Interesting piece by Brian Feeney in today’s Irish News, pointing out that a recently leaked committee report talks about beefing up the Lords, redding out the poor attenders (of which there are more than a few Unionist reps) and making all new seats amenable to re-election (albeit for a fifteen year period)…
He suggests that if Sinn Fein jumps abstain towards abstention, it is opening up new, winnable ground for nationalism’s zombie party (“life after political death”) in an all NI constituency fought on PR…
His reasoning presumably that whilst it may make sense for the Republican heartland to send a pure message to Westminster, an NI wide constituency will be looking for more parliamentary bang for their buck… And abstentionism is not likely to go down as well with everyone else…
Mick 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. Twitter: @MickFealty
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