The Save Lough Neagh Campaign
Diarmuid Flood, Marc Mac Seáin, Pádraig Cairns, and Páidí MacNiocaill
Lough Neagh lies at the heart of Ulster and borders five of its counties - Antrim, Down, Armagh, Tyrone, and Derry. Crucially, it provides forty percent of the North’s fresh drinking water [1] and there are plans to increase the amount of water drawn from the lough. It’s not just drinking water the lough provides. Forty percent of the North’s land, of which three-quarters is agricultural, flows into the lough. It’s one of the largest lakes in all of Europe and supports a diverse ecosystem of plants, animals, and organic matter.
In the summer of 2023, toxic algal blooms spread across the lough. This subsided briefly during the winter as temperatures cooled, but re-emerged in the summer of 2024. The proliferation of these noxious blooms was driven by; excess nutrients from agricultural run-off and corporate pollution, sewage dumping in the catchment area, and climate change. Government policy, mainly the “Going For Growth” strategy, super-charged these culprits. The Northern Ireland Environmental Agency (NIEA) confirmed that agricultural runoff had a central role in causing this crisis, with 62% of excess nutrients in the lough being derived from agricultural sources. The nitrogen and phosphorus found in animal slurry and chemical fertiliser directly disrupt the chemical balance in the water, creating the conditions for algal blooms to intensify.
These issues are only complicated by the private ownership of the lough and the lack of a single managing body. After the ‘Flight of the Earls’ in 1607 the lough was confiscated by the English baron Arthur Chichester, who acted as the Crown’s Lord Deputy in Ireland. The lough eventually passed through inheritance to his descendant, the 12th Earl of Shaftesbury, Nicholas Edmund Anthony Ashley-Cooper who lives in his Georgian estate in Dorset, England. The titles at play here should give some sense of the problematic aspects of this ownership scheme. After activists brought the pollution issues to light, the Earl stated he would be willing to sell the lough to the Northern Ireland Assembly but ‘he would not give it away for free’ [2]. When asked if he would ‘gift’ the lough back to the NI government he stated ‘I would like to be treated like any other business owner… the business has a value.’
Since the summer of 2023 local community and environmental activists have campaigned to bring attention to these issues and to fight for solutions. To learn more about the experience of the campaign, its successes and lessons, we sat down with three activists intimately involved - Marc Mac Seáin of South Armagh, Pádraig Cairns of Lurgan, and Páidí MacNiocaill of Mid Ulster.
The below questions were answered by all three collectively.
How did the campaign begin and how did it develop?
The pollution and social crisis of Lough Neagh was not a new phenomenon in the summer of 2023. Loughshore residents, environmentalists and activists have been banging the drum on this issue for decades - with a prominent focus by People’s Democracy campaigners, such as loughshore resident Michael Farrell, author of “The Great Eel Robbery” in the 1960s.
When the news broke of severe blooms in summer 2023, the immediate focus was mostly reporting on the visible symptoms of the pollution problem and the health concerns for those making use of the lough recreationally. There wasn’t much focus on the actual root causes of the pollution or how it was produced.
A group named Save Our Shores had been created by some cold water swimmers in Ballyronan to share news media and to report incidents of pollution alongside sightings of dead animals. The flurry of activity in this social media group throughout the summer made it clear there was mass dismay at the situation, with the group amassing 10,000 members rapidly. In September, a packed public meeting was held by the group at Seamus Heaney centre in Bellaghy [3]. The locals in attendance were outraged at the situation but despite this energy, a broader campaign took some time to form.
We decided to use an annual cycle around Lough Neagh called Lap the Lough to highlight the issue. In August 2023 a handful of us - both community and People Before Profit activists - decided to organise some banner drops along the cycle route. We made banners highlighting the issues with the pollution, extractivism, and private ownership and held them at pit stops such as Aghagallon near Lurgan and Ballyronan near Magherafelt. Through that we got chatting with a variety of people enthusiastic to see such actions.
We decided to try to thread together the local campaign groups alongside engaging with the Save Our Shores forum. The latter hosted community discussions in Bellaghy & Lurgan which featured the NIEA (Northern Ireland Environment Agency) and Lough Neagh Partnership. These events allowed for networking between environmental activists and gave an opportunity for them and members of the community to scrutinise those bodies. At these events the lack of action was highlighted and it was decided campaigning would continue.
The Save Lough Neagh (SLN) campaign was born out of a coalition of social, political and environmental groups, coming together to champion the survival of Lough Neagh through five mutually agreed demands:
A well-funded water service
An independent Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to stop polluters
An end to the private ownership of Lough Neagh and sand dredging
Research, recovery, and a just transition for local farmers
Legal protections in the form of Rights of Nature
We successfully brought together fishermen, veteran environmentalists, trade-unionists and dedicated socialist activists. Collectively we organised demonstrations, marches, educationals, and a series of ongoing protests around the shores titled ‘The Loughshore Stands Up’ which gives voice to marginalised loughshore communities who have long been overlooked.
What was the significance of the campaign to you?
