85% rates rise in seven years

The normalisation of politics arrives at last, with a big fat rates rise of 19%, delivered courtesy of Peter Hain. Jeff Rooker explained that it came with a rise in certain expenditures: “We have announced a substantial investment strategy for Northern Ireland, we have launched new funds for Children and Young People, Skills and Science, and Environment and Renewable Energy and we have just announced increased funding for new drugs used in the treatment of cancer. All these are worthy …

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High growth in the Catholic middle classes

Fascinating piece in the Economist (via the invaluable Newshound). Much of the early stuff is general, but it slices down into some interesting longer term metrics for the substantial social change that has taken place underneath the stuff and nonsense of headline politics. It has some interesting things to say about a burgeoning Catholic middle class. More later! For members of the rapidly-growing Catholic middle class, in particular, life has never been better. Their success is evident in the universities, …

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Tourists staying longer in Northern Ireland

One of the bright spots in the comparative figures pulled together by Alan Ruddock in his north south ecnomic analysis for Management Today was the levels of tourism in Northern Ireland. Whilst number of visits last year were down, the people who do come are staying longer. The Northern Ireland Tourist Board said the overall number of visits last year dropped slightly by 1% from 1.98 million in 2004 to 1.96 million. However, the total number of nights spent by …

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NI has lowest unemployment rate in the World!

Yep, you’ve never had it so good! According to the latest comparative figures, Northern Ireland leads the world in the league for the lowest unemployment rate. It has the lowest ILO measure of unemployment of all countries listed – that includes all EU countries, the US, Canada, and Japan. Reader Howard notes: “I know there are caveats with all data but it’s a pretty striking headline stat for an economy so commonly derided”. Mick FealtyMick is founding editor of Slugger. …

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Hain under pressure to cap business rates?

Given how the manufacturing sector in Northern Ireland has taken a hammering in the last few years, unsurprisingly the Secretary of State is being heavily lobbied to cap local business rates by a cross party group drawing from a number of Northern Irish parties. “Group spokesperson Basil McCrea said the support of the parties was hugely significant and he hoped Mr Hain would take on board the suggestion that the industrial rates bills should be capped at 25%.” Companies may …

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Ireland 3rd highest in EU for oil consumption per capita

RTÉ highlights one of the policy options, Ireland may need nuclear power, recommended by Forfás, the national board responsible for providing policy advice to Government on enterprise, trade, science, technology and innovation in Ireland, in its latest report [full document here pdf file], but the report’s main focus is the Irish economy’s increasing dependency on oil and how to lessen the risks that dependency holds.The key finding of the report were – Key Findings – There is growing evidence to …

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Democracy or dependency?

Tom Griffin has picked up on my Guardian piece on the questions facing the Northern Irish economy, and puts it the context of a changing discourse around devolution. He believes the choice is between continuing dependency on the central UK exchequer, or self determination. It is a situation inherently favourable to nationalism, because he argues, “the choice for self-determination which is at the root of the nationalist ethos.” That said, only the DUP seem to have anticipated the need for …

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Northern Ireland and the non sectarian economy…

One of the surprising things about the Republic’s burst of economic busy-ness is the way in which the mythologies of the past have, thus far, had little provenance in the ‘great leap forward’. To paraphrase Robert Frost successful business way leads onto way. And that is very much the difference between an inward looking Northern Ireland and the outward looking Republic. My latest blog on the Guardian’s site, looks at Northern Ireland’s strange position on the periphery on the UK, …

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So, is everyone paying attention?

The Secretary of State for Wales and Northern Ireland, Peter Hain, could be forgiven if he had a wry smile [or perhaps a *shakes head*? – Ed] when faced this morning with the Sinn Féin delegation of Bairbre de Brún MEP, Mitchel McLaughlin MLA and Caoimhghin O Caolain TD asking for a £10 billion, 10-year “Peace Building Strategy”, to “deliver an agreed programme that puts stability and growth on the fast track”, although the SF statement is short on actual …

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Isle of Man drops tax to 0%

Given the pressure building for a harmonisation between Northern Ireland’s and the Republic’s rate of Corporation Tax, it seems the Isle of Man intends to stay ahead of the game by offering an inducement to one major IT firm of a 0% percentage rating! Thanks for the heads up Cormac!! Mick FealtyMick is founding editor of Slugger. He has written papers on the impacts of the Internet on politics and the wider media and is a regular guest and speaking …

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DUP: importance of getting macro conditions right

The DUP’s Robin Newton has an Op Ed in last night’s Belfast Telegraph backing the SDLP’s call for corporation tax to be reduced to 12.5%, or better still 10% so that Northern Ireland can remain competitive with the Republic.He goes on to break the now familiar narrative of “fair shares of the cake”, to arguing that government investment must concentrate on growing the cake: This one factor – immediately attracting greater levels of inward investment – could achieve a great …

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Fantasy Ireland?

