pup – Page 2 – Slugger O'Toole

The Nasty Face Of Nationalism

The Firemen on September 24, 2014, 7:01 pm

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A PERSONAL VIEW by Derec Thompson Derec Thompson is a self-employed web designer originally from Belfast who now lives in Cambuslang just outside Glasgow. He was recently involved as a campaigner for a Yes outcome in the Scottish independence referendum and has consequently joined the Scottish National Party. Follow Derec on Twitter I’ve just emerged from the first political campaign I’ve ever been involved in. The Scottish independence referendum campaign has possibly been the longest in living memory. As …

@LADFLEG: “We are pro-Union and pro Loyalist”

David McCann on June 30, 2014, 5:30 pm

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Last week I sat down with two of the brains behind Loyalists Against Democracy (LAD), Billy and Ron. I was interested to catch up with the guys since we last spoke in February about the group’s foundation and how they approach certain issues. This time, however, I was interested to speak to them about some of the issues that they group has been involved in since we spoke, namely; the departure of Winston Smith, Pastor McConnell and where does LAD …

So, you want to be a Cllr? Here’s some social media do’s and don’ts.

David McCann on May 4, 2014, 2:30 pm

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This round of local elections were interesting for me as I watched in January my twitter feed being swamped with tweets of election hopefuls announcing their candidacy for the various wards in the upcoming election. Ever since the election of Barack Obama in 2008, candidates have looked to social media to promote themselves and their issues. Now, the impact of this is debatable, I think that for local government elections, social media is a nice stocking filler for candidates. It …

UPDATE- Jamie Bryson-A rebel without a hope?

David McCann on March 24, 2014, 11:20 pm

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You might think I don’t have better things to do with my time but alas this evening I ventured out to conduct my second interview with Jamie Bryson. I was surprised when he contacted me saying he wanted to talk to me again, as our first encounter led him to be generally criticised but I thought with his attempts to fundraise and Billy Hutchinson’s recent comments about him it was worth another go. I began the interview by asking him …

Forget ethnic thematics: a straightforward response to Billy Hutchinson

Turgon on March 22, 2014, 8:10 pm

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Billy Hutchinson’s explanation for his sectarian murders has been covered below by David McCann. Unfortunately they degenerate into concepts like “Truth recovery”, “ethnic thematics” and such like. The News Letter have provided somewhat more direct responses. From the News Letter: Kenny Donaldson of Innocent Victims United said that Mr Hutchinson’s attempted justification of his murders “bore all the hallmarks of the same sick delusional thinking that is prevalent within the republican movement”. Referring to the UVF slogan ‘For God and …

Mr Hutchinson and Ethnic Thematics by Cillian McGrattan

David McCann on March 19, 2014, 6:06 pm

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This a guest post on Billy Hutchinson’s recent interview by Dr.Cillian McGrattan of the University of Ulster When it comes to dealing with the past, the PUP have often been seen as one of the more upfront political parties – that is, less inclined to indulge in ideological double-think, smug condescension or obfuscation about deeds, dates and motives. Billy Hutchinson’s Newsletter interview in which he claims that while he ‘wouldn’t try to justify’ his killing of two Catholics, ‘we’re not …

McGuinness: in the city of Belfast the UVF, the PUP and the Orange Order are one and the same thing // Robinson responds to the “dictator” deputy First Minister

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on January 16, 2014, 10:59 pm

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The moment that draft seven of the Haass proposals went into the shredder may well have been at 10:45pm when BBC NI’s The View broadcast deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness telling Mark Carruthers: Mainstream unionist elected representatives have told me that they accept my analysis that in the city of Belfast the UVF, the PUP and the Orange Order are one and the same thing … I believe it needs to be challenged. Just as I have challenged those so-called …

The past is a foreign country, they do things differently there #spotlightNI

David McCann on October 30, 2013, 9:19 am

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If you have not watched last night’s Spotlight programme I would strongly urge you to do so. In our drive to project a modern and peaceful Northern Ireland, we sometimes forget about some of the criminality that still plagues our province. Stephen Dempster’s report leaves a lot of questions for the PSNI, politicians and the rest of civic society to answer. 15 years on from the Good Friday Agreement we still have not fully taken the gun out of our …

PUP Conference encouraged to be self-critical; recognises another marginalised community & adopts pro-Equal Marriage policy

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on October 13, 2013, 9:05 am

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The PUP conference left Belfast this year and headed to Brownlow House in Lurgan. More motions, more members speaking up to propose or support those motions, more women, more men in suits and ties, more delegates than recent years with lots of new faces from the new Mid-Ulster branch. If was a conference that valued protest but was told to concentrate more on politics. Co-operation and cross-party dialogue was necessary to deliver solutions. PUP Belfast city councillor Dr John Kyle …

PUP-Is there anyway back in from the cold?