The centrality of Lough Neagh in environmental and ecological terms is well covered above but the significance of the lough is broader than even that. Lough Neagh looms large in the consciousness of those who live around the shores, and this is reflected in the sheer number of musicians, artists, writers and poets that the shores have produced. When the campaign organised Nature's Revolt - an art exhibition hosted in January 2024 exploring the ties between art and resistance, hosted on the shores of the lough just outside Lurgan - we received a deluge of submissions from artists right across the north. Similarly, a prominent activist in the campaign, Andy McGibbon, explores themes of nature, exploitation and extractivism in his folk project Madra Rua, which have played at various SLN protests and campaign events
For us as Marxists, the ecocide at Lough Neagh epitomises in a demonstrable and tangible way how capitalism and the private ownership of natural resources leads to the devastation of our planet and its ecosystems. When a loughshore resident’s tap water runs foul, we can say “that's capitalism”, when dogwalkers discover dead swans or otters washing up on the shore covered in green slime, we can say “that's capitalism”. The campaign allows for an ecosocialist analysis to be delivered right into the heart of communities around the shores, and one which appears to have been broadly accepted.
The campaign also provides an opportunity to shine a spotlight on both the history and the legacy of colonialism in the north of Ireland. The absentee landlord, the Earl of Shaftesbury continues to earn royalties from extractive sand dredging on the Lough bed he owns. Despite alarm bells for years from fishermen, environmentalists, and People Before Profit councillors in Derry & Belfast, the SDLP environmental minister paved the way to legalise this exploitation in Stormont.
Our campaigners are quick to mention the now infamous quote from Arthur Chichester in which he describes butchering “man, woman, child, horse and beast” in the conquering of the shores of the lough in 1601 [4]. The current successor to Chichester, the 12th Earl of Shaftesbury, has been one of the primary targets of our campaign in the fight for public ownership of the lough. “Not a penny for the Earl” and “Give It Back, Thief!” being among our main slogans.
You mention “Not a penny for the Earl”, what other slogans and messages did the campaign feature?
We broadly focused on the ‘Three Ps’ with our messaging for the campaign: Pollution, Profiteering and Political Negligence. These three topics formed the main thrust of our propagandising, as well as taking any opportunity to promote the demands of the campaign. We enjoyed significant media coverage and widespread public uptake of our talking points as a result. Our campaigners had repeated appearances on regional news programmes, as well as a multitude of articles in a litany of prominent publications. The significance of this can't be understated, as it gave the campaign a weapon with which to heap pressure upon both Shaftesbury and the political establishment at Stormont. The result of this was concessions from both the aforementioned parties; the Earl being forced to state that he would give the lough back to the people at no cost, and Muir's Alliance party being forced into concession after concession on disastrous policy decisions.
Has the campaign been successful?
The issues that led to the apocalyptic scenes at Lough Neagh are large in scale and systematic. The campaign will need to continue into 2025 to pressure the necessity of system change. Scientists have stated that even if the pollution flowing into the lough were to stop immediately, it would take twenty years for the lough to recover. The algal blooms have temporarily subsided during the winter months like last year but they will likely reemerge as the weather heats up once again.
The public outrage and pressure has pushed the Stormont government to address the issues with a ‘Lough Neagh Action Plan’ published in July 2024. However, as is typical there has been little substance on this front since. In order for the lough to even begin to heal, huge changes in how we treat our natural resources will be necessary.
People power has shown that victories are possible. The pollution in Lough Neagh continues to be a national and international issue with reporting continuing to cover the campaign. Stormont was forced to at least be seen to be working toward resolving the issue. Those activists engaged in the campaign have seen first hand the destructive effects of the current system.
What are the lessons of the campaign?
The seasonal nature of the issue meant we found public engagement diminished as the most visible symptom of the problem (that is, algal blooms) became less visible. There was a need to diversify our activities. During warmer months we would focus on campaigning which would draw people to the loughshore to witness the toxic scenes themselves. This wasn’t possible in the winter so we instead focused on cultural events such as Nature’s Revolt or Sli Eile’s Climate Camp. We also took this time to focus on information gathering and to network with other activists.
One major lesson we took early on was the need for a unified and coordinated campaign drawing together community and environmental activists. We felt this could act as the spearhead for activity and media coverage. Despite political differences with some of our coalition partners, we have ultimately been able to agree a programme of action that is both radical and based in class politics, while at times making necessary concessions. Our mutually agreed campaign demands are a testament to this. Broadly, our work within this campaign is a reminder of how engaging in united front work is at once deeply challenging and hugely rewarding.
Campaigning on this issue has made clear to all of us the need to connect the environmental and ecological crises with the neglect of working class communities and the problems that come from private ownership of water and other resources. Lough Neagh is crucial in an ecological sense but is also relied on for clean drinking water by communities across the north. It’s clear these issues can’t be dealt with in isolation. We have to connect the issues that come when profit is put above both the planet and the people who live on it.
Notes
[1] "Your water is safe to drink". Northern Ireland Water. Archived from the original on 29 September 2023. https://www.niwater.com/news-detail/12350/Your-water-is-safe-to-drink/
[2] 'Earl of Shaftesbury open to Lough Neagh sale but won't give it away' BBC Northern Ireland, 4 October 2023. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-66996132.amp
[3] Lough Neagh: Public meeting calls for action over algal blooms, BBC Northern Ireland, 20 September 2023. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-66838618
[4] Gloriana's Bloody Age. Massacre and Misrule in Elizabethan Ireland, Tudor Times, 2 July 2023. https://tudortimes.co.uk/guest-articles/glorianas-bloody-age/the-war-against-civilians-1600-03