Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

It is a sad day for artistic and political freedom in Ireland when a simple mural on the wall of the Project Arts Centre in the centre of Dublin has had to be painted over. I am sorry the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht is not present herself as this is very much an attack on artistic freedom. It is a very wrong decision by the Charities Regulator. As I travel to work in the middle of the referendum campaign to repeal the eighth amendment, I pass churches which have posters on their railings. I am told by many that they find an amount of material from different publications on the tables at the backs of churches, all of which is consciously and strongly anti-repeal. Many Catholics find this deeply offensive and upsetting and some of the suggestions in them around what happens are deeply upsetting. It is a very sad day regarding a simple, attractive mural using the word "repeal" and the image of a heart. The referendum is about things that are close to all our hearts and which are difficult.

The Charities Regulator has written to the Project Arts Centre threatening its charitable status for engaging in political activity which is not in line with the charitable purposes of the organisation. It is worth looking at this juncture at what the Act states and not just at the guidelines on political activity issued recently by the regulator. The 2009 Act excludes from being registered as a charity a political party or body which promotes a political party or candidate or a body which promotes a political cause unless the promotion of that cause relates directly to the advancement of the charitable purposes of the body. The Act does not exclude any charity from engaging in a collaboration with any of those bodies. Neither does the Act have an express ban on charities engaging in political activity. The Act also lays down the circumstances in which the authority, after consultation with An Garda Síochána, can exclude a body from the register. These are circumstances where something is either unlawful, contrary to public morality, contrary to public policy, in support of terrorism or terrorist activities or for the benefit of an organisation membership of which is unlawful. None of these, as far as I am aware, applies to the Project Arts Centre and its collaboration whereby the mural was painted on the wall of the centre in public view.

I was involved in the development of charities legislation some time ago. The last time I checked, most religious bodies in Ireland were charities, which is rightly so. I do not object to that. I do not object to churches having huge amounts of material from posters to leaflets, sermons and events relating to their view in respect of the referendum. That is as it ought to be in a civic society. I object very much to the interference with the artistic and political freedom of the artist, which is essential, in this decision by the Charities Regulator which has forced the mural to be removed.

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