Brian Walker Adds 2 I’d completely forgotten about this until Ben Brogan Pol Ed of the Mail’s blog reminded me. (Had a CRAP moment – can’t remember a fucking thing). Peston was sort of blamed because one of the bank chiefs who met the Chancellor last Monday night blabbed the fact to him. This caused the markets to tumble to their lowest yet and precipitated the whole £400 billion package. Quite the most expensive leak in history. It gives you a good …
The ill wind of the financial crisis blows kindly for the political fortunes of Gordon Brown at the moment. The news this week that he is to break convention and campaign in the Glenrothes by election is a straw in the self-same wind. Only two weeks ago, it was in Glenrothes that he was supposed to meet his nemesis, but now Labour may have a chance, as Andy MacSmith once press handler to the late John Smith opines in the …
Saturday’s a day for catching the mood, so how are you bearing up? Apart from the petrol queues at Tescos, thanks to their ”price war,” not too badly in my case, assuming the pension funds holds up. A backlash against all the solemn stuff nobody can do anything about is inevitable. Naturally somebody has to blame the media and it’s Cranmer’s turn. The financial crisis in the new bird flu. “Christmas itself may be cancelled because Santa banked in Iceland. …
I hesitate just a moment before applauding the award of this year’s Nobel Peace Prize to the international negotiator Martti Ahtisaari. He flitted across our screens for trying to jump start decommissioning before going on to greater things. Nothing personal or ideological, just that as the headline says: “ Got conflict? Mr. Ahtisaari is your man.” He’s a professional negotiator and as such, he’s above the fray. If you’re not involved in the conflict, it’s pretty easy to transcend it. …
The abortion reform campaign doesn’t look like a dead duck by any means. I can’t find any press coverage yet, so important exchanges are below the fold. From Pro Choice press release, Thursday 9 October Yesterday pro-choice supporters flocked into the Commons to launch their campaigning ahead of expected votes at the Report stage of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill now likely to be on the 22 October. Diane Abbott Labour MP who has tabled New Clause 30 to …
Update. Here is an impressive account by Jonathan McCambridge in the Bel Tel of the reasons for failure in the case and others, minus the conspiracy theory. “In the end, the problem was the same as in the Omagh bombing and Robert McCartney murder trials – how do you solve a crime without evidence?” Our old friends the dogs in the streets will have a complete theory about the Northern Bank robbery and I doubt if Chris Ward is central …
In these tough times, it’s good to know that a Northern Ireland small industry is flourishing abroad, even if it’s not doing so well at home. The DFM was unable to attend due to the death of his mother . Not all the nuances were quite right The Right Honorable Martin McGuinness, MP House of Commons United Kingdom (via videoconference) Continuing with the theme of former enemies, protestant Jeffrey Donaldson is on hand. Donaldson, a lead negotiator of the Good …
Did you feel like heading for the hills or did you just shrug? A Times poll taken even before yesterday’s mega rescue plan suggests that “on the brink ” panic was held at bay. “56 per cent in Britain, and 51 per cent in America, say they are not worried. Women are a bit more worried about the safety of their savings than men, 41 to 33 per cent.” Judging from the near-zero response to the crisis from Sluggerites, I …
On today of all days, just about the most unlikely campaign imaginable is the Guardian’s “ Save the BBC” blog. Defending the £3.4 billion a year corporation may seem absurd but a closer look shows what the Guardian is arguing for is the need to protect the BBC in tough times like today, when it’s tempting to milk it as a cash cow. The argument goes that the BBC acts as the guarantor of a great part of British journalism …
Some things are almost beyond comment, like what it felt like on a Titanic lifeboat waiting to be rescued by the Carpathia, but here goes. How “real” is this rescue, how will it affect you and me? “It will cost every man, women and child sixteen hundred pounds,” I hear them say. On the BBC News last night they faithfully included Belfast in a regional roundup of the effects on the “real” economy. We saw a Belfast butcher, a real …
