Council asked to allocate money for Liam Mellows commemoration

Fianna Fáil has called on Galway City Council to allocate money to enable community groups to commemorate significant historic events from 100 years ago.

Councillor John Connolly (FF) said he regrets the “inertia” that surrounded the organisation of local commemorations for the War of Independence.

It comes after approaches for funding from military historian Damien Quinn for a centenary conference, was turned down by the Council.

The conference, with 12 speakers – including Cllr Connolly – proceeded last week from the Crane Bar and was screened online.

Mr Quinn hailed it a “massive success”, but he criticised the Council for not funding the event.

He first approached the local authority in February and several requests for funding were ignored.

Cllr Níall McNelis of Labour donated €200 towards the cost of the conference but it was still short about €500, which would have covered the cost of making a digital book of the event.

The Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media confirmed to Mr Quinn that “all decisions regarding the commemorative programme in Galway City Council are a matter for the local authority”.

A spokesperson for the Council confirmed to Mr Quinn that an open call for expressions of interest to be included in the programme did not happen.

“Galway City Council worked with the Galway City Creative Ireland Team including the Heritage Officer Jim Higgins in the development of the Decade of Centenaries programme. An open call was not a requirement nationally and I believe that less than a quarter of all local authorities opted for an open call process,” a spokesperson said.

Cllr John Connolly said that he regretted Mr Quinn’s project was not supported by the Council, but he urged him to consider now applying for future events.

“I am conscious that December 8, 2022 will mark the centenary of the execution of Liam Mellows. This should be commemorated in Galway. I would be delighted to help again the organising of such an event,” he said.

Cllr Connolly said that Fianna Fáil proposed on two occasions at the 2020 budget meeting to provide €50,000 towards a fund for community groups to commemorate the centenary of incidents that occurred in Galway between 1920 and 1921.

“Unfortunately, a majority of elected council members in their wisdom voted against the proposal. The proposal we suggested was to enable community groups to seek funding to organise commemorative events,” he said.

“In autumn 2019, I also wrote to the then mayor in a further bid to urge the local authority to make some provision for civic commemoration of the lives lost and events of significance within the city in the 1920-21 period. I regret the inertia that there has been surrounding the organisation of commemorations but do acknowledge the impact public health restrictions have had on efforts to do so,” Cllr Connolly added.