Parties – Page 28 – Slugger O'Toole

Right then, let’s think hard about a border poll

Brian Walker on September 20, 2014, 10:36 pm

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The political conditions for the Scottish referendum were simple compared to anything likely to apply in Ireland. With the dominance of the proportionality principle in the institutions, the weight of the GFA is against it and a new political chapter would have to be turned before it is conceivable. It would become a potential result of a good long time of stability not a way out of the present near- deadlock. So sorry to disappoint, but there won’t be a referendum anytime …

Has anything been happening while I’ve been away?

Brian Walker on September 20, 2014, 5:54 pm

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For the past few of months I’ve been buried in other projects, not least the Scottish referendum. So Northern Irish affairs are as inward looking and deadlocked as ever. Well I never! Paisley’s death passed off with little fuss amid the customary respect the Irish reserve with fingers crossed for the recently dead in contrast to the living. How amazing that at the funeral this most clerical and religious of politicians had no church service and no political salute. The elephant …

Alex Salmond: “For me as a leader my time is nearly over…”

Pete Baker on September 19, 2014, 4:23 pm

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Following defeat in the Scottish Independence referendum, Scotland’s First Minister, and SNP leader, Alex Salmond has announced he will stand down as First Minister in November when a new SNP leader will be chosen. More at the Guardian’s Scotland Independence live- blog Adds Here is the official resignation statement, via the SNP, from Alex Salmond I am immensely proud of the campaign which Yes Scotland fought and of the 1.6 million voters who rallied to that cause by backing an independent Scotland. …

Gerry Adams “Did you overrule Martin McGuinness when he wanted to do a deal?”

Mick Fealty on September 18, 2014, 8:07 pm

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Nice work by Anthony McIntrye on Gerry Adams’ interview with Audrey Carville on Morning Ireland yesterday. One segment which jumped out at me in particular was this bit.. AC: Okay. So you’re very clearly preparing for government. And I suppose if anyone is wondering what Sinn Féin would be like in government they’d just have to look North. And perhaps the impression they might get is of a party running scared of making tough decisions in government. GA: Well, this …

Fianna Fáil, firmly embedded in the history of the Irish state, now need to articulate its future

Mick Fealty on September 18, 2014, 4:56 pm

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Oh yes, Irish Politics… This is worth noting in passing. Fianna Fail are suffering something of the same hangover that befuddled first the Tory party and latterly the British Labour Party. Being in power for so long that you lose your direction and purpose. Gary Murphy puts some bones on that in the Examiner.. Martin’s jibe that Fine Gael are too right-wing was not just some throwaway remark but had its roots in Fianna Fáil’s long history. Fianna Fáil always viewed …

“to protect the Policing Board’s integrity…”

Pete Baker on September 17, 2014, 5:20 pm

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In the absence of any further explanation from Sinn Féin for Caitríona Ruane’s dramatic flouncing off the NI Policing Board selection panel to recruit a new PSNI Deputy Chief Constable on Monday, her party colleague on the Board, Gerry Kelly, MLA, has attempted to defend her actions. “If the process is wrong and particularly if the belief [is] that it is compromised, then there is a duty on that person to raise that and that’s what Caitríona Ruane did and I stand by …

Sinn Féin: “In light of the need for absolute transparency in all public appointments and to protect the Policing Board’s integrity…”

Pete Baker on September 15, 2014, 8:25 pm

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Earlier today the Sinn Féin MLA, and member of the Northern Ireland Policing Board, Caitríona Ruane, suddenly announced that she was unilaterally withdrawing from the panel to recruit a new PSNI Deputy Chief Constable – claiming that she “[believed] that the process may have been compromised”. Here’s the statement from Sinn Féin Sinn Féin MLA and Policing Board member Caitríona Ruane has withdrawn from the panel to recruit a new PSNI deputy chief constable and called for a fresh recruitment process. The Policing Board member said; “I …

“The job of a journalist is not to cheerlead, but to ask hard questions…”

Pete Baker on September 11, 2014, 2:04 pm

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In the Irish Times, Karlin Lillington makes a pertinent point on coverage of Apple’s recent launch of “two phones, a payment system and a watch” – “a non-existent product that, for now, remains vapourware”. From the Irish Times The idea of an audience of journalists and analysts giving a standing ovation at a product launch is, frankly, alarming. The job of a journalist is not to cheerlead, but to ask hard questions. To be sceptical at product launches. To confirm …

Lord Chief Justice Morgan: “Our system of government depends on mutual respect between the executive, the legislature and the judiciary…”

Pete Baker on September 5, 2014, 4:02 pm

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The BBC reports that, after waiting 8 months for a reply, Northern Ireland’s most senior judge, Lord Chief Justice Declan Morgan, has made public a letter of complaint he sent to the Northern Ireland First and deputy First Ministers about comments made by a NI Executive Minister in the Assembly. From the published text of the letter in the BBC report Dear Peter and Martin RULE OF LAW Regretfully, I am writing to you about comments made by a Minister …

“Run like a huckster’s shop” – Redux

Pete Baker on July 31, 2014, 2:35 pm

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[No change since June 2009, then? – Ed] Have there been any consequences…? A BBC report that the DUP and Sinn Féin have, belatedly, agreed the outcome of the semi-detached polit-bureau Northern Ireland Executive’s June budget monitoring round was met with understandable criticism from the other NI Executive parties. Justice Minister David Ford, who leads the Alliance Party, described the situation as “shambolic” while the Ulster Unionists and the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) said they had been kept in the dark about …

