Ireland

Numbers are important, but government (and journalism) needs to find and act upon real stories too

Mick Fealty on April 30, 2018, 12:50 pm

| Readers 754

Wicked problems always occur in a social context — the wickedness of the problem reflects the diversity among the stakeholders in the problem. — Jeff Conklin The weekend papers in Ireland are full of speculation based almost entirely on those most chancey of numbers, the latest polling figures. It leaves, even in an avid anorak type like yours truly, a sense that the world must be happening somewhere else. A friend, who is firmly ensconced inside the Irish political bubble, …

DUP threatening to bring the government down over a customs union – or are they?

Brian Walker on April 26, 2018, 9:00 pm

| Readers 6467

An interview with Nigel Dodds for the PolticsHome website is headlined: DUP warns it could bring the government down if Northern Ireland kept in customs union – and let in Jeremy Corbyn? (my addition). Mr Dodds said continued membership of the customs union would “cross a very big red line for” for his crucial bloc of 10 MPs. He said: “For us there is the fact that if as a result of the Brexit negotiations for instance there was to …

The media’s inability to tear Corbyn down is no surprise to people in Ireland. Our media has been failing to tear Sinn Féin down for decades.

Richard Gallagher on April 25, 2018, 12:22 pm

| Readers 4650

In the UK, Jeremy Corbyn has come under an attack from the establishment media the likes of which we have never seen an opposition leader be subjected to before. Just about everything has been thrown at him, from IRA sympathising, colluding with Czech spies, anti-Semitism, to taking three hours to congratulate William and Kate on the birth of their third child. Importantly however, nothing has stuck. Corbyn continues to shrug it off, rise in the polls and remains on track …

Sinn Fein to back Ian Marshall for the Seanad

David McCann on April 24, 2018, 9:45 pm

| Readers 3198

Sinn Fein President, Mary Lou McDonald has confirmed the party will back Ian Marshall for the upcoming Seanad by-election. She said; “I am pleased to confirm that Sinn Féin will be supporting Ian Marshall in the upcoming Seanad by-election. “I have met with Ian on a number of occasions in recent weeks and I have been impressed by his views on Brexit and the potential impact Brexit will have on the island, north and south. “I believe Ian will be …

IT Poll suggests pre-Christmas Brexit euphoria around Taoiseach is starting to wear off

Mick Fealty on April 19, 2018, 2:27 pm

| Readers 5360

I’m generally not minded to bother readers with polls unless they tell us something new or challenging. Today’s Irish Times/Ipsos MRBI contains some details I think are well worth noting. Here are the headline figures… Not a lot of change in the general pattern (note that independents still sit on shrinking ground), though as Damian Loscher notes Sinn Féin is up three points to 22%, its highest rating in this poll since early 2016. He also notes that: Sinn Féin …

The Border Force row exposes differences between British and Irish citizenship that have to be settled

Brian Walker on April 18, 2018, 10:00 am

| Readers 4865

Leaving aside the delicious irony, I would guess that Sinn Fein are right: the attempt to limit recruitment for the UK Border Force to British passport holders is discriminatory and would be overthrown in court. Why should anyone have to produce a passport for a job in Northern Ireland anyway? This has echoes of the malign Windrush problem. without feeling the pain – yet, Up to now only when you go abroad and need to produce a passport has the issue …

“I have no ideological objection to Sinn Féin being part of a government.”

Mick Fealty on April 12, 2018, 10:49 pm

| Readers 3159

AFTER months of denials that FG would contemplate a coalition, here’s an interesting and telling story breaking today in Dublin… A Fine Gael minister has denied he was slapped down after declaring no objection to Sinn Féin in government, adding that many of his party colleagues share his view. Jim Daly said he spent two hours with Leo Varadkar on Wednesday and the purported controversy over his comments that Sinn Féin’s mandate was legitimate was never raised once by the …

Hear My Voice – a cinematic companion piece to Colin Davidson’s Silent Testimony

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on April 11, 2018, 7:31 pm

| Readers 840

Hear My Voice is a cinematic companion piece to Colin Davidson’s Silent Testimony, a 2015 exhibition of 18 portraits of people who suffered loss during the local conflict, developed in conjunction with the WAVE Trauma Centre. The paintings are back in the Ulster Museum until Sunday 22 April and the exhibition is well worth a visit.

