Brian Walker

To my question : “What lord of the nature decreed that newspapers had an exclusive right to the internet?”, the Guardian adds: “ Who made the rule that everything on the internet should be free?” Answering its own question, it confesses media bosses themselves were responsible, treating the internet first as a cute showcase, then an affordable loss leader, before the transformative power of new media finally hit them. Now Rupert Murdoch, faced with a $2 billion loss has decided …

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No time like the silly season for one of those occasional landmark think pieces by an American about the place of the UK in the world. Styrker McGuire of Newsweek characterises Britain under Blair to have been “ the last gasp of Empire” and insists that the recession will make Britain less special. Well maybe, but who would have expected the boom time of the 90s and early noughties? “Greatness” is a subjective measure relying overmuch on military rather than …

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It seems to be a season for catching up on obits. Dick Ferguson QC rose to the top of the lawyer’s tree on both sides of the water, as defence counsel in some of this era’s most notorious murder trials . The Fergusons, it may be necessary to remind people, were prominent Fermanagh Unionists. Cousin Raymond was a member of the 1982 Assembly and chairman of Fermanagh Council. Another relative was Harry West, the former Unionist leader. Dick was in …

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As you get older, you have to get used to the idea of real life experiences repeating as something called culture. It’s always an anxious moment, waiting for the re-enactment or recall. Will vivid memories of the old experiences come rushing back or will they return back embalmed. in the oul’ Oirish way? Day after day in the old Belfast Magistrate’s Court, solicitor Paddy McGrory (senior) solemnly intoned little speeches as to why his clients should get bail. Every now …

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This nine year study of behaviour in integrated and segregated achools by University of Ulster psychologists is more than a statement of the bleedin’ obvious. I hope it provokes an open debate among all responsible people, frustrated by the persistent failure of the end of the Troubles to blunt sectarian edges. Only 6% attend the integrated sector. But closer mixing can help relationships in the other sectors where however “teachers in mixed schools in Northern Ireland can find it difficult …

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Prompted by a comment in Mick’s Ryanair post, I’m putting up the news in case like me, you missed the death of that wonderfully versatile actor Harry Towb. He was equally at home in Greek tragedy and the slapstick of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum or a Sam McCready comedy. Reared in the now very small Jewish community in Belfast, the Jewish Chronicle records that he was thought to be the only Jew ever to …

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The Sunday Times fails to declare an interest in its depressing report that the Observer is threatened with closure on the back of Guardian Media Group’s growing operating loss of £36.8 million. This is the paper’s plausible enough spin on GMG’s statement on Friday that it will be unable to carry the current rate of losses beyond 2011. The ST also fails to declare the parent Murdoch group including Sky’s self-interest in its separate story claiming that the Conservatives in …

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In that other Supreme Court, the Dublin one, justice has been served by denying the Mahon Tribunal the chance of interrogating Irish Times editor Geraldine Kennedy and correspondent Colm Keena on the sources of newsbreaks about Bertie Ahern’s notorious “dig-outs.” The five judge court yesterday found the High Court devalued journalistic privilege “so severely” in its decision it had, as a result, failed to strike the proper balance between the rights of the tribunal to protect its private investigative phase …

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Some other thoughts about the new UK Supreme Court which takes over from the Law Lords in October. It’s basically the same lot with the same powers, but now formally separate from the legislature, which is the case in most countries. The modernising Blair government made the historic change almost casually because they felt the UK’s ( or rather England’s) historic concentration of the powers in Parliament was oudated and open to serious challenge on grounds of unfairness and incompatibility …

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Due sensitivity has been observed over the thorny problem of how to symbolise Northern Ireland in new UK projects. The controversial ID card has already been discussed exhaustively in Slugger, where you can just about make out the shamrock ( for Irish citizens, you see). For the new Supreme Court which is more territorial, they opted for a flax plant, not that we have many left outside the Folk museum. From the BBC slide show ( sorry I can’t reproduce …