The last time I blogged on the abortion campaign in Northern Ireland in June, it dropped like a stone. I’m glad to say that the campaign is full of life and is carrying the cause to London. This effort will almost certainly fail and may not even reach the floor of the House of Commons. Much depends on Harriet Harman who is minister for women as well as the organiser of Commons business. It made waves at Westminster in July …
Update WOW! This certainly gets Ireland out of jail and anyway– “There has been no stampede on the part of UK businesses to transfer savings to Irish banks, a BBC poll suggests. In a survey carried out with the consultants Unicom, 91.6% of the 312 small businesses quizzed said that they would not consider moving deposits.” Peston adds: “The decision by the German federal government to guarantee all private savings in German banks is momentous. In a globalised banking market, …
It wasn’t Bunker Hill nor Bastille Day nor yet Easter Monday because there was no victory, not many were hurt nor was there a clear outcome. But October 5th 1968 has to be the landmark day of the death of a kind of innocence when the civil rights march in shabby little Duke St in Derry was batoned by the police, launching more or less continuous violence that never really stopped for thirty years. It was too an early example …
Remember him? The Secretary of State who tilted back towards the Unionists after the love affair between Mo and the Shinners? Mandelson is back, “third time lucky”. No more popular south of the border than among nationalists in the north – “ Trade commissioner Peter Mandelson strongly criticised the Irish guarantee plan” and the enemy of Irish farmers, his returns seals off one of the oldest feuds in British politics. Fortunately for Mandelson, an interview he gave to the New …
As far as I can make out the Irish bank guarantee saga has reached somewhere between Pete’s disapproval and my earlier optimism. Finance Minister Brian Lenihan has been explaining himself to the Financial Times: “Mr Lenihan insists Ireland did not want to strike out on its own, but needed to act quickly. “Our government and I would have preferred a European approach to guaranteeing confidence and stability of the banking sector,” he says in an interview with the Financial Times. …
I ‘d been interviewing Sir John Stevens about his celebrated Report when I first met Hugh Orde in New Scotland Yard on the day his appointment as Chief Constable was announced. He seemed like Lewis to Steven’s Morse, (it’s terrible when even chief constables seem young). I got to know him slightly as an easy and friendly communicator even when he wasn’t telling you anything much. I wondered how he’d fare in the political vipers’ nest that was post-Agreement Northern …
An important difference of emphasis is worth noting between First Minister Peter Robinson addressing the Institute of Irish Bankers and Philip McDonagh of PWC as reported in the Irish News at the NI Economic Conference. Mr Robinson while recognising “real difficulties,” tended to look backwards at old (relative) successes and look ahead on the (equally relative) bright side for future prospects. Robinson: “If we were to listen to some in the media we might have expected to come here tonight …
Late tonight ( October 1st), the affair shows the limits of sovereignty but in a way that leaves Irish self-interest and national pride intact. It’s not a bad way to have your cake and eat it either. Ireland is being forced to extend rather than limit its full deposit guarantee scheme by including “foreign owned” banks that are well-known fixtures in Ireland like Ulster Bank and National Irish Bank. With such a huge guarantee scheme, nearly half as big again …
Here’s a shaming story about social attitudes. A new poll by Amnesty International suggests that “almost half (46%) of Northern Ireland university students believe that a woman is partially or totally responsible for being raped if she has behaved in a flirtatious manner.” I’d hoped at first that the poll was a bit of PTQ-type messing about with answering poll questions perversely but sadly, reading the detail, it wasn’t. The latest similar poll in the Republic wasn’t much more enlightened. …
Slugger contributors grasped the implications straight away, you clever lot. While Ireland has won admiration from savers and investors for jumping the gun with its bold guarantee plan, in the financial markets and political comment, it took a while – a few hours at least – for the penny (or rather the cent) to drop. Ireland is setting the pace and other countries are worried about the destabilising effect of the Irish move. On the whole opinion seems to be …
