Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Gordon’s tight Scots fingers on the UK purse…
Fascinating exchange in which the Belfast Telegraph’s Ed Curran’s easy stereotyping of the Scots, and the UK Chancellor of the Exchequer as, well, ‘tight’.
EC: Some people have suggested that the British Government has been pretty mean - and Gordon Brown in particular - with you and the new power-sharing administration? What is your view on that?
IP: Well we have an economic package? It is not as good as it should be, and it is not as good as it will be, but I think that we hit the ground at a very rough time, because there was great difference between 10 Downing Street and 11 Downing Street? And I don’t think that Mr Brown is a Stalinite.
I think he is a decent man. And he knows Northern Ireland, and he knows it because he was brought up in a Presbyterian manse and there is a great likeness between the Scottish situation in many ways and our situation.
EC: So you don’t think he is a bit tight?
IP: What?
EC: A bit tight, like the Scots have a reputation for being tight.
IP: No, what I think is this here: the man had other very important things on his plate at that time. And I think we did… maybe we did not put the case as well as we could have done, I don’t know.
Slugger O'Toole Admin @ 12:20 PM
Copper wire was invented when a Scotsman and a Dutchman started fighting over a penny.
Posted by on Jun 12, 2007 @ 01:15 PMHa!
you forgot he ha before penny in post #1
Posted by on Jun 12, 2007 @ 02:01 PMWhat is a Stalinite? Maybe the Comrade knows. Is it the one that grows from the cave floor?
Posted by on Jun 12, 2007 @ 02:23 PMCome one, treat the issue seriously. Suggesting a man might be tight with money because he is Scottish is like suggesting he will be stupid because he is Irish or well hung because he’s black. It’s not on for a journalist to talk like that.
Posted by on Jun 12, 2007 @ 03:13 PMLurker
You mean those aint true? Oh come on…
Amazes me few have picked up on this Aer Lingus story, or maybe they have before. Not that its all done and dusted by any means.
Posted by on Jun 12, 2007 @ 03:22 PMWhat an embarrasing article from Curran - more suited to afternoon, light entertainemnt TV while supping a cup of tea.
Not one question on DUP U Turning or what exactly the essential differences between the GFA & the SAA.
Curran is no Jeremy Paxman and indeed this whole piece was an embarassment to critical journalism and its role of holding our Leaders to serious account.
One has to assume that the BT is more concerned about keeping on the side of the ruling classes and hope they advance Tony O’Reilly’s agenda of having their ludicrously high Net Profit Margins taxed at 12.5% and thus a seemless transfer of cash back across the border.
Posted by on Jun 13, 2007 @ 12:22 PM
