Brian Walker Why are very important subjects like personal finance and climate change so mindnumbingly boring? For two reasons I suggest. We’re frightened of them and the waywardness of human nature robs us of easy answers. I defy you to tell me what the real story is coming out of Copenhagen, leaving aside the demos and the shuffling over the size of the conference table. I think it may be a political poker game between China straddling the First and Third Worlds, …
With deadlock and blocking being the dull keynotes at the macro level of the North-south institutions, political scientist Elaine Byrne’s view of practical cooperation in the Irish Times provides a cheering note. Even more worth noting was George Quigley’s grand overview of 10 years of the institutions and how to take them forward. Towards the end of his lecture he opts for an eventual Irish confederation, with the preservation of British citizenship for those who want it, but his constitutional …
The people of Northern Ireland, he suggested, are not as divided as the politicians. On this one, I feel like the guy at the back of the crowd whose shout isn’t heard. I’ve been saying this for years and hoping it’s true. The sentence comes from Liam Clarke’s reflective piece in the Newsletter, where he quotes the businessman/blogger,/ and now new SDLP politician Conall. The trouble with the quote is (a) it’s desperately hard to prove and (b) such evidence …
Not a bad prediction. “Biffo’s efforts to nudge along P&J will mainly be interesting I suspect, because of the body language afterwards. Will Marty and Peter stand together etc? “ And stand together they did after a fashion – at least no boats were burned by either party. They could hardly have avoided the joint appearance, as the Taoiseach was standing just out of shot, wisely avoiding playing piggy in the middle. Yet the contrast with the post-Massarene standing together …
Are the wheels coming off the Chilcot inquiry? The Lib Dems aren’t the only ones to accuse it of failing its first test with former JIC chief John Scarlett, he of the notorious 45 minute claim. I admit this badly knocked my own confidence in the panel. The gap between Blair lying and Blair self-deception is narrowing as the inquiry progresses. Now former DPP Ken Macdonald, a top lawyer whose very job was to know the exact weight of words, …
There’s a substantial agenda for today’s North-South ministerial council at Limavady. Biffo’s efforts to nudge along P&J will mainly be interesting I suspect, because of the body language afterwards. Will Marty and Peter stand together etc? Both leading parties have been rival champions for NAMA protection, Marty receiving “assurances “ that no “fire sale” will threaten northern stability and Sammy nominating advisory board members. Who ever said north-south was useless? Some relief must be felt that northern assets at risk …
The Sunday Business Post claims that 4.1% cut in Welfare will “push Irish youth abroad.” Where to? Unless it’s to look for scarce work. On welfare they’re still a lot better off than in UK including NI. Take two rough comparisons. They’re crude, they may not compare like with like and I offer them only in the hope that others will pitch in with valid and comprehensive comparisons and what the respective financial measures may mean for the whole island …
The Sunday Times The Conservatives have opened up a polling lead of 17 points, bringing an abrupt end to recent Labour hopes that the next election could result in a hung parliament. Only the Chancellor’s plan to impose taxes on bankers’ bonuses is backed by voters, with 66 per cent saying taxing high earners is fair. And Mr Cameron and George Osborne, the shadow Chancellor, have yet to convince voters that they have the right prescription to get Britain out …
With fastidious care but still with a provocative edge, Matthew Parris has called for a end to the extreme sentimentality in the public debate and news coverage over British army casualties in Afghanistan. He does so in a spirit of deep respect for the troops and their families. But he points that this is a volunteer army and that a young person’s decision to sign up for the Armed Forces has not invited a greater career risk of death or …
Alliance’s surprise ( to me) pullout from the P&J ministry complicates what seemed to be a straighforward if stubborn impasse between two sides. Whether this buys time for a solution or wastes it will I suppose become clear quite quickly. At this distance though, it seems a rather priggish move and a lost opportunity for David Ford to have refused nomination as the minister. His half-nomination had been the single accommodating exchange between the DUP and Sinn Fein on the …
