“To me my daddy is worth more than any animal, any dog and I would just have liked her to be here to see that.”

For an example of the terrible way we have treated victims of the Troubles look no further than today’s Irish News:

THE daughter of a Ballymurphy massacre victim had revealed how authorities originally offered her mother just £350 in compensation for the death of her father.

Her father Joseph Murphy was one of 10 people shot dead while an eleventh victim died from a heart attack after allegedly being put through the ordeal of a mock execution by British troops in August 1971.

Speaking to The Irish News last night, Ms Donnelly said her only regret was that he mother Mary, who died in 2016, was not present yesterday.

“It should have been my mummy there today, because of what my mummy went through with the original inquest and the way that they were treated at the original inquest,” she said.

“It shows you the way things have changed, at the original inquest my mummy was offered £350 for herself and nine children and the case beforehand, it was a prize greyhound had been killed, knocked down in a road accident, and the owner of that dog was offered £700.

“To me my daddy is worth more than any animal, any dog and I would just have liked her to be here to see that.”

Heartbreaking…

Brian O'Neill

I help to manage Slugger by taking care of the site as well as running our live events. My background is in business, marketing and IT. My politics tend towards middle-of-the-road pragmatism, I am not a member of any political party. Oddly for a member of the Slugger team, I am not that interested in daily politics, preferring to write about big ideas in society. When not stuck in front of a screen, I am a parkrun Run Director.