Wirral-Curious: Down the Banksy Comes Over the Water
Interview by Niamh Rourke for Wirral Community Review
NIAMH: Siobhán McDonnell, better known as Down the Banksy, you’ve been described lately as “Wirral-curious.” Should we be worried?
SIOBHÁN: Only in a constructive way. I came over to see Charlotte Joanne and accidentally found a peninsula having an argument with itself, which is very much my area.
NIAMH: Accidentally?
SIOBHÁN: Charlotte Joanne doesn’t invite you round like a normal person. She says, “Come for coffee,” and by the time the kettle’s boiled there’s a moral framework, three named women, a planning dispute, and a sentence trying to get onto a wall. She’s like if a filing cabinet had feelings and lipstick.
NIAMH: That sounds affectionate.
SIOBHÁN: It is. Annoyingly. I’m fond of her. She has this gift for making a local row feel like the edge of civilisation without losing sight of the actual hedge.
NIAMH: Your football piece — “We know who’s English by the colour of their shirts, not the colour of their skin” — has already travelled well beyond its first version. What was the point of it?
SIOBHÁN: The point was: don’t pretend confusion. Football people understand belonging perfectly. Shirt, badge, song, scarf, end, stand, suffering, loyalty. They know what adopted identity looks like when it’s made of polyester. Then suddenly, when the subject is Englishness, some people act like skin is the only thing they can read. No. I’m not having that collapse in literacy.
NIAMH: And now you’ve followed the wall with an essay about Peak Cluster, carbon capture, and Wirral.
SIOBHÁN: Because a wall can remove an alibi, but it can’t do all the paperwork. The shirt piece is a reprimand. The pipeline argument needs a ledger. Different instrument. Same bad temper.
NIAMH: For readers who have not been following every inch of the carbon capture debate, what is your position?
SIOBHÁN: My position is not “approve it.” My position is not “stop it.” My position is: stop lying about the invoice.
If a major CO₂ pipeline and coastal installation affects Wirral, then Wirral gets to ask hard questions. Route. safety. wildlife. flood risk. emergency planning. compensation. who profits. who carries the risk. All of it.
But if the answer is “no pipeline,” then the next question is not “lovely, back to innocence.” Cement and lime still produce CO₂. The country still wants homes, roads, hospitals, railways, water treatment, all the concrete civilisation likes to stand on while pretending it is above industry. So where does that bill go instead?
NIAMH: This is your “some other fucker” idea?
SIOBHÁN: Regrettably, yes. It began as a rude phrase and then behaved like political economy.
Everyone wants the benefit. Everyone wants some other fucker to host the cost. Not in my back yard. Not in my tax bracket. Not on my coast. Not through my village. Not in my view. Fine. Sometimes “not here” is right. Sometimes “no” is the moral answer. But name who pays instead.
That’s the whole thing. Name the some-other-fucker before you congratulate yourself.
NIAMH: So you are asking both sides to be more honest?
SIOBHÁN: I know. Horrible of me.
Developers don’t get to say “nationally significant infrastructure” like that makes local fear evaporate. A mitigated cost is still a cost. A regulated hazard is still a hazard. A restored field has still been dug up.
But objectors don’t get to say “no” as if the atmosphere signs the receipt and leaves quietly. If refusing this protects Wirral but sends the emissions, jobs, imports, or infrastructure burden somewhere else, then say that too.
NIAMH: That sounds less like protest art and more like accountancy.
SIOBHÁN: Finally, someone understands me. I’m not a street artist. Streets are just where the wall was. I don’t decorate surfaces. I issue notices.
NIAMH: And what notice would you issue to Wirral?
SIOBHÁN: Something polite enough for a community magazine?
NIAMH: Ideally.
SIOBHÁN: Then this:
Wirral is not a dumping ground. Wirral is not a blank space at the end of someone else’s diagram. But Wirral is also not outside the climate, outside industry, outside the national ledger, or outside consequence.
So ask every question. Demand every receipt. Refuse the smooth brochure voice. But price both columns.
NIAMH: Final line?
SIOBHÁN: No is not free. Yes is not free either. Price both columns.