Parties – Page 7 – Slugger O'Toole

On the legacy deadlock, equality before the law for the security forces is not moral equivalence with the IRA

Brian Walker on April 30, 2018, 3:49 pm

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Ruth Dudley Edwards has just commended “Legacy: What To Do About The Past in Northern Ireland”, a short book by Unionist councillor and redoubtable human right campaigner Jeff Dudgeon, edited mainly from the contributions at the conference on legacy legislation he organised in Belfast on March 3rd. As you’d expect, Ruth shares the passionately held view that the UK’s so far unseen draft Legacy Bill is based on a flawed approach developed by the traditional justice academic lawyers who to …

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

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

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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 …

“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

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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sense of ‘password’ or ‘test of membership’ gave the impression that I thought the Good Friday Agreement was in any way outdated or unimportant.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 …

A revised Belfast Agreement is needed more than nostalgia for 1998

Brian Walker on April 2, 2018, 4:31 pm

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Like Magna Carta, the Belfast/ Good Friday Agreement has acquired the status of icon of the constitution. This is not altogether in its favour. A good deal of nonsense is talked about Magna Carta. Back in 1215, no sooner had the ink dried on the vellum of the fair copy, than bad King John denounced it. But the idea of curbing the unbridled power of the monarch could not be unborn and it finally evolved into government by the rule …

Transfixed by their obsessions without progress, they ignore the real politics of the future …

Brian Walker on March 26, 2018, 1:49 pm

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Following on from Peter Donaghy’s really interesting corrective post comparing ROI/NI household income, what about the Budget then? How did it go down with you over the tray bake or down the pub? Yes, I’ll bet you were riveted. The frustration in veteran economic commentator John Simpson’s measured prose is clear enough. The British government know they can spin the budget without facing direct challenge. Punch drunk civil society reacts wearily, having made similar points for years to little avail …

“A feature of the devolved administration here has been that the two main parties have been sensitive to criticism…”

Pete Baker on March 14, 2018, 3:03 pm

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The BBC reported a telling admission from the head of the Northern Ireland Civil Service, David Sterling, during the RHI Inquiry yesterday. Mr Sterling said the practice of taking minutes had “lapsed” after devolution when engagement between civil servants and local ministers became much more regular. But he said it was also an attempt to frustrate Freedom of Information requests. Mr Sterling said ministers liked to have a “safe space where they could think the unthinkable and not necessarily have …

Direct Rule in action: “In the light of the ongoing absence of an Executive…”

Pete Baker on March 13, 2018, 2:40 pm

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Northern Ireland Assembly Legislative Consent Motions, required by the UK Parliament to legislate on devolved matters, may have been devalued by the absence of a protest by the then NI Assembly Speaker in March 2015, but the UK Government could at least pretend that one had been passed at that time. Yesterday there was no such pretence by Steve Brine (Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health). Welcome to Direct Rule… My hon. Friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Lord O’Shaughnessy) …

Derry’s politicians should stop playing the victim and make more friends and influence people

Brian Walker on March 10, 2018, 8:22 pm

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Steve Bradley’s chastening post on Derry part 1 is remarkable for its detailed analysis and the volume of comment in response -greater I think than for any of the usual subjects I’ve seen in a long time. Certainly it touches a nerve with me. I left my Derry home to go to school in Coleraine and never lived there again after the fateful year of 1969 when the old order quite suddenly and easily fell apart, an arresting fact its …

For the sake of clarity, all sides should stop spreading myths about Brexit and the Good Friday Agreement

Brian Walker on February 26, 2018, 1:22 pm

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Ignorance and special pleading about the Good Friday Agreement and its relationship to Brexit and the border has been a feature of angry comment that has followed the collapse of the Stormont talks. The Daily Express led the pack The Good Friday agreement explicitly stipulates there cannot be a hard border on the island of Ireland, leaving Brexiteers launching impassioned arguments on the deal. It does nothing of the sort. Even Adam Boulton who speaks with the great authority on …

Equality has arrived but the DUP and Sinn Fein have yet to face up to what it means

Brian Walker on February 23, 2018, 6:39 pm

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“Equality” has always been a Sinn Fein buzzword. As the recanted ex- IRA man Shane Paul O’Doherty lethally today quoted Gerry Adams speaking in 2014: “The point is to actually break these bastards – that’s the point. And what’s going to break them is equality … That’s what we need to keep the focus on – that’s the Trojan horse of the entire republican strategy is to reach out to people on the basis of equality.” Other views are un-cynical …

Arlene and Mary Lou are at least explaining themselves. But how much does Stormont matter now?