Political ferment is reflected in the GFA junketings, but no sign of a breakthrough

Brian Walker on April 11, 2018, 12:23 pm

| Readers 540

Will the DUP and Sinn Fein pay any attention to the eloquent pleas of the elder statesmen to return to the Executive? On the surface the answer appears to be no, unless something is going on behind the scenes we don’t know about. Local politics suffers from elder statesperson fatigue. This generation has learned how to take in their stride the high sounding generalities from popes, presidents and prime ministers past and present. The shock of the new wore off …

Ireland and slavery, then and now, free event…

Soapbox on April 11, 2018, 8:13 am

| Readers 1674

We know that Ireland like most countries in Western Europe got caught up in the 18th-century slave trade and Irish merchants could benefit from the produce of the West Indies. Belfast was not exempt. The wealthy businessman Waddell Cunningham had a plantation in the Caribbean (called Belfast !) to take just one example. However there was a formidable opposition to slavery among the citizens of the growing late-18th century town, often involving radically-minded women – and a welcome was given …

Clinton: “Keep the cranes up. Keep the voices free. Keep the votes fair. You’ll figure it out.” #GFA20

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on April 10, 2018, 5:31 pm

| Readers 1358

Political leaders of old and today gathered at Queen’s University, Belfast for a day of events focussed on the 20th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement. Former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair said that people “should realise that this agreement was never going to support all the problems of Northern Ireland” while former US President Bill Clinton had a triptych of advice for NI: “Keep the cranes up. Keep the voices free. Keep the votes fair. You’ll figure it out.”

“I think we must also recognise that there are real economic reasons why people have played up the issue of the Irish border…”

Pete Baker on April 10, 2018, 3:37 pm

| Readers 2119

Played up is right. Labour Party front bencher, the shadow trade secretary, Barry Gardiner, a former NIO minister, has apologised for “informal remarks in a meeting last month“, in particular, that his “use of the word ‘shibboleth’ in its sense of ‘password’ or ‘test of membership’ gave the impression that I thought the Good Friday Agreement was in any way outdated or unimportant. I absolutely do not.” Which is fine. But his recorded comments, last month, during a Q&A session after a speech …

Forgotten ‘rights’ in the Good Friday Agreement? #Agreement20

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on April 10, 2018, 11:30 am

| Readers 678

Gender based violence, impediments to women’s participation in peace-building, a study on whether abortion was a workplace issue, FGM in NI and the LGBT community’s journey to equality in the wake of the Good Friday Agreement were all discussed in a panel at Saturday’s #Agreement20 conference in Manchester.

A Further Shore (Lyric Theatre) #GFA20

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on April 10, 2018, 10:10 am

| Readers 410

A nuanced and at times moving medley of spoken word and song remembrance of past times, incidents and ways of living during the Troubles, gradually working up to the negotiations and the 1998 Agreement. Not so balanced to become boring, but carefully seeded with surprise and honesty in the many perspectives it opened up.

Coming to terms with our interdependencies #GFA20

Allan LEONARD (Mr Ulster) on April 10, 2018, 8:24 am

| Readers 395

On the 20th anniversary of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement, it is easy to neglect the peace process that preceded it. My reference point is the 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement, because I learned about the efforts of then Taoiseach Garret FitzGerald the year before, from a magazine article that I read in a local library in my rural hometown in Ohio. I knew then that what he was working on was important.

A noble illusion perhaps, but unity and reconciliation are not compatible

Brian Walker on April 9, 2018, 3:20 pm

| Readers 3787

Writing in the Irish Times, Robin Wilson has eloquently identified “a cosmopolitan vista of “unification as reconciliation” among diverse individuals on the island…. as the current Tory government disappears down the Brexit rabbit hole”. Amid fears of a renewed, Brexit-induced hard Border, a plebiscite would be a blunt-instrument (and one-sided) response – less discussion, more sectarian headcount. A more sophisticated approach, less likely to lead to highly unwelcome consequences, would be to redefine the process of north-south co-operation recognised by …

Máire Braniff: “the spirit & promise of 1998 Agreement has been firmly cast aside” #Agreement20

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on April 9, 2018, 12:00 pm

| Readers 851

Ulster University’s Dr Máire Braniff delivered Saturday’s keynote address at the #Agreement20 conference in Manchester, with her session titled “Progress in Paralysis: Change and Continuity in post-Agreement Northern Ireland”.

Consensus, Red Herrings and Umbrellas – Panel on Post-Agreement Politics at #Agreement20

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on April 9, 2018, 8:30 am

| Readers 390

THREE PAPERS presented at the #Agreement20 conference addressed the topic of post-Agreement politics in NI, looking at political consensus, what can be learned from white elephants like the Girdwood Community Hub, and comparative studies between Hong Kong, post-war Germany and NI.

Thomas Hennessey: The Hand of History: Why was there an Agreement in 1998? #Agreement20

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on April 8, 2018, 7:59 pm

| Readers 1383

At the #Agreement20 conference, Professor Thomas Hennessey explains why he thinks there was a political deal in 1998 and looks at the bottom lines of the different parties and governments involved in the negotiations leading up to the Belfast Agreement, and delves into the significance of the three-stranded approach.

There is nothing republican about tying identity to a tricolour

Cathal O'Hagan on April 8, 2018, 9:00 am

| Readers 4160

“This decision will put back community relations…people are telling me their culture is being eroded, people are angry!” While this quote is reminiscent of the infamous flag protests of 2012, the main result of which being the increase in Jamie Bryson’s Twitter followers, the above comments are actually only weeks old and refer to a Councillor’s response to rumours that a Strabane St. Patrick’s Day parade would not allow the Irish tricolour to be flown. While Derry and Strabane District …