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Sir Declan Morgan, Chief Commissioner ICRIR The combined impact of the May report on the functioning of the ICRIR and Nuala O’Loan’s scathing criticism that it was ‘”set up to fail” is bound to dismay its unbiased supporters. The HR issues are bad enough,  perhaps emerging from the problems of recruiting a mix of skills for a number of different roles.  But criticisms from an expert on policing and justice such as Baroness O’Loan is even more damaging. Her charge …

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My trust in policing was pretty much a given growing up, though I appreciate that won’t be true for everyone reading this. For much of my life, I believed that if something truly awful happened to me, a police investigation would pursue the truth with rigour and urgency. After reading Dr Jan Melia’s review, something foundational in that trust has been broken. Few stories have unsettled me as much as this one. In August 2020, Katie was found critically injured …

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I do wonder if at times Doug Beattie would rather deal with the Taliban than local politics, at least you know where you stand with the Taliban. Despite being an ex-leader of the party and one of their big names, it seems his local constituency is not happy with his liberal stance and is planning to give him the heave-ho for next year’s assembly elections. Where the situation gets weird is that, despite Doug having quite a high profile, he …

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Adam Fusco is a Senior Lecturer in Department of Politics in the University of York The results of the devolved elections in Scotland and Wales have seen three out of three First Minsters elected for the first time that wish to see the immediate or eventual independence of their nations. To date, Wales has largely been absent from conversations about independence, but the historic victory of Plaid Cymru in the Senedd election brings Wales into discussions about the breakup of …

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Colin Murray is a Professor of Law at Newcastle University.  The UK Supreme Court’s judgment last week in Dillon undermines the UK’s commitments in the Brexit deal. The decision, relating to the previous Conservative Government’s Legacy Act of 2023, and its controversial amnesty provisions, demonstrates a high-handed disregard for Northern Ireland’s special constitutional arrangements. It amounts to an assertion that, after Brexit, the UK Parliament can legislate as it chooses and the special commitments made under the Withdrawal Agreement are …

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Matthew O’Toole, the former Downing St insider now leader of the opposition at Stormont, has issued a firm but polite warning of the prospects for all Ireland’s future of the increasingly likely alternative to Labour. YouGov’s poll today extends Reform’s lead, Reform 28% Con 17% Green 16% Lab 16% LD 13%  Starmer may be replaced as leader by despairing Labour MPs, but if he is not, the next most likely prime minister is certain to have a radically different approach …

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As I write this, British cabinet ministers are gathering in Downing Street for what is surely the most fateful moment of Keir Starmer’s premiership. Yesterday, over 60 Labour backbencher MPs AND the Home Secretary publicly called on him to quit in the wake of Labour’s disastrous performance at the local elections, the culmination of a torrid period of missteps and mistakes defined by his cataclysmic error of judgement in appointing Peter Mandelson to be US ambassador. There are roughly three …

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Sir Kier Starmer’s speech on Monday morning painted an almost apocalyptic picture of the future of his country, were he to be ousted from the Prime Ministership. He said “our country will go down a dark path”. Referencing the gains by Reform UK and the Greens, he stated that Labour is “battling the despair upon which they prey”. “Change cannot come quick enough”. “People need hope”. “Incremental change won’t cut it”. Starmer described “a battle for the soul of our …

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When foreign, and especially American, visitors come to Northern Ireland, they are amazed that one of the outcomes of our much-lauded peace process isn’t far more Catholic and Protestant children being educated together. The growth of the integrated education movement, which began with a group of idealistic parents setting up Lagan College in Belfast in 1981, has been slow. In 1998, the year of the Good Friday Agreement, there were 41 schools (24 primary and 17 post-primary) enrolling around 3 …

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UCL’s Constitution Unit has done something remarkable. They’ve produced a report on the Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive, Towards a Programme of Reform that’s understated. Perhaps they think that NI politics is  no longer quite the glaring anomaly compared to the upheavals across the water?  But no. The litany of failure is  fully recognised. The  perverse creation of power sharing as a brake on progress not  an accelerator. The Assembly sitting out for five out of nine years, the evasion …

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The idea for Open Sunday is to let you discuss what you like. Just two rules. Keep it civil and no man/woman playing. Comments will close at 12 pm on Monday. Brian O'NeillManaging Editor of Slugger O’Toole. I help to manage Slugger by taking care of the site as well as running our live events. My background is in business, marketing and IT. My politics tend towards middle-of-the-road pragmatism; I am not a member of any political party. When not …

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In addition to our normal open Sunday, we have a politics-free post to give you all a break. So discuss what you like here, but no politics. Comments will close at 12 pm on Monday. Brian O'NeillManaging Editor of Slugger O’Toole. I help to manage Slugger by taking care of the site as well as running our live events. My background is in business, marketing and IT. My politics tend towards middle-of-the-road pragmatism; I am not a member of any …

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It’s 1983. I’ve long left small town Ireland for the big city of Dublin. I’m currently working as a trainee retail store manager in Tallaght a village now crammed with 70,000 rehoused inner city residents. It’s a worthwhile career. I’m bursting with nervous energy. I’m not going to fail. No more alcohol. No more cigarettes. No more gambling. No more playing darts in pubs to all hours. I’m a punk rock apostate. The safety pins, razor blades, saliva lathered shirt …

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First up, a confession. Strictly speaking this was not an Irish Unity poll, it was conducted on behalf of the European Movement Ireland as one of an annual series on Irish attitudes towards the EU and the policy choices it faces. But it contained a question on voting intentions in a referendum on Irish Unity. You can download the full report from https://www.europeanmovement.ie/em-ireland-eu-poll/ Second confession. Brian asked me if I would be interested in writing about it, and at first …

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The UK Supreme Court’s ruling that the rights of victims and their families have not been diminished by the amended  operation of the Independent Commission for Reconciliation and Information Recovery (ICRIR)  all but guarantees the final  passage of the UK government’s replacement Troubles Bill. But it does little to satisfy its critics.  The Supreme Court  rejected the NI Courts’ finding that the Windsor Framework was  the  proximate cause of diminution,  leaving open the possibility of a referral  to the European Court …

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Yesterday the people of Britain went to the polls to cast their democratic mandate in the Welsh and Scottish Assembly elections as well as local elections in England. Results will be coming out throughout the day so I have created this post for you to chat over the results as they come in. Initial results in the English council elections show massive gains for Reform at the expense of Labour and the Conservatives. Interesting times indeed. Brian O'NeillManaging Editor of …

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Will today be the last day of Keir Starmer’s Prime Ministership? With voting to the Scottish and Welsh assemblies and also the English Council elections, it is a crucial test of the popularity (or lack thereof) of the Labour Party and Keir Starmer’s leadership. It looks like Reform and the Green Party are going to be the main winners today. The Daily Mail hysteria around the Green Party is particularly fun to observe. All the charts below come from Poll …

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The Guardian reports on unearthed interviews with the playwright Arthur Miller about his marriage to Marilyn Monroe. Some of the quotes are quite revealing: He was one of the greatest playwrights of the 20th century and she was one of the greatest actors. In newly unearthed recordings made over a period of nearly three decades, Arthur Miller opened up about his short-lived marriage to Marilyn Monroe, saying she wanted a husband who was a “father, lover, friend and agent,” and …

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The Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly are under fire for their record in delivering public policy and services. In a new working paper published as a Constitution Unit report today, Alan Whysall argues that their under-performance threatens the stability of the 1998 Belfast/Good Friday Agreement settlement. Specific measures to improve matters have been little discussed. The paper – Improving Government in Northern Ireland – offers an agenda for early debate on such measures. The debate must have a clear and …

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