Despite the shock, the horror and the scathing hurt words, the Irish body politic doesn’t really get it, even now. A management culture is about to hit the Roman Catholic Church, according to the Indy, with fewer dioceses and management training for bishops, but still no new recruitment plan for priests. What system exists for the people of Ireland to approve or disapprove whatever reform turns up? None as far as I can see. It will come handed down from …
A fortnight after the report, and a reaction at last. ..the Holy Father was deeply disturbed and distressed …..The Holy Father shares the outrage, betrayal and shame felt by so many of the faithful in Ireland.. “Disingenuous and inadequate” a survivors group call it. The BBC are reporting that “heads will roll” and that the Church in Ireland will be reorganised, whatever that means. Only a papal visit and a public apology in Ireland would allow the Vatican to atone …
A furious spin battle is going on right now that may decide whether Gordon Brown’s main plank for the election holds up or shatters in pieces. At first glance, the spectacularly disloyal leak that the Treasury wanted to go much further and raise Vat rather than national insurance has the smack of a government losing control. Brown promptly denied any split but he would say that wouldn’t he? The challenge to his credibility at such a time seems deeply wounding, …
Let’s cover the local angle first – somebody has to. The Northern Ireland MSM’s sparse coverage on line of the implications of both Budget statements suggests that money talk is beyond their ken and that of their audiences. This is a bad mistake and lazy journalism. So it’s thanks to Henry in the Guardian for making the obvious phone calls and passing on the Northern Bank’s assessment that for NI the recession is over – thanks to southern shopping. We …
At last “the momentous day” has arrived when the mountain of constitutional and legal obstacles to abortion care and counselling in the Republic is being challenged in the Strasbourg Human Rights court. The three women “AB and C” argue that this lack of care and counselling amounts to a violation of their human rights. One of them suffered an ectopic pregnancy. They also say the lack of any effective legal remedy in Ireland means taking a case in the State …
Since we’re on about the Church, in Northern Ireland the decision to make the new Education and Skills Authority (after I hope only a temporary hiccup) the general school employer, will further erode the role of the Catholic clergy, already much less than in the Republic, as far as I can make out. Did it happen when nobody was looking? Might the secular trend advance even further if as a solution to the school transfer impasse, choice at 14 was …
I’ve just spent two hours at Biobank, a UK wide health data project, patiently answering lots of very personal questions about the state of my health. Half of them were about my well being, my state of mind, and what I think are the reasons for it. All done anonymously of course but hopefully to bear fruit one day in new social policies. Happiness as a social goal is at least as old as Jeremy Bentham, the utilitarian philosopher of …
Just to show how desperately the climate change deniers are grasping at straws.This is the clearest account I’ve seen of the great tree ring data scandal from East Anglia, by the university’s Royal Society Research Professor. Brian WalkerFormer BBC journalist and manager in Belfast, Manchester and London, Editor Spolight; Political Editor BBC NI; Current Affairs Commissioning editor BBC Radio 4; Editor Political and Parliamentary Programmes, BBC Westminster; former London Editor Belfast Telegraph. Hon Senior Research Fellow, The Constitution Unit, Univ …
Not only is the north mopping up on the shopping but the PSNI are becomng officious over southern motorists’ laws, it seems. We all tell stories in a tight corner but this one has a ring of truth from the Derry Journal. …the Inishowen mother, whose car was pulled over had her Irish registered car clamped despite her car tax being out of date by 48 hours. The distraught mum, who wishes to remain anonymous, was clearly seriously distressed as …
The news alerts, the backgrounders, the live blogs from Copenhagen- all great stuff. But is a single campaigning editorial line from 56 papers in 45 countries just what we need to launch it ? On the contrary, there’s nothing like a big chorus of unanimity to set off the discordant voices and stoke the comforting paranoia of grandstanding sceptics the Telegraph’s blog editor sympathises with in a – wouldn’t you know it? – last minute tilt at the BBC. Personally …