Brian Walker on February 17, 2018, 5:39 pm

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“tiocfaidh ár lá Pat Leahy in the Irish Times The extent to which coaxing the DUP back into powersharing is secondary for Sinn Féin was captured perfectly by McDonald’s speech at her ardfheis coronation at the RDS last weekend. If Sinn Féin was primarily concerned with helping Arlene Foster to bring her party back into Stormont then McDonald wouldn’t have rounded off her peroration with that rousing “Tiocfaidh ár lá!”Never mind that it was unscripted; it wasn’t accidental. Arlene …

For a political deal ever to emerge, mutual ignorance needs to faced and mutual respect observed

Brian Walker on February 14, 2018, 4:27 pm

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Mick has rightly just pointed out how tantalising easy the language issue could be to solve, were it not for the politics that expresses a far deeper mutual ignorance ( in both senses) than is often recognised and which 20 years of supposed power sharing has failed to reduce. Politically there must be limits to the management of the voluntary apartheid state we appear to be creating before cohesion collapses altogether. That moment may not be as far off as …

Sceptical, not cynical about “the long drawn out attempt to breathe life back into the Stormont arrangement”

Pete Baker on February 12, 2018, 9:09 pm

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Whilst on Saturday Brian highlighted the question of “the prospect of Sinn Fein’s return to Stormont as Mr Adams’ parting gift”, today Ed Moloney posits another, equally plausible scenario… You know, a cynic might suspect that the whole thing, at least the long drawn out attempt to breathe life back into the Stormont arrangement, was staged or timed so that the breakthrough would happen just when Sinn Fein want to present a new, Adams-free image to the electorate down South, one …

Could the DUP handle the return to Stormont as Gerry Adams’ parting gift?

Brian Walker on February 10, 2018, 10:38 am

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The papers are at one in running the story that a Stormont deal may be imminent next week. But “with more work to be done” the emphasis ranges from glass half full to glass half empty. The Irish News headlines “ speculation quelled as differences remain ” while Suzanne Breen now bylined as the paper’s political editor, sticks her neck out with the quote from “sources” that, “we may not have an agreement within hours but we are potentially on the …

Rising expectations? The minority parties should put them to the test tomorrow

Brian Walker on February 7, 2018, 2:07 pm

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“I’m frustrated too, “ Karen Bradley told MPs. “The negotiations are at a very sensitive stage.. very detailed and intense.. I’ve committed to not giving a running commentary .. I’m not going to say anything that would jeopardise the talks.. They will last weeks, not months.. She was echoing the Taoiseach in the Dail yesterday, telling TDs : … he did not want to say anything that might cause offence to anyone at such a crucial juncture in the process …

A mockery of a negotiation so far

Brian Walker on February 6, 2018, 10:33 am

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So “huge differences remain” if you’re the DUP but “good progress” was made if you’re a novice British minister reading off the pre-prepared NIO script. What else don’t we know that the political correspondents can’t be bothered to say? The role of the chair is unknown – co-chairs, facilitators or dynamic leaders with a cunning plan ready to view? “We do not negotiate in public” said Sinn Fein’s Conor Murphy last week as if for all the world this was …

“I first went to the party in Feb 2014 over this bullying and have consistently done so to try and get it stopped.”

Mick Fealty on February 5, 2018, 1:34 pm

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So, as we know, there’s been a steady stream of southern SF councillors leaving the party. The latest to go is North Dublin Cllr Noeleen Reilly, this is the one most likely to do serious damage, who announced her exit of. We knew something was wrong when the local SF TD, Dessie Ellis, publicly threatened to sue the Ballymun Tidy Towns Committee over what he alleged at the time was… …a completely false allegation was made against him at the meeting …

Could reform of the petition of concern hold the key to surprise success in the Stormont talks?

Brian Walker on January 30, 2018, 10:01 am

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Following up on Mick’s post on Colum Eastwood, let’s hear it for his SDLP deputy Nichola Mallon who’s called for the reform of the notorious blocking instrument of the petition of concern. It had been supposedly been agreed in the abortive Fresh Start agreement of November 2015 that it should be used only “in exceptional circumstances,” stating – importantly – “the grounds upon which it is being tabled and the nature of the detriment”. After which nothing happened. The investigative …

Pressure to resume the responsibilities of government is not a winning card

Brian Walker on January 24, 2018, 5:49 pm

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So how are the prospects for the talks being trailed? Are three women, Arlene, Michelle and late joiner Karen are up the creek with Simon but without a paddle? Or will they brave the towering waves of cynicism to ride them out and make it home to everyone’s huge surprise? Karen – as we must get used to calling the secretary of state for the time being -, repeats the standard stale brief, that agreement is close if only.. She …

Mary Lou McDonald faces battle of margins as FG and FF set to scrap over every loose seat

Mick Fealty on January 20, 2018, 7:45 am

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IAs we await the confirmation whether or not Mary Lou McDonald was the only candidate for President of Sinn Fein, our own Patricia McBride tipped Michelle O’Neill for Vice President on RTE Drivetime last evening. So it looks like two women at the top. Or rather front of house. Power up to now has rested almost exclusively with the parties shadowy ‘leadership team’. Neither women can expect to be let too far off the party’s halter. Nor are they likely …