VIEW, Issue 60, 2021
www.viewdigital.org
Page 15
‘My WAVE work goes on’ Campaigner Alan McBride pays tribute to ‘tenacity, courage and the bravery’ of the victims who would not give up fight for compensation met with WAVE Trauma Centre campaigner Alan McBride in a room in Belfast city centre. It was a couple of weeks after innocent victims of the Troubles in Northern Ireland had been awarded compensation following a long battle over many years. I asked Alan what were his feelings on the day it was finally announced that a compensation fund would be set up. “There were times when we thought we’d never see it. I’m proud of the role I played, but I was even more proud of all those injured. Because without their tenacity, their courage, and their bravery, it wouldn’t have happened. And whilst I think of the people who died in our group and who never witnessed the compensation package, it was still a day of great rejoicing and the end of a 13-year journey.” I asked Alan did he intend to keep working with WAVE or was he looking to go in another direction? “No, my work with WAVE goes on,” replied Alan. “One of my biggest regrets in terms of the pension is that we were not able to anything for the bereaved.You’re only really legally eligible if you were injured, be it psychologically or physically. And, of course, that will include some bereaved people but it doesn't include them all. I’m now campaigning in regard to getting some acknowledgement and financial redress for bereaved people. “I’m also involved in a project where we are looking for 100 stories of kindness being shown to people, Catholic or Protestant, in the midst of the Troubles.” Alan went on to talk about how 2021 had been a particularly difficult year for him personally. “My daughter Zoe turned 30 this year. That means she is older now than her mother, Sharon, who was killed in the Shankill Road bombing in 1993. That kind of brought it home to me in terms of how long Sharon has been dead, and the fact that she was a young person with her life in front of her, and how it was taken from her.” At this point in the interview, Alan smiled as he recollected what Sharon had been like as a young woman (she was 29 years of age when she died). “She was gorgeous,” he said. “She was a really beautiful woman, kind and considerate. She was the kind of woman that would have done anything for anybody. And whilst that’s might be a bit of an old cliché, it’s still very true. Her relationship with her daughter was beautiful to watch.” I asked Alan about his views on Northern Ireland and what the future might be like, especially with growing commentary about a possible border poll. “I’ve always tried to be optimistic
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Alan McBride: ‘At the end of the day people in Northern Ireland have to share this little piece of the Earth’ when I’ve thought about Northern Ireland, although there has been times when they’ve been, you know, very sad,” replied Alan. “But my optimism looks as though it has been misplaced. I don’t think that we have made the kind of strides that I would have hoped that we would have made following the Good Friday Agreement. But at the end of the day, we have to learn to share this piece of the Earth. “I’m not overly concerned which flag
flies over Belfast City Hall – whether it’s a Union Jack or a Tricolour, or even both of them. For me it’s all about the quality of your life. “I was a very firm Remainer. I believe that Brexit will be bad for Northern Ireland. I hope that I’m wrong about that. “I also have a strong British identity. I would want it respected and recognised in terms of there ever being a United Ireland.”
