the same time, the levels of violence – while lower than the 1970s – still gave considerable cause for concern.

On 6 December 1982, 17 people, 11 of whom were soldiers, died when an Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) bomb exploded in Ballykelly, Co. Derry/Londonderry.

The INLA had emerged in 1975 from a split in the Official IRA.

For more information, including archive clips, on this subject, visit 91�ȱ�: Ten Chapters of the Northern Ireland Troubles ()