Owen Bowcott noted that results of the census had raised sectarian tensions (and headcounts) every year since 1971. But when the last results were finally announced in December 2002 the hope of Catholics attaining majority status by force of higher birth rates, drained away almost overnight. Yet all of Northern Ireland’s Nationalist parties hold out for a possible future re-unification. Boston based writer Ron de Pasquale reckons it relies on pitching it coherently to the Protestant middle class. Mick FealtyMick …

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Diverging economies within the UK

Much of the recent engaged economic debate has been within the all island context. However, the FT has an interesting piece on how the UK is running on a two track economy: one with a flours hing private sector in in London, the South East, Eastern and South West regions; and the others effectively bust, and held up mostly by a massive degree of public expenditure. If there is a small bright spot for Northern Ireland it is that in …

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Ireland: at peace and open for business?

On his travels Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, as one of our California based readers put it, has gone to where the money is – San Jose, home to many of the US’s weathiest Venture Capitalists and one of Dublin’s several sibling cities. There he clearly laid out the Republic’s current pitch for inward investment: education, innovation and taxation. But he starts with a pitch on the Northern Ireland peace. Not process, just peace: The story of Ireland has never been brighter. …

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How we squandered our peace dividend

There is little doubt that in many respects Northern Ireland has never had it so good: unemployment rates are 4.5% (pdf), just below the UK’s average of 5.1%. The sense of settled well-being arising is most palpable in areas of traditional high unemployment like the Bogside in Derry. Disputes erupt every so often about the trend of higher Catholic unemployment, but we’re in a different territory from the 80% unemployed heads of households that held for some considerable time in the …

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Education, education, education…

Despite some online scepticism about the real reasons for Amazon’s strategic shift from Slough to Cork, it has caused some in the mainstream British press to pause for thought, given Amazon’s stated reason being a failure to attract a highly enough educated workforce. Mick FealtyMick is founding editor of Slugger. He has written papers on the impacts of the Internet on politics and the wider media and is a regular guest and speaking events across Ireland, the UK and Europe. …

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Northern Ireland’s major advantage over the Republic?

It looks like the Republic’s economic underbelly lies in the serious shortfall in its telecommunications infrastructure. According to Seán Murphy (subs needed), director of Chambers Ireland, “the 2005 IMD World Competitiveness Book, which tracks the performance of 60 countries, ranked Ireland 56th for its communications technology capabilities and 46th for its broadband subscriptions. While chambers have issues with how this survey defines broadband, the fact that internationally respected institutions can actually rate us at such a low point in the …

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Challenges ahead for Ireland’s economy

Thanks to Maria at Crooked Timber, who hopefully will find time to take a detailed look at the report, I can note the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development Economic Survey of Ireland, released yesterday., which, among other points, makes recommendations on the fiscal framework, the housing market, removing obstacles to employment for women, closing the infrastructure gap, encouraging research and development, reforming all levels of education, increasing competition, and, most importantly, the key challenges for the economy in the …

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“We’re all in this together” – Peter Hain

Another week, another two year funding package announced by the Secretary of State for Wales and Northern Ireland, Peter Hain [should we be reading something into that 2-year time-frame? – Ed]. This time a �59million package, the Environment & Renewable Energy Fund, that will attempt to create a market for renewable energy in Northern Ireland. The BBC report focuses mainly on the 4,000 private home-owners that the government hope will avail of grants [of between 30-50% of the cost) to …

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Our tedious range of displacement activity

Back in 2000 I came over to Northern Ireland with a colleague from River Path. He’d done his homework well. The most striking fact he came up with regarding NI’s economic health, at a time when money was arguably flowing far too freely, was that the inward investment of private capital in NI was 25% of the UK average. That, in anyone’s language, was/is bad news. It’s one reason why Lyndsey Allen’s fingering of the real problem of Northern Ireland …

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