Debate contribution: Slieve Gullion Cairn
Debate contribution by Mr Andrew McMurray on .
- MLA
- Mr Andrew McMurray
- Party at the time
- Alliance Party
- Date
- 10 March 2026
- Type
- Debate contribution
- Business
- Adjournment
- Heading
- Slieve Gullion Cairn
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5437442
Read the official Assembly record
Text
I welcome the debate and thank the Member for raising the issue. I thank the Minister for attending. Slieve Gullion is not in my constituency, but I do not think that those who constructed the cairn and the burial chamber would have had much of a concept of Assembly boundaries. The cairn at Slieve Gullion is special for the reasons that have been highlighted. It is the most intact passage cairn in Northern Ireland, despite the current structural issues. It is the highest passage tomb in Ireland, and it also aligns with the winter solstice sunset. It does, however, form a wider landscape of interconnecting monuments that are located across the Mournes and more widely across Ireland and Scotland. While I have taken the time to visit Slieve Gullion — it is a very nice hill — I am more familiar with the ancient sites in and around Castlewellan and South Down. There is the Ballynoe stone circle outside Downpatrick in Clough; the Legananny dolmen, which has a capstone that sits directly south; and the Drumena cashel and the Finnis souterrain that you can crawl into and through. The beauty of those monuments is that you can literally step in and through our shared history. Unfortunately, you cannot currently do that atop Slieve Gullion, and that is a cause of great annoyance to those who are even more passionate about our ancient sites than I am. The cairn has been closed for some time due to structural issues, and some of those who like to visit those places are worried that the closure might continue beyond this year's winter solstice on 21 December. There is an urgency to the matter because of the location of the cairn. The repairs must be done during the summer months; it is obviously more challenging to carry them out on the top of Slieve Gullion during inclement weather. Once we get into the autumn, there is a risk that another winter solstice will be lost. The history and stories about the cairns are fascinating. They are very old, and some of their origins are unknown, but they are all clearly related to ancient myths and stories. However, those stories reach forward and touch our popular culture. Slieve Gullion cairn is the house of the Cailleach Beara, the infamous witch who tricked Finn McCool of the Fianna into diving into the bottomless lake for her ring. The story links into the setting sun atop Slieve Gullion and Cailleach Beara's lough, because, of course, you cannot see the sun set into the lake when you are on top of Slieve Gullion; you can only see that from Slieve Croob or Knock Iveagh, which are in South Down. Knock Iveagh has its own access issues, of course. These stories show the connections that we have to the landscape and these sites. When the past reaches forward, those of you who, like me, have read and still read 'The Lord of the Rings', will see the similarities to J R R Tolkien's Sméagol and Déagol, who go swimming for the golden ring. Tolkien and CS Lewis were contemporaries who were both influenced by our ancient myths and legends. To sum up, the site was a very important site to the people who built the cairn, and it should be important to us today. People come a long way to see it, and it is a great disappointment for them when they find that it is closed.
We are sometimes good at protecting our more recent cultures at the expense of forgetting our shared ancient culture. It would be reassuring to have from the Minister a timeline for completing the works at the cairn, and I urge the Minister to ensure that those works are progressed as soon as possible, with a view to reopening in time for this year's winter solstice.
643 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
Assessment
Jev’s structured answers met the documented threshold for “not flagged”.
- Overall probability that the activity is being used to promote, exploit or escalate an identity-based controversy: 0.03 (flagging needs at least 0.70; at or below 0.30 is not flagged).
- None of the five culture-war criteria was met (each was below 0.60).
- Assessed as legitimate policy scrutiny (0.67).
- No identity-based framing was identified (0.97).
- The overall probability was at or below the not-flagging threshold.
This is an AI-generated assessment of the text, made against published criteria. It is not a finding of fact about the MLA or their intentions. The Assembly record itself is the fact.
Jev’s structured answers
| Question | Probability | Met? |
|---|---|---|
| Identity framing | 0.04 | No |
| Sectarian or communal antagonism | 0.02 | No |
| Cultural grievance politics | 0.05 | No |
| Dog-whistle messaging | 0.02 | No |
| Controversy escalation | 0.05 | No |
| Legitimate policy scrutiny | 0.67 | Yes |
| Overall judgement | 0.03 | At or below not-flagging threshold |
| Option | Probability |
|---|---|
| No identity-based framing (chosen) | 0.97 |
| Reports or questions it | 0.01 |
| Criticises or condemns it | 0.01 |
| Adopts it | 0.01 |
| Subject | Probability |
|---|---|
| No identity-related subject | 0.83 |
| Sport (including the GAA), the arts and cultural bodies | 0.08 |
| Flags, emblems, symbols, names and memorials | 0.03 |
| Another identity-related subject | 0.03 |
| Religion and belief (including people of no religion), churches, faith communities and religious prejudice (including antisemitism and anti-Muslim prejudice) | 0.01 |
Assessed 21 October 2026 at 15:15 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.
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