It’s hard to guess that one. Northern society is split into two tribes, so the politics reflects those tribal divisions. PSF and the DUP came to prominence by pitting one tribe against the other. I don’t think you can ignore the power of that dynamic, hoping that opportunistic manipulators will forget the best trick in the book or that the society will cease to be divided into two tribes. The tribal division regarding The Irish Language Act, for example, indicates otherwise.

Morality and principled behaviour from a political party will win votes, but will they win enough votes? PSF have been completely unprincipled on the issue of support for the UDA godfathers, but rather than condemn them for that, many of their supporters chose to either divert their eyes from it and onto the propriety of Her Majesty’s law (a delightful ultra pro-state juxtaposition for the old anti-state ‘republicans’) or they chose to praise PSF’s lack of principles as a virtue in politics. Either way, they recognise that they set the low standards by voting for PSF.

It might be that the public has been so corrupted by the process of being persuaded that mass-murderers are fit and proper people to hold elected office that they simply don’t have the required integrity to ‘purify’ their own politics at this late stage – which is probably why it isn’t necessarily a bad thing that you only have a puppet administration in the north, anyway.

I wonder if FF really know what they are letting themselves in for?

3 October 2007

The Mount in East Belfast on Friday 2 November (9.30am to 11.30am)

Has Ritchie consulted with her other partners? Will she be attending the consultation in the Farset Centre?

What are the implications for ‘joint’ ventures such as the McAleese (and SF) endorsed Finaghy Crossroads Group? Did someone forget to tell Comical Marty where his 2d went?

The impression given here (whether it is fair or not) is that they are spending more effort on trying to make sure things don’t get down than actually doing stuff. To be fair they have some of the more difficult Ministries (Ruane’s Education brief offers a particularly onerous cocktail of competing priorities).

But I suspect as this controversy continues that that impression will just sink deeper with each successive anaemic, direct-rule-policy-affirming directive that comes out of the ‘big two ministries’.

He strikes me as having the diligence and attention to detail that means one is more likely to believe his version of events over that of the DUP Ministers who probably spent their time shouting and sniping during the disputed meeting.

SF and the DUP made their way to the top of their respective tribal pile by being the loudest and brashest during the protracted negotiating period of the [i]process[/i], but now that politics has moved onto the nitty gritty, boring bread-and-butter stuff, the UUP and SDLP’s qualities such as consistency, logic and attention to detail, may become the more important attributes signalling a change in fortunes for the latter parties?

“Did any of the three move a motion to table the adoption of the minutes until the next meeting?”

If we ditch the apparently ambiguous word ‘table’ in the above and replace it with ‘defer’ – I think that’s what you’re asking although you seem to be confusing yourself as well as everyone else – well if you read or listen to what Reg Empey actually said, then that’s [i]precisely[/i] what the three ministers tried to do, but they were voted down by the DUP/SF axis so the minutes were adopted as the official (albeit still disputed) version of events.

Ritchie just wanted it on the record that she disagreed with the adopted version of events. You can debate whether it was wise to explicitly make accusations of minutes being deliberately tampered with (as opposed to it coming down to some kind of misunderstanding).

However, bear in mind that a certain senior civil servant has previous form when it comes to massaging the truth when it comes to producing official version of events (see judicial review of IVC case). And you can understand her anger about the same individual’s alleged behaviour two days beforehand – attempting to physically stop her from entering the chamber to make a Ministerial announcement in a legislature that she, not he, was elected to.

Ritchie, it seems to me, and I may be wrong here, has calibrated her most serious attacks on cabinet colleagues only, but she also seemed at pains on H&M to make it clear she simply wanted to focus on action, not recrimination. It’s pretty clear she’s been widely been briefed against, but it doesn’t look like a sticking point in any path to resolution.

SF’s first embarrassment was entirely self inflicted (40 minutes for goodness sake, how long do you need to change shortish speech?). Such apparent incompetence has its own price, not least with activists. Nothing eats away at confidence like failure to perform in the front rank.

Night.

I agree. But it reminds me of a question I asked earlier:

“it occurs to me to also ask why if she thought she was to pass on to the FM, DFM and Robinson the legal advice she received, what she believed to be the purpose of that.”

Just a courtesy fyi? Or they thought it was to come back to the exec? This could turn out to be a genuine misunderstanding on what was agreed at the second last meeting. There’s not enough information in the public domain for me to form an opinion yet.

As for SF, they’re all over the place these days trying to figure out what they still believe in, so who knows. She made them look bad so they tried to take a lump out of her and it backfired. That’s not evidence of a conspiracy against her though. That’s politics.

I see Robo’s transparent concern for coherent governance. It’s something he has voiced consistent concern over long before his party enter negotiations with SF never mind government. But I am puzzled as to why the Executive appeared to allow Ms Ritchie to take independent action two months ago and then stepped in so abruptly with that point of order two days ago, and then following it up with this mess of a meeting yesterday.