David McCann on September 29, 2013, 10:59 am

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The PUP has not had a very happy post-Good Friday Agreement existence. Since 1998, they have suffered an electoral decline that would make David Trimble blush. Yes, Northern Ireland’s voice of Loyalism has been out of sorts and out of political influence since it lost its last remaining assembly seat in 2010 when Dawn Purvis left the party. In addition to this, the party has lost a staggering 88% of its vote over the last 15 years. The party now …

The PUL Community and the Peace Process: An Audit

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on May 21, 2013, 8:35 am

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The third session of the all day PSA/Fellowship of Messines workshop – Has the Protestant Working Class lost out in the Peace Process? – looked at the peace process through the eyes of two loyalist leaders and an academic. Strong views on the Social Investment Fund, how paramilitary actions gave unionists confidence in the peace process, loyalism being equated with criminality, loyalists’ sacrifices for peace, the tsunami of hate and bigotry that came out of the flag protests, and the …

Taking years off your life – NI life expectancy deprivation gaps show increase over last decade

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on May 17, 2013, 12:04 pm

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bus route life expectancy - CRC's NI Peace Monitoring Report

When I asked Billy Hutchinson on Wednesday about the lack of publicity around any PUP campaigning on health and life expectancy, I was thinking about the kind of life expectancy figures that have been released yesterday by the Department of Health in their Inequalities Monitoring System/Life Expectancy Decomposition comparative report: Chapter 4 deals with the deprivation gap: The male life expectancy deprivation gap was 4.5 years in 2008-10 which represents a 10% increase from 2001-03. The female life expectancy gap …

Billy Hutchinson: talking at rallies and protests doesn’t necessarily make you a leader

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on May 17, 2013, 8:30 am

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Billy Hutchinson – leader of the PUP – said during a workshop on Thursday that the media often used the word “loyalist” as a shortcut to mean “criminal”. He quoted the example of a DUP councillor up in court for some misdemeanour who was described in a newspaper as a “loyalist” rather than a “member of the DUP”. I asked him afterwards whether there is much the PUP can do to address the media’s perception of loyalism? One of the …

On the lack of unionist leadership – what would Paisley in his prime made of it?

Brian Walker on January 8, 2013, 12:20 pm

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As Paul Bew has pointed out in the Times(£), with the NIO a rump and now lacking historic memory in depth, there’s not much Theresa Villiers can do to affect the flags disturbances directly, with day to-day responsibility for law and order devolved to Stormont. Unless that is, the protests gain wider political traction as a result of Willie Frazer’s exercise in protest tourism and other spasms. This seems unlikely as the “People’s Forum “ seems as rickety as the unionist …

UVF campaign of ‘flying riots’ leaves Unionists isolated…

Mick Fealty on December 6, 2012, 2:25 pm

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All’s far in love and war. Sammy Wilson’s intemperate allusion on UTV last night to his own Justice Minister being carried around in a police landrover might have landed more squarely if there wasn’t a series of ‘flying riots’ going on around the place. Today there’s talk of more disruption, yet to be confirmed, in Glengormley. In the meantime, it seems the only paramilitary organisation yet identified by the PSNI are the UVF, whose own political party the PUP at …

Round-up of the PUP conference (including audio from speeches)

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on October 16, 2011, 9:00 am

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Billy Hutchinson speaking after taking over as PUP leader

The Progressive Unionist Party’s annual conference was held on Saturday morning in the large conference room in City East this morning. About 60 people attended. This year exhibitors hadn’t been invited, curtailing a conference revenue stream, but also keeping the focus on party business. I’ve a theory that most party conferences are identifiable from a photo of the back of delegates’ heads. This morning’s conference was dominated by older men, though some younger people and some women were present. As …

Billy Hutchinson is the new Progressive Unionist Party leader

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on October 15, 2011, 2:12 pm

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Billy Hutchinson - newly elected as PUP leader

Billy Hutchinson was the only nomination for leadership and was elected unopposed at this morning’s Progressive Unionist Party conference held in East Belfast. You can watch his first interview as leader and hear his comments on what the PUP stand for, where the party is going and whether the PUP has the energy to go forward. Hutchinson spoke of the continued need to challenge criminality, repeating his mantra: You can’t be a criminal and a loyalist at the same time. …

PUP conference preview

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on October 14, 2011, 9:32 pm

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On Saturday, the Progressive Unionist Party will hold their annual conference. It’s been a year of change for the PUP. In the May elections, neither the PUP’s leader Brian Ervine nor independent Dawn Purvis won a seat in the Assembly. Instead the East Belfast loyalist mantle seemed to pass across to Sammy Douglas, who had been approached by and agreed to stand for the DUP. In the local government election, both PUP councillors retained their seats with John Kyle in …

Gusty Spence (1933-2011)

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on September 25, 2011, 4:33 pm

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Gusty Spence died in hospital this weekend aged 78. He served in the British army for five years and was stationed in Cyprus. He was approached to join the UVF in 1965, and soon became its leader in the Shankill. Under his watch, terror raids by local UVF men resulted in the death of civilian Protestants and Catholics. Spence was arrested shortly after the UVF was declared illegal in June 1966. His daughter Liz describes his arrest in the book …

Healing Through Remembering (new chair Dawn Purvis) refused PEACE III Funding

Turgon on August 13, 2011, 12:10 pm

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When Dawn Purvis was defeated at the Stormont elections, a number of commentators on slugger including myself predicted that she would end up with a job in the quango / do-gooder industry. Indeed I suggested that far from helping those whom she claimed to represent (working class unionists in East Belfast) her time especially since she left the PUP had been more directed towards increasing her profile amongst what are sometimes known as the liberal dissidents. Many members of the …