PAUL CLARKE:PAUL CLARKE, who has died aged 65, was a former assistant national executive officer of Siptu and in the mid-1990s also played a leading role in a combined community-trade union initiative to combat drug abuse.
Former Siptu general secretary Bill Attley described him as a “coalface person [who] brought a vocational approach to his work”, and said that “throughout his working life he always acted with good authority”.
Arising from an initiative led by the Dublin Council of Trade Unions and community groups he became joint chair of the CityWide drugs crisis campaign. The campaign was aimed at involving the people most affected – drug users, their families and communities.
In addition he worked with Uisce (Union for Improved Services, Communication and Education), a drug users’ forum based in Dublin’s north inner city. Seanie Lambe of the Inner City Organisations Network praised his contribution: “He played a huge role.”
Born in Dublin in 1945, he was one of four sons of Jack and Anna Clarke. He was educated at Synge Street CBS.
A printer by trade, he was one of a group of young, left-wing officials recruited to the Workers’ Union of Ireland by Paddy Cardiff in 1978, who believed that the union’s further development required an influx of committed, radical people.
Clarke was for many years secretary of the national hospitals branch. He succeeded Paddy Murphy as assistant general secretary of what was now the FWUI, following the merger with the Federation of Rural Workers, and was based in Monaghan for a time.
He was closely involved in the negotiations that resulted in the merger of the FWUI and the ITGWU to form Siptu in 1990. He could be said to have named the new formation by proposing that the terms “services”, “industrial” and “professional” be incorporated in the name.
As assistant national executive officer he was responsible for Siptu members in the public sector, and was part of the union’s negotiating team in various national agreements. He served as an executive member of Ictu.
He worked well with colleagues whose political views differed from his, and recognised the need to win the respect of opponents as well as those he represented.
He took early retirement and in 1998 settled in Dromod, Co Leitrim, where he planned to establish a BB business. The plan did not come to fruition and he continued to be associated with industrial relations as a member of the Employment Appeals Tribunal.
He relaxed by sailing, having been an accomplished canoeist – a skill he was happy to pass on to young people from deprived areas. Music was another great interest, and he loved to sing.
As a young man he was a member of the Connolly Youth Movement; he later joined the Labour Party.
He is survived by his wife Mary (née O’Haire), stepson Keith O’Haire, nieces, nephews, especially Paul and Simon Clarke, and relatives and friends, including Brid Clarke.
Paul Clarke: born June 22nd, 1945; died May 17th, 2011