February 17, 2011
By Staff Reporter
The DUP’s Maurice Mills, twice deputy mayor of Ballymena, was unrepentant this week after a storm of protest over his views on God’s propensity to consign millions to death for “anti-Biblical” transgressions.
The party leader, Ian Paisley, faces demands to expel Mills after his comments at a recent council meeting in Ballymena. The party has distanced itself from his views but so far taken no disciplinary action against him.
“The practices in which these people are involved are heinous”, said Mills after criticism of his original comments. “As far as I’m concerned God marked the card of those who had previously been involved [in the ‘Southern Decadence Festival’ in New Orleans’].”
“They were going to have something similar or even better, as they hoped, but two days before there was the intervention of God through the instrument of Hurricane Katrina,” he said.
Some viewed Mills’ comments as the ravings of a crank. Others believe his message was highly dangerous in an environment where racist and homophobic crimes are on the increase.
Sean Morrin, co-chair of public sector union UNISON`s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender group, said Mills had delivered a highly dangerous message. “It could be a trigger for abuse, violence and murder,” he said.
Patricia McKeown, UNISON’s regional secretary, said people like Mills “should be drummed out of public office.”
A Manchester city councilor, attending a conference in Belfast against hate crimes in the workplace, said she was astonished and that if such comments were made in Britain, the person responsible would be stripped of all powers.
Amongst the many who criticized Mills comments was the SDLP assembly member, John Dallat, who said the “rising tide of fundamentalism within the DUP” presented a serious challenge to democracy.
“This week, the North Antrim DUP assembly member Mervyn Storey got offended about the Post Office issuing ‘Mother and Child’ postage stamps, claiming they are a ‘Catholic thing’ and offensive to the many thousands of mainstream evangelical Christians”.
Mills’ comments, said Dallat, “are so far off the wall that people laugh at them. But his claim that the tsunami was sent by God to punish Asia for not being Christian is no laughing matter.”
“Anymore than his remarks that God has punished Africa with Aids because of sodomy is something than cannot be dismissed. According to this political misfit, Hurricane Katrina was the weapon God used to punish the US for allowing a gay festival.
“It would be foolish to dismiss these people as harmless cranks. There is no way of knowing how much they may be fuelling the fires of hatred in all sorts of ways.
“Against such a background it is difficult to see how anyone Catholic or Protestant, nationalist or unionist can have hope for the future while this tide of fundamentalism is rising in the DUP,” Dallat said.