The public use of politically-charged symbols and emblems is an emotive issue for unionists and republicans, but the furore is perplexing to others in the North, writes Fionola Meredith
W hile some might consider it more of an affront to good taste than a political embarrassment, Sinn Féin councillors in Limavady, Co Derry, are adamant that the council's Prince Charles and Princess Diana coffee mug has got to go. The chintzy royal wedding cup is just one of several apparently offensive items - which include a Royal Engineers paperweight and a toy dragon which was a gift from the 1st Battalion Welsh Guards - that the councillors want removed from Limavady Town Hall, to create a "neutral working environment".
They also have their eye on a statue of Limavady man William Massey, the one-time prime minister of New Zealand and - crucially - an Orangeman, as well as on the union flag hanging in the mayor's parlour. In the face of this planned excision, unionists on the nationalist-dominated council are incensed, claiming that their heritage is being airbrushed out.
Enshrined in the Belfast Agreement, the principle of "neutral working environments" recognises the political sensitivity around the use of symbols and emblems for public purposes, and was intended to ensure that such symbols are "used in a manner which promotes mutual respect rather than division".
It sounds like a simple, reasonable aspiration but - as so often is the case in Northern Ireland - its practical application has turned into a complicated, point-scoring and increasingly fraught process. The proportion of publicly-displayed shamrocks to red hands of Ulster is fiercely contested; fundamentally, this is about territory. DUP MLA George Robinson, who sits on Limavady Borough Council, accuses the Sinn Féin councillors of "preaching about inclusivity and co-operation . . . but promoting division and ill will".
Meanwhile, Sinn Féin Councillor Cathal Hassan retorts that 87 per cent of the council workforce say they want a neutral working environment. While he agrees that, when it comes to symbols and emblems, inclusivity is preferable to exclusivity, Hassan says there's no item representing the nationalist/republican tradition on council property - "so, in the absence of inclusivity, neutrality is really our only option".
WHILE THE NORTH is notorious for its historic obsession with the use and perceived misuse of politically-charged symbols, it appears that today - even under the harmonious aegis of Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness - the issue is as inflammatory as ever.
As the row continues in Limavady, in Enniskillen, Co Fermanagh, feelings are running high over the replacement of a photographic tribute to the 11 victims of the IRA's Remembrance Sunday bombing in the town. The original memorial, at the town's fire station, was a montage of pictures of the victims. It was removed after a complaint by a member of staff.
But the new tribute - an unimpeachably "neutral" black and white image of firefighters at the Cenotaph scene of the bombing - has angered unionists. As far as Tom Elliott, Ulster Unionist MLA for Fermanagh and South Tyrone, is concerned, it's "a slap in the face to the relatives of those who died in the bombing".
Over in Banbridge, Co Down, it's a similar story. Earlier this month, Orangemen protested outside the offices of Banbridge District Council after certain items - including a painting of an RAF checkpoint and UDR and RUC plaques - were removed from public display.
Again, the language was emotive: a letter handed in to the council offices on behalf of 50 Orange lodges in the area described the move as "utterly devastating", and accused the Equality Commission of Northern Ireland, whose role it is to promote good relations and oversee anti-discrimination law, of engaging in "a long-term strategy to wipe the face of Britishness from Northern Ireland".
Drew Nelson, grand secretary of the Orange Order, warns: "The Equality Commission needs to be careful. All we want are good community relations, but this is actually damaging community relations." For those in the North less exercised by strong political allegiances, the furore over creating and maintaining "neutral working environments" - especially when it comes down to bitter wrangles over crockery and giftware - is perplexing.
"It's a strange thing to get worked up about," muses Dr Kris Brown of Queen's University, Belfast.
Brown has knowledge of the field: he has recently completed an audit of Troubles artefacts, cataloguing everything from tea sets made by republican women prisoners, decorated with a motif of a lark breaking free from a ball and chain, to unexploded mortars recovered from police stations. "Some of the material here - like the toy dragon in Limavady - is kitschy, tongue-in-cheek, ephemeral stuff; it doesn't seem overtly political, but rather it has had political value projected on to it," Brown says. "This is where you end up when you start trying to make decisions about what constitutes unionism or Britishness, and nationalism or Irishness, and tagging objects with a particular identity - where do you draw the line?"
AND BROWN DOESN'T see any sign of the controversy abating. "I wonder if it's all indicative of future brushfire cultural wars. People are taking to the streets over these issues: it's a long way from chuckling towards Stormont."
Under scrutiny, the possibility - and perhaps the desirability - of ever achieving a truly neutral working environment starts to look shaky. In the end, can you ever achieve a genuinely value-free shared space? And if you could, would you really want to work there?
As Neil Jarman, the director of the Institute for Conflict Research in Belfast, points out: "From parades downward, this is all about public display. But if everybody objects to everything, then you end up with all walls painted magnolia. The result is puritanism - nobody will be allowed to sing or dance."