Speaking after the meeting, Gerry Carroll said:
"Yesterday’s message from the Garvaghy Road residents could not have been clearer: this march is not wanted. Nearly 4,000 local people have signed petitions opposing it. That is an entire community speaking with one voice.”
"Residents are genuinely fearful about the prospect of widespread violence this weekend. Many of them remember 1997 all too well, when they were promised no march would take place, only for that promise to be broken and people dragged off their own road so the Orange Order could get its way. Nobody should be asked to relive that trauma.”
"The British and Irish governments have a duty to intervene and stop this disruptive march from going ahead. We have also written to the Parades Commission to register our objection to this march taking place in any form. This isn’t about culture or heritage. It is an attempt to impose Orangeism's will on a community that has already said no.”
"Political unionism is deliberately stirring up sectarian tensions to distract from its own endless string of scandals, and from the fact that it is heading into the May elections a wounded animal. But unionist elites do not speak for working class Protestants. Nobody wants to see a return to the dead-end violence of the past. Working class people in every community face the same housing crisis, the same cost-of-living squeeze and the same crumbling health service. The only people who benefit when we're turned against each other are those at the top.”
"Residents were also clear in their stand against racism. The people of the Garvaghy road - whether from the nationalist or migrant communities, or neither - refuse to be targeted, and they refuse to be divided.”
"All Garvaghy Road residents deserve to live in peace. They won't take this lying down, and People Before Profit will stand with them every step of the way."