DUP Leader, Arlene Foster was speaking to party supporters this evening making the following comments On devolution: “Northern Ireland has now been without an effective government since the start of the year. Since the March Assembly election we have been engaged in several rounds of discussions with Sinn Fein and the other Northern Ireland parties more…
If the Irish Times is right, Dublin HQ has prevented Michelle O’Neill from striking a political deal. It is a deplorable fact that throughout this 10 month deadlock, so little is reliably known about party positions beyond nods, winks and notoriously unreliable mood music. At least in the Brexit negotiations the principals give some sort more…
Interesting speculation in the Irish Times on who is holding things up. Dublin and London sources are pointing fingers directly at Sinn Fein to accuse them of an old Modus Operandi of theirs: ie, telling their interlocutors they’re nearly ready and, then suddenly not being… We’ve seen the same pattern in countless negotiations in which even a more…
Catalans stand on their balconies late into the night banging metal pans with spatulas and wooden spoons snatched from their kitchen drawers. The collective rattle of utensils echoes throughout Barcelona. Spain has imprisoned two leading Catalan Independence leaders in a move that only serves to deepen and harden the current divisions between Barcelona and more…
Dr Gráinne Watson spoke to Slugger about ‘smart cities’ ahead of her session at Thursday’s Big Data Belfast conference. The concept has burgeoned as local and national governments try to address the impact of climate change, recycling targets, urban regeneration, transport congestion and economic investment.
Northern Ireland has been such a pasty white place until recently. So much so, that in my teens I worried that I’d accidentally be a racist when I finally met some brown people. Thankfully there was a website for this – a university had set up a test, flashing images of white and brown people more…
While the news about Bombardier is very welcome, a note of caution is also due. Boeing is not taking it lying down. Again, though Bombardier are saying that a new C-series production line in Alabama means expansion of C-series production as a whole, there are bound to be fears that Bombardier/Airbus may eventually switch some more…
I was a guest of Fianna Fáil at the Ard Fheis in Dublin this weekend, specifically to talk about the recent disastrous Tory campaign and to describe how Labour was able to brigade its new ecclesia towards one unlikely victory. In summary, here are seven loosely connected overall impressions from Saturday: What’s changed since 2013? No protesters more…
The Northern Ireland administration’s late and confused hurricane warning to school children and young people parallels local political attitudes to climate change. By failing to take climate change seriously even when the evidence is hitting us in the face we are disregarding the rights of our children and young people. The late, confused and more…
The View presenter Mark Carruthers has taken a look into the complexities of identity in Northern Ireland. In his 30 minute documentary for Radio Ulster he speaks with academics, politicians and members of the clergy about their experiences with identity and what makes up a Northern Irish identity. As the radio programme starts, Carruthers points more…
I’ve been following the news as Ophelia has been tracking her way up the island. Can you please share your observations and concerns (photos too), but we’re more interested in hearing your direct experiences in the comments below…
So the target date for either direct rule or an agreement to revive the Executive has slipped for another week at least. What a surprise! We were told by the two governments yet again that ” progress” had been made, but this has been slapped down by the DUP. Sinn Fein’s agenda as far as more…
Plan A or plan B? Deal or no deal? The Parties (DUP / SF) are at a fork in the road. All clichés that have been bandied about since last week when there was a faint glimmer of hope that there would be some sort of resolution to the talks that apparently have been ongoing more…
It seems far-fetched, risible even, yet some experts claim the Camino de Santiago de Compostella is the origin of the European Union project. The argument goes that the pilgrims of the Middle-Ages who tramped across the many Pilgrim Ways that coalesce in the City of Santiago, north-west Spain, brought tolerance of differences and a focus more…
Carrie Montgomery is deputy chief executive at Contact NI. If 90% of Northern Ireland patient deaths by suicide were assessed as no or low risk during their last contact with services, she asks in this post why the Public Health Agency is being constrained to just provide services for people at high risk of suicide?
Background This Sunday 15th October, the Austrian people will head to the polls for a general election. This snap election was called in May following the resignation of vice-chancellor Reinhold Mitterlehner of the centre-right People’s Party (ÖVP). The incumbent ‘grand coalition’ of the ÖVP and the centre-left Social Democrats (SPÖ), led by current Chancellor Christian more…
Mike Nesbitt is the former leader of the UUP and is the current MLA for Strangford How do you think you would react if you heard that a unionist leader – Robin Swann, or Arlene Foster, for example – was refusing to deal with the NHS waiting lists, or the funding crisis in our schools, more…
BREAKING: Michel Barnier says he will NOT recommend to EU leaders next week that talks will move to the trade issue — Tony Connelly (@tconnellyRTE) October 12, 2017
Irish speakers are entertained mightily at present by a series of memes poking fund at the Newsletter’s hysterical obsession with scare stories about what an Irish Language Act might do to Northern Ireland – the funniest features a front page story trumpeting a proposal to replace Edward Carson’s statue at Stormont with one of Peig more…
Stephen Dempster did a handy piece of reportage on the Social Investment Fund. The figure at the heart of the piece, Robin Newton was quick (9.01) to anticipate the Nolan firestorm that followed this morning: “I reject the allegations in the Spotlight programme. I did not mislead the NI Assembly. I have never been appointed more…
