MacBride Principles

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The MacBride Principles — consisting of nine fair employment principles — are a corporate code of conduct for United States companies doing business in Northern Ireland and have become the Congressional standard for all US aid to, or for economic dealings with, Northern Ireland. They were written by the Irish founder of Amnesty International, Seán MacBride.

[edit] The principles

1. Increasing the representation of individuals from under-represented religious groups in the workforce including managerial, supervisory, administrative, clerical and technical jobs.
2. Adequate security for the protection of minority employees both at the workplace and while travelling to and from work.
3. The banning of provocative religious or political emblems at the workplace.
4. All job openings should be publicity advertised and special recruitment efforts should be made to attract applicants from under-represented religious groups.
5. Lay-off, recall, and termination procedures should not in practice favor particular religious groupings.
6. The abolition of job reservations, apprenticeship restrictions and differential employment criteria, which discriminate on the basis of religious or ethnic origin.
7. The development of training programs that will prepare substantial numbers of current minority employees for skilled jobs, including the expansion of existing programs and the creation of new programs to train, upgrade, and improve the skills of minority employees.
8. The establishment of procedures to assess, identify, and actively recruit minority employees with the potential for further advancement.
9. The appointment of a senior management staff member to oversee the company's affirmative action efforts and the setting up of timetables to carry out affirmative action principles.

In addition to the above, each signatory to the principles is required to report annually to an independent monitoring agency on its progress in the implementation of these principles.

The principles do not call for quotas, reverse discrimination, divestment (the withdrawal of U.S. Companies from Northern Ireland) or disinvestment (the withdrawal of funds now invested in firms with operations in Northern Ireland). The Caucus positively encourages non-discriminatory US investment in Northern Ireland.

[edit] Campaign

The MacBride Campaign is conducted on a three-fold level:

1. Federal - The MacBride Principles became the law of the U.S. in October 1998. The U.S. House and Senate passed the MacBride Principles -- as part of the Omnibus Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 1999 -- and President Clinton signed them into law. The MacBride law mandates that recipients of U.S. contributions to the International Fund for Ireland (IFI) must be in compliance with the MacBride Principles. (The U.S. has been contributing about $19.6 million per year since 1986 to the IFI.)
2. State and Cities - Millions of dollars in State and City pension and retirement funds are invested in American corporations doing business in Northern Ireland. The MacBride Campaign lobbies to have legislation passed to direct these funds to be invested, in the future, only in companies that endorse the Principles (again, note, not divestment or disinvestments). This is the first step. The second step — once the MacBride Principles investment law has been passed — is to get a contract compliance law passed.
3. Shareholder Resolutions - The Campaign works to have Shareholders pass resolutions endorsing the Principles.

[edit] Endorsement

The MacBride Principles have been passed in the following 18 US States:

Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Kentucky, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Texas, Vermont and California.

The have also been passed or endorsed by over 40 cities, and are pending in many more. The following organizations or individuals have also endorsed them:

• The Irish Government:
• The Reverend Jesse Jackson
• Randall Robinson of Trans Africa — the group that sponsored Nelson Mandela’s visit to the United States
• New York State Governor George Pataki
• Former New York State Governor Mario Cuomo
• New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani
• Former New York City Mayor David Dinkins
• Former Boston Mayor Raymond Flynn (and former Ambassador to the Vatican)
• The AFL-CIO; the National Council of Churches
• The American Baptist Convention
• The Episcopal Church
• The Lutheran Pension Board
• The United Church of Christ Board of World Ministries
• The United Methodist Church
• Many US Catholic bishops
• Virtually all Irish-American organizations.