BRIEF REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE HOUSE OF PARLIAMENT, HELSINKI DURING THE STATE VISIT
BRIEF REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE HOUSE OF PARLIAMENT, HELSINKI DURING THE STATE VISIT TO FINLAND
Madam Speaker
It is a privilege to have this opportunity to visit the Parliament of Finland, to meet you once again, to meet your parliamentary colleagues and to see this elegant building, one of the most distinguished seats of parliamentary democracy in Europe.
Since I knew we were to meet here on this day, the 22nd of May, I sought inspiration from the great Finnish epic, the Kalevala, and by coincidence found there in Rune the 22nd, the Tormenting of the Bride, the story of women as the poem says “ever slave to other masters.” And I wondered if it was the power of pity in that great epic that moved this country, this Parliament, to become legendary champions of universal suffrage. Like your own distinguished President, I too am one of the very few elected women Heads of State in the world. It is a very particular and moving honour to stand in this Parliament, the first Parliament in the world to give the vote. Ireland followed your lead soon after. The unfortunate, sad young bride of the Kalevala lamented her situation saying:
“Otherwise I thought and fancied
Wished it different all my lifetime,
Thought to go as goes the cuckoo…”
Thanks to those early pioneers of equality, we are now able to say things are very different, more and more women do know the liberation of going where they want life to take them and not where others would put them.
Madam Speaker, this is not the first time you and I have talked of some of these things. I recall with pleasure meeting you in Dublin earlier this year when you led a group of Finnish Parliamentarians to Ireland. This was in return for an earlier visit to Finland by a delegation of Irish Parliamentarians. I know that on these visits the Irish and the Finns got on like the proverbial house on fire. That probably explains why there is a very lively Finnish-Irish Friendship group in this Parliament and an on-going interest in extending and deepening friendships and links between the representatives of our peoples.
We are two small nations. Our people have known many forms of misery and oppression historically. They have transcended a lot of hurt. We are fiercely proud of our respective identities and we each fought a bitter fight to achieve our independence. Today both our countries know a level of success and self-confidence which vindicates much of the past suffering. These things allow us to relate easily and spontaneously to each other at the human level and they encourage us to foster that human dimension, building up mutual networks of support and assistance. These things will benefit our peoples and enrich all of us.
Both our societies have faced and continue to face contemporary challenges from the changes in the world economic environment. We have both been very successful in adapting to those changes and using effectively the opportunities they present, particularly in the information technology sector. We have also faced similar problems including those associated with achieving balanced economic development. These things and many more we have in common, but we are different. And it is in those very differences that our biggest mutual resources lie as we share with each other our different experiences, different perspectives, different insights, different wisdom. These things are tradable gifts if we have the humility and the generosity to share and to offer them. We have much to learn from you and I know you are interested in hearing our story too. I hope that the contacts between our Parliaments will continue and develop, that the Finnish and Irish peoples from opposite sides of Europe, will long be joyfully curious about each other.
Thank you once again, Madam Speaker, for your warm welcome and hospitality.