As for Sinn Fein? Their messaging has been all over the place. They clearly set a trap for Ms Ritchie on Tuesday which just as clearly backfired on them. I am always sceptical of the potential for any long term electoral damage out of short term skirmishes. And I also consider that the very real plaudits that Ritchie has earned are largely for her individual performance, not her party’s.

The flip flop between Ni Chuilin’s accusation that Ritchie had authorised the funding in the Assembly on Tuesday to McGuinness’s assertion two days later that it was the decision was taken by Peter Hain in the first place to fund the UDA is no kind of fatal blow. And granted they were talking about slightly different things. But the transparent intention to hoist a SDLP minister upon the meat-hook of UDA funding (even forty minutes after she had actually cut it) in the first instance, and in the second, the Deputy First Minister blatantly trying to get himself off precisely the same hook was damaging.

But how damaging I’m no position to say.

I could, but I can’t think of a good PR line to go with that one.

She played a blinder, but she should have held her cool while all around …

A full quotation would be more acceptable –

As in

“And your point is?

Oh, I see, “slightly unhinged”..

Well, as Martin McGuinness himself declared – She has “lost the run of herself”..”

It’s entirely unreasonable to say – “These are not accurate minutes of the last meeting of the Executive.”

Not at all. Minutes are often, if not always, inaccurate to some degree or another. It may, on the other hand, be considered unreasonable to accuse someone of altering them unless you can substantiate that accusation.

See? It’s not that hard to understand.

There is no need to second guess future events.

Welcome onboard, at last. Slugger’s is full of innuendo and speculation.

As it stands, Ritchie made a decision on stopping funding of the UDA/CTI project, the majority of her colleagues on the exec have voted to adopt the minutes of the second last meeting, Ritchie has accused some people of altering those minutes.

Though I do also understand that the points you are making have more to do with interpreting the PR game than actually getting to the nub of the problem.

Any speculation or innuendo on what the nub of the problem is allowed?

Here’s mine: SF control the nationalist side of the exec and assembly, the DUP control the unionist. The SDLP and UUP are bit part players at this stage. And it’s all a farce to date. Including Ritchie’s decision and Empey’s rush to hold her hand. Amateur politics and dramatics all rolled into one. But sure it keeps them off the streets anyway.

You have an opinion to share yourself?

That’s an awful lot of futuring. You are speaking of some things as though they had already happened when, to all intents and purposes, they have not. On the other hand, if you wish to make a disclosure at this point, just make sure it is legally robust.

I get your point about potential drift from her intention to act against the UDA, but that would appear to have blocked by the actions of her ministerial colleagues. Though I do also understand that the points you are making have more to do with interpreting the PR game than actually getting to the nub of the problem.

Reg Empey has provided useful information about how this Executive meeting departed from the norm. He also recalls telling Ms Ritchie that the upshot of the previous meeting was that she had been left on her own. He also noted:

- The last minute delivery of the minutes.

- The last minute co-option of an agenda item.

- A hiatus whilst the DUP and Sinn Fein conferred: though I understand that this also happened during an earlier meeting.

- The suggestion that one of the Ministers go home to find notes in the middle of the meeting.

- A quotation misattributed to Ms Ritchie by the Deputy First Minister.

This last is interesting since the substance of this particular dispute is an alleged insertion in the minutes of something Ms Ritchie denies ever happened. I would suggest that much of the irregularity around that meeting requires less answers from Ritchie than from her DUP and Sinn Fein cabinet colleagues.

There is also the disputed account of the behaviour of Ms Gildernew, who was variously reported in the mainstream press as having voted and abstained. It may not come to much in the end but at this stage, when we are so short of full disclosure, it pays to keep all potentially relevant detail close to hand.

There is no need to second guess future events. There is another meeting on Tuesday. Perhaps a resolution will be found by then? In the meantime, all I see is a lot of smoke and a few disingenuous mirrors.

It’s entirely unreasonable to say – “These are not accurate minutes of the last meeting of the Executive.”

And your point is?

Oh, I see, “slightly unhinged”..

Well, as Martin McGuinness himself declared – She has “lost the run of herself”..

Hello again, ref the above Sir Reg sounded very convincing on Talkback, I smell a fish…..

Are you trying to quote Loftholdingswood in your defence?

No, I was just making fun of his name, in that context.

Apart from that, I don’t see myself as defending anything.

Should I be?

Opposing the adoption of the minutes is as strong a signal, if not stronger – and was supported by the 2 UUP ministers.

And instead of saying look how reasonable I was, she started saying there was no mistake on her part, the minutes were altered, blah blah blah. To be frank, that’s idiocy. Rank amateur at best, slightly unhinged at worst.

Are you trying to quote Loftholdingswood in your defence?

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