WITH the death of Sam Nolan on April 14 2024, the Dublin labour movement lost one of most inspiring stalwarts.

Born in 1930, his parents were committed socialists, his carpenter father a union activist and Communist Party of Ireland member.

Young Sam followed his father’s trade and, in 1947, joined the Socialist (later Democratic) Youth Movement and, by 1952, was serving on the executive of the Irish Workers League (IWL).

A leading member of the Unemployed Protest Committee, he was a key figure in the election of Jack Murphy to Dail Eireann as an unemployed workers’ TD in 1957.

Church pressure on Murphy — and outright antagonism to Marxist activists like Nolan — saw him resign the seat in May 1958. 

Nolan played a leading role in progressive campaigns like the Dublin Housing Action Committee in the 1960s and contested the 1969 general election for the Irish Workers Party (IWP).

When in 1970, the IWP merged with the Communist Party of Northern Ireland (CPNI) to form the Communist Party of Ireland (CPI), Nolan was elected deputy general secretary.

In 1976, in reaction to the CPI changing its position on the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, Nolan was among the 21 members who resigned and created the Irish Marxist Society (IMS).

Nolan then joined the Labour Party and was active in Labour Left and elected to the party’s administrative council. He became an official for Ucatt and, from 1979, was secretary of Dublin Council of Trade Unions, a position, remarkably, he held into his eighties.

Throughout his life, Nolan read voraciously, retaining ideas while being unafraid to alter his own position when confronting by new evidence or strategic demands.

He had an alert awareness of tactical motions and decisions that advanced Irish workers’ cause, promoted peace and expressed international solidarity. He proved an indefatigable leader as the Dublin Council of Trade Unions-led protests against Vietnam and apartheid, led the PAYE Tax demonstrations of the 1970s/1980s, and supported every progressive economic, political and social cause.

In his last years, he was a vociferous opponent of the racist movements against migrants and demanded a free Palestine to his last day.

He was a conspicuous presence on Dublin May Days, whether on foot, with rollator or in wheelchair. His was a central voice in the trade union lobbying that resulted in the granting of May Day as a public holiday.

This year’s Dublin march — led by Sam’s partner, the Marxist philosopher Helena Sheehan — paid poignant tribute to his first absence from O’Connell Street for over half a century.

President Michael D ­Higgins, who attended Nolan’s funeral, acknowledged that Nolan’s chosen political path was “not an easy road” as while fighting for “vital rights” he was often “confronted with great hostility.”

When Higgins said that “the trade union movement, the labour movement and the entire left has lost an outstanding figure who played an important role in so many of the key campaigns of the last 70 years,” he spoke for thousands who had marched with Sam for over 80 years.

FRANCIS DEVINE