Craig reiterates Northern Ireland’s resistance to joining Free State

Belfast, 11 October 1922 – Sir James Craig, Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, has declared that the six counties will not be ruled by a Dublin parliament.

Speaking yesterday in the House of Commons in Belfast, Craig took issue with what he claimed were exaggerated complaints and malicious misstatements about the current state of affairs in Ulster.

Craig was met with loud cheers as he rose to speak and declared at the outset that the parliament was meeting under more satisfactory conditions than had existed at any point since the creation of the Northern Irish parliament.

There were further shouts of ‘Hear, hear!’ when, later in his speech, he declared that the policy of his government was to retain a parliament of their own and not be subjected to one in Dublin.

There would be no Dublin parliament for them, he stated, and ‘what man in his senses would suggest for a moment that there should be anything but a voting out of the Free State when the time came.’ That would be his party’s policy to the end.

During his speech Craig confirmed that royal assent had been given to the legislation removing proportional representation for six county local government elections.

He also announced plans to set up a royal commission to investigate the issue of temperance with a view to introducing legislation on the matter at some point in the future. The Prime Minister said that he personally believed that a majority of the parliament members were pledged in some form or other to temperance reform.

James Craig, filmed by Birtish Pathé, visiting the late Michael Collins earlier this year

[Editor's note: This is an article from Century Ireland, a fortnightly online newspaper, written from the perspective of a journalist 100 years ago, based on news reports of the time.]