“They’d have known from then that I couldn’t be counted on to fall into line.”

An organisation which plays a key role in distributing public money to community organisations in Derry has been found guilty of discriminating against a local man because of his opposition to what he characterised as a “Sinn Fein/DUP carve-up” of community organisation in the city. The Waterside Neighbourhood Partnership (WNP) has been ordered by a Fair Employment Tribunal to pay Gary McClean £10,000 compensation for denying him a job as a Community Development Officer (CDO) in the Curryneirin area despite …

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Vatican Church and State: Whichever’s the more convenient?

Observing the kerfuffle down South about the closure of the Irish Embassy in Vatican City, my old joke came back to mind: Now you Holy See him, now you don’t. One minute, Benedict XVI is a Head of State, like the emperor Akihito, Bashir Assad or George W. Obama. Then, in an instant, shazam!, he’s the leader of a religion, on a par with the Dalai Lama, the Archbishop of Canterbury or the Reverend Ron Johnstone. Maybe he cannot be …

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