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Sir Paul Stephenson backs down in row over Union Jack badges. Will commenters high mindedly ignore this too predictable thread or take up the cudgels? Just a test! 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 Coll. London

Broadly on Mick’s theme of creating a “free and open encounter” for Digital Britain and Ireland, Open Democracy reviews a really stimulating paper: Electing our Masters: the Hustings in British Politics. In it, author Jon Lawrence calls for a reinvention of the old 18th century hustings, “assertive, irrelevant and sometimes disorderly.” Paternalist TV and politicians’ spin are much to blame for shutting the wider public out of campaigns and so far, pace Obama, the web for all its diversity, provides …

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It was a godsend that Sean Donlon, Eamonn Gallagher and Noel Dorr were the chiefs of Dublin’s Department of Foreign Affairs at the height of the troubles. In a memoir appearing in the Irish Times over the past two days, Donlon gives a gripping account of how Charles Haughey when first elected Taoiseach at the end of 1979 tried to overturn the anti-Provo stance of Jack Lynch. Clearly, the diplomats were nervous of how the (wholly and completely innocent) former …

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Which split will grow wider – DUP-TUV or Sinn Fein- Éirígí? Are the main parties doing more than suffering from a bout of activists’ fever? Or could widening fissures really throw Northern Ireland politics into the melting pot? If the threat to Sinn Fein in the north really is substantial – and I’m not convinced – the trend presents a challenge to the centrist parties the Ulster Unionists and the SDLP they can hardly afford to ignore. With the TUV …

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Liam Clarke, never a republican apologist, takes the alarmist line on Sinn Fein’s future if it sticks with Gerry Adams. No surprise that he describes a party moving away from the old stalinism. A new southern strategy he reports, is not only needed on its merits but to counteract fears of instability in the north. The DUP political leadership appears less committed to equality and partnership in government; unionism overall is fractured and directionless; and the political institutions are becoming …

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A quick flick round the Sundays shows a neat split between support for Tory cuts and Labour spending. The Conservatives are coming out more and more macho about cuts though on the details if you saw him this morning, you’d have to agree that Cameron was pathetic. Despite their rhetoric, on specifics they’re as scared as Labour and people can see through that. Only recently dismissed as impossibly crude, Gordon Brown’s neo-Keynesianism which has already gained some traction, is raising …

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Although there’s no doubt of Andrew Mackinlay’s unionist sympathies, these are not exclusive. You fail to capture the essence of the man if you stereotype him as simply a DUP supporter or anything else. He is in fact that rare animal, a one man awkward squad who genuinely believes in Parliament. And he ‘s that even rarer creature, an English MP with a real interest in our affairs. Regularly, he was one of only two of three Labour backbenchers present …

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Under pressure of the worst recession since the 1930s, leadership everywhere is having a tough time. Gerry Adams take comfort, you’re not alone. Like the early to mid 30s, only in America is leadership flourishing and even there, under growing pressure. In our own islands, the uncanny similarities between Brown and Cowen – finance ministers who got us into this mess, poor communicators, worse leaders etc – persuade many of us to write them off. None of this will produce …

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In case you missed it, a terrific piece by Newton in the Irish News, courtesy of Nuzhound. For administrative purposes, sectarianism is now entirely in the eye of the beholder. If you feel like a victim, then you are a victim. In addition, if anyone else feels that you might feel like a victim they may take pre-emptive offence on your behalf. Brian WalkerFormer BBC journalist and manager in Belfast, Manchester and London, Editor Spolight; Political Editor BBC NI; Current …

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Strangely enough it’s the Guardian that stresses the predictable “scorn,” while Cranmer is still holding fire. The Times explains that the idea was inspired by the refusal of a fictional vicar to bury Tess of the d’Urberville’s dead baby in holy ground, not that Thomas Hardy was much of a Christian. So two cheers for the Church of England for burying the last remnants of bastardy and living in sin with their new combined service of marriage and baptism. Irish …

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