Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I am glad to speak for the Labour Party to pay tribute to Austin Currie. As a politician and civil rights campaigner, he leaves a tremendous legacy and had the extraordinary achievement of serving as Minister in both jurisdictions on this island. Reviewing the remarkable journey of Austin Currie's life and his strong legacy on peace and integration, one can only imagine what it must have been like for him at such a young age - 24 - to take a seat in the then unreformed Stormont Parliament, having won the 1964 by-election in East Tyrone. I cannot imagine what that was like. It was a time when there was blatant discrimination, including structural discrimination, against Catholics in Northern Ireland, particularly in the allocation of public housing, an issue that was to have a huge influence on his politics and his campaigning work.

In 1968, the well-documented sit-in at the new council estate in Caledon shone a light for Austin Currie and all on the island on what was happening across Northern Ireland and brought much-increased public attention to the discrimination faced by Catholics and the political situation there. Speaking on the issue beforehand in Stormont, Austin Currie said those famous words, that all hell would break loose. They were prescient words because the fallout from that protest and that political context led to the formation of the Northern Ireland civil rights movement. Following that, as we saw, unfortunately, the terrible violence of the Troubles erupted and Austin went on to form the SDLP along with his colleagues Seamus Mallon, Gerry Fitt and John and Pat Hume. Like them, he was a man of peace who abhorred the violence of the Troubles and remained committed to non-violence, despite the enormous toll it took on his own family, with constant threats and over 30 attacks on his family home and family members, including on his beloved wife Anita.

These things led him to move his family, ultimately, and take refuge in this jurisdiction, where he served as a Teachta Dála for many years and was to serve as Minister of State with responsibility for children in the rainbow coalition between 1994 and 1997. The Tánaiste has remarked how Niamh Breathnach, Labour Minister for Education in that coalition, paid tribute to his work on the rights of children. Another colleague of mine, former Labour leader Joan Burton, was a constituency colleague of Austin and shared with me the anecdote that when he first came to run for Fine Gael in Dublin West, Vincent Browne asked him about his knowledge of the geography of the constituency at a time when he would not have been an expert on that, to put it politely. Once elected, as Joan acknowledges, he became an expert on the highways and byways of Dublin West and developed a detailed mastery of constituency issues, remaining a Teachta Dála until 2002. As a Fine Gael candidate in the 1990 presidential election, he was extraordinarily generous to our successful Labour candidate, Mary Robinson, recommending transfers to her unstintingly right up until polling day. We remember him for that too.

I pay tribute on behalf of Labour to Austin's family, to Anita and his children, Estelle, Caitríona, Dualta, Austin óg and Emer, our Oireachtas colleague. I think I am the only Member here who has had the pleasure of serving with Emer, which I did in the Seanad until my by-election last summer. It was a pleasure to serve with her in the Upper House and to continue to work with her on the WorkEqual campaign and other campaigns in which we share a common interest. I express my condolences and those of Labour to the extended family, Austin's grandchildren, siblings, relatives and friends. May Austin rest in peace, knowing that his efforts helped to bring peace and reconciliation across this island.

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