Martina Anderson MEP: “and if the British government lifts its ban on Executive access to the EIB…”

Pete Baker on July 17, 2014, 7:49 pm

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No update yet from Sinn Féin on the meeting they chose to trail a couple of days ago between three of their MEPs, led by the Derry Northern Ireland representative, Martina Anderson, and “the Vice-Chairman of the European Investment Bank (EIB) Jonathan Taylor”. But let’s hope they were better briefed than the 15 July press release suggests, otherwise the only reaction is likely to be a rolling of eyes by Jonathan Taylor, Vice-President of the EIB, formerly Director General for Financial Services at …

Quite correct Gerry, “Sinn Féin is not the problem” (for Fine Gael)…

Mick Fealty on July 16, 2014, 11:02 am

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Next time you hear someone from Sinn Fein going on about the unreliability of the Independent Group of Newspapers, nod sagely in agreement and put this statement from Party President Gerry Adams at them… That the Taoiseach would determine junior Ministries on how they might impact on Sinn Féin merely highlights the fact that the Government still doesn’t get the message delivered by the voters. And the source for this ‘story’ Gerry? None other than the hated (or at least ‘they …

Peter Hain: “since I was running the place I could more or less do what I wanted to do…”

Pete Baker on June 29, 2014, 5:23 pm

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The former Secretary of State for Northern Ireland [and Wales, etc! – Ed], Peter Hain, has been reminiscing about the good old days… “When I was Secretary of State for Northern Ireland in 2005-07, [Prince Charles] was delighted when I told him that since I was running the place I could more or less do what I wanted to do. “I was able to introduce a trial for complementary medicine on the NHS, and it had spectacularly good results, that …

Micheal Martin’s strength is his early adaption to FF’s changed circumstances

Mick Fealty on June 25, 2014, 3:04 pm

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So, Brian Crowley has gone his own way. Choosing a political grouping that contained the British Conservative party was eccentric and perhaps eccentric enough to mute any widespread criticism of Micheal Martin within the wider party. In the Irish Times Mary Minihan makes a brief assay of where the party is. She makes an important point here: Unlike some of his egotistical lieutenants, Mr Martin was an early-adaptor, absorbing the scale and shock of seat losses incurred in 2011 and understanding …

“Now meetings seem almost routine and we have dispensed with the fig leaf…”

Pete Baker on June 24, 2014, 6:57 pm

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Like boiling a frog… After the party’s opposition to her first truly historic official visit to Ireland, this week, on the third occasion of the Northern Ireland deputy First Minister, Sinn Fein’s forgetful Martin McGuinness, being presented to the UK Head of State, Queen Elizabeth II, the earlier pretence has finally been dropped. As Liam Clarke notes in the Belfast Telegraph In another sense, the Queen and Martin McGuinness may look back on how difficult that first meeting between them had been …

Fianna Fail’s only MEP Brian Crowley jumps EP political groups…

Mick Fealty on June 23, 2014, 11:36 am

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Oh, and here’s some more bad news for Micheal Martin (this time it is actually real bad news)… BREAKING: Fianna Fail MEP Brian Crowley is to leave ALDE + join the ECR, home of the British Tory MEPs, Danish Peoples’ Party + True Finns — Tony Connelly (@tconnellyRTE) June 23, 2014 So, his only MEP has gone rogue and swung back to the right [with the British Tories? – Ed] to join the ECR group and leaving the much diminished …

Gerry Adams: “this can be too easily twisted into a view that since everyone was to blame, nobody was to blame…”

Pete Baker on June 21, 2014, 4:46 pm

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The Sinn Féin president, Gerry Adams, TD, has been blaming others, again, for the failure to agree a comprehensive package on, among other issues, dealing with the past – in particular, a failure to agree on the holistic approach that could be said to characterise the mechanisms contained in the Haass proposals. But he had some interesting comments to make last weekend on a specific topic from the past elsewhere – [Not here? – Ed] No, there – that could help inform further discussion. Here’s …

NI Police Ombudsman: “It’s very easy to raise allegations – I think the important thing is whether there is any evidence behind it”

Pete Baker on June 19, 2014, 4:52 pm

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Having investigated a complaint from the Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams – following newspapers reports in 2006 which alleged that members of the RUC knew of a 1984 UDA gun attack on Adams in advance, or were themselves involved – the Northern Ireland Police Ombudsman, Michael Maguire, has published his conclusions. Dr Maguire has said he has found no evidence that police knew of, or were involved in away way, in the attack on Mr Adams: “We have talked to all the people involved in the events …

Unionists! “Surprise us with original thinking and sensible strategies: and surprise Sinn Fein, too, while you’re at it!”

Mick Fealty on June 19, 2014, 3:01 pm

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I’m not sure there is much that anyone else (in any other political party I mean) can learn from Sinn Fein. Their sheer corporate autocracy is something even a party with the DUP’s history of demagogic leadership cannot match (and, as Chris Dillow notes, history really does matter) can match. But Alex Kane has a point in one particular regard with respect to unionism’s abysmally poor pitching of its own project… There is a pro-Union majority in Northern Ireland – a …

“What kind of party will Sinn Féin be as it becomes a leading player?”

Mick Fealty on June 17, 2014, 10:24 am

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Jude Collins thinks its only matter of time until Sinn Fein becomes the largest party in the Republic, but he has some concerns about what that will mean when they get they get there… I’d prefer to think that Sinn Féin are working for those suffering most in southern society not for political advantage but because they believe it’s a core feature of what they are as a party. They’ve shown in the recent elections that their appeal is wide …