Irish Newspapers suggest that Provisional IRA sympathisers being members of the P-IRA political wing, Sein Fein existed in Australia as “Irish-Republican movement “ and brought over an alleged P-IRA bomber to tour centres of Irish population in Australia and “talk” at events at Irish Clubs.
Publication: Irish Examiner
Location: Cork, Ireland.
Publication Date: Tuesday, July 24, 1979
Page: 14
Article Title: IRA man arrested in Australia
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A member of the IRA, Phillip McCullough, was arrested in Adelaide, Australia yesterday on charges of having concealed a criminal record when seeking entry to Australia.
A spokesman for the Department of Immigration in Canberra said McCullough was arrested after it was confirmed he had been convicted in Belfast of causing an explosion that destroyed a telephone booth.
The Department spokesman said McCullough had served 18 months in Prison for his offence. "Since he had not disclosed at the time of his application for a visa that he had a criminal record, he became a prohibited immigrant on arrival in Australia, the spokesman said.
McCullough is to be held until the Immigration Department decides whether to seek his deportation. McCullough is a member of the Provisional Sinn Fein. He was spending the week in Adelaide as a guest of the Irish-Republican movement. McCullough was arrested by a plain-clothes Australian policeman accompanied by an official from the Department for Immigration at the home of a member of Sinn Fein in South Australia.
Publication: Evening Herald
Location: Dublin, Ireland.
Issue Date: Tuesday, July 24, 1979
Page: Page 5
Americans leave
"A SINN FEIN man and a leading Sydney television girl are at the centre of a major controversy in Adelaide, Australia.
Philip McCullough, 33, was arrested in the South Australian capital yesterday for failing to disclose a criminal record on his visa application. And TV News personality Geraldine Willesee quit her job with a Sydney station to rush to his aid. The couple met in Belfast three years ago when Miss Willesee was covering the Northern Ireland scene. She told Adalaide newsman Bob Whittington: "He was a friend to me when I was over there. Now I want to help a friend." Miss Willesee, 28, is the sister of Sydney's leading television compere (Mike Willesee) and the daughter of a former Senator (Don Willesee).
McCullough was arrested in a private house, shortly before he was due to speak to a meeting of the Irish-Australian Club. He has been in the country for over a month, touring centres of Irish population and giving his views on the Northern situation.
He is now awaiting deportation on a charge of failing to give full information on his visa application. Australian policy say that he did not include his criminal record, an 18 month prison sentence for setting fire to a phone box in Belfast."
Publication: The Sydney Morning Herald
Location: Sydney, New South Wales
Issue Date: Wednesday, July 25, 1979
Page: Page 6
Article Title: False Pretences
The Sydney Morning Herald from Sydney, New South Wales on July 25, 1979 · Page 6
"IT IS not surprising that a visiting Northern Ireland republican, Mr Philip McCullough, should have been arrested in Adelaide as a prohibited immigrant and that he should now, in effect, be obliged to leave. In his application for a visa he did not disclose the fact that he had a criminal record that, in fact, he had spent 18 months in jail for causing an explosion which had wrecked a telephone booth. This being the case, he has clearly misled the Australian authorities, who, like their counterparts in most other countries, might well have refused him admission if they had known of his conviction for a violent act. He can thus blame only himself, not Australia, for the situation in which he now finds himself. The Acting Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs, Mr Ellicott, had no alternative but to set in train measures which have led to the announcement of Mr McCullough's voluntary departure. No country, least of all at a time when terrorism is a world-wide problem, can be expected to tolerate deception in a visa application. Mr McCullough claims he has never been involved in terrorist violence, but he also admits supporting violence in certain circumstances. And his conviction for a violent act is on the record. That should be quite enough for the Australian Government. What should not be done, however, is to go beyond this single, and damaging, consideration. Mr McCullough is a leading member of the Irish nationalist Sinn Fein organisation, the political wing of the Irish Republican Army. In Australia, this is not a crime. Nor is it a crime to spend a week in Adelaide as the guest of the Irish-Australian republican movement. Nor, by the same token, is there anything reprehensible about touring Australia, as Mr McCullough has been doing for four weeks, to put the Irish republican case. Many people, repelled by the IRA's appalling record of violence, may insist that such a tour is undesirable; but it is not illegal. The same may be said of a tour in support of other causes which have embraced violence for example, the Palestine Liberation Organisation. The free interplay of ideas is vital to the survival of democracy, and it is both dangerous and naive to hope to suppress ideas which many may find utterly unpalatable. Australian democracy should be hardy enough to accommodate them. Mr McCullough's mistake was not to state his views but to conceal his conviction for a violent act."
In case you were wondering, what became of him>
Mr Philip McCullough is described in the below you tube video as a "journalist" with the "Belfast Media Group"
