Peter Hain: “I took some risky decisions to engage with people who were on the fringes…”

The BBC reports more self-aggrandisement disguised as political comment from the erstwhile Secretary of State for Wales, etc, Peter Hain.  From the BBC report

“In Northern Ireland, I think there is a particular issue with the loyalist community and I do not think the government is doing enough to engage with them,” [Peter Hain] said.

“I took some risky decisions to engage with people who were on the fringes and some actually almost in uniform as it were, in paramilitary activity, and it paid off.”

[Who could he possibly mean? – Ed]  Well, to be fair, some of those people are still on-side.

And which ‘government’ does he mean?  I suspect that his target is the Conservative/Lib Dem coalition in London.  But, unlike the time when Peter Hain was undermining the rule of law, and contradicting the PSNI, the issues he identifies would now more accurately be described as being the responsibility of the Northern Ireland Executive semi-detached polit-bureau.  [That was the ‘indigenous’ deal! – Ed]  And they have responded to violent unrest before…

From the same BBC report

Mr Hain said that, coupled with youth unemployment, made the situation in Northern Ireland “very toxic”.

“Youth unemployment is horrific in Northern Ireland and particularly loyalist youngsters feel that they don’t have a future. They think that republicans are getting everything.

“You’ve got youngsters without training, without jobs, on both sides of the divide actually feeling that this is ‘not their scene’ any more.

“Because they can’t get jobs, they don’t have a stake so they’re causing trouble, and there’s also, I think, an identity issue there as well,” he told BBC’s The Wales Report.

However, apparently, some of the parties in that NI Executive now only yearn for victory…

Pete Baker