Despite FACE to FACE dialogue with Sinn Fein, Parades Commission and residents groups over the past 10 years we are no nearer to resolving this problem. Since SF formed the residents groups in the early 1990,s the bigotry and intolerance displayed by Irish Republicans towards the public expression of our culture has plagued our community. Nowhere has this been so shamefully demonstrated than at Ardoyne in North Belfast! The government's Parades Commission has ruled that

• we can't carry our flags or banners
• we can't play music not even hymns
• we can't whistle, hum or sing
• the band is not allowed to play a drumbeat to keep pace.
• our friends and families are not permitted to walk on the pavement.

We condemn other countries for their lack of human rights yet our own Human Rights Commission stays silent! Our church leaders stay silent! The majority of the politicians stay silent!
The Parades Commission piles humiliation upon humiliation on those from our Loyal Orders and our community who visit them in their ivory tower to express our point of view.
The Parades Commission rewards republican violence.

The violence at Ardoyne is nothing new to the long suffering Protestants who live along the interfaces bordering their Catholic "neighbours". In the weeks leading up to the Twelfth houses in Twaddell Avenue were attacked repeatedly.
The police and media know that those participating in the GARC "parade" on the evening of the Twelfth had armed themselves with an assortment of missiles which they hurled at Protestant residents opposed to their march of shame. They were still allowed to proceed.
The Parades Commission know this too yet they refuse to make any public comment.One Commissioner, Rev Brian Kennaway avoided talking about this by focusing on a minor incident of a band playing outside a chapel. Is that more important than the violence that poured out from the GARC parade?!!
The Protestant communities which reside along the length of the Crumlin road are to be commended for the support they gave to the local Orangemen returning home and for the restraint they showed in the face of violent republican aggression.
We must support all the Loyal Order parades along the Crumlin road. If they are stopped then the rest of us will be next to be driven out like the people of Torrens were.