Welcome to Oirelaand El Pesidente

WELL the Shamrock has been well drowned and lo and behold El Presidente Obama is making the journey to the Republic of Oirishness.

Now will Barack take the next step and come north, where we used to associate the name Barack with the misspelled name of where security forces resided and paramilitaries used ‘barrack busters’?

And, should he nip across the border for tea and tiffins at Hillsborough Castle and a wee natter at the Assembly, then he would just be doing what the previous two incumbents of the Whitehouse have done.

But there is a slight problem - no crisis. If one tracks presidential visits over the past decade or so, they have mostly come at “crucial” points in Norn Iron politics. A timely visit from an actual, proper, statesman is seen as the order of the day to resolve the issue.

To ensure President Obama makes the wee jaunt north of the border, the challenge for our politicians is to get returned on 5th May and have an almighty row.
You’ll have to let the presidential aides know in advance, of course, but the actual row shouldn’t be a problem for our MLAs: most of them could start a row in an empty house.

In the meantime, genealogists in Ireland have discovered Barack has Oirish ancestors from Co. Offaly. This is the current ‘ancestral arms race’ going on between the Republic of Ireland and Norn Iron – to see whether north or south has had more presidents... So far Norn Iron is slightly in the lead but when the first Hispanic president is elected what are the odds that they’ll find his Mexican great, great Porta Rican grandfather met a man that sold him an Irish terrier...

Chill winds

IT emerged this week that almost half of Northern Ireland homes suffer from fuel poverty – that is a large proportion of their budget goes on heating their homes, with many unable to do so regularly.

Social Development Minister and self-proclaimed scourge of HM Treasury, Alex Attwood, has launched a £127m programme to replace old boilers and generally help out those facing the deep chill.

Now some have been less than enthused by the whole package but it raises a couple of issues.

First up, is this a minister that was really opposed to the budget. He got money for fuel poverty and abstained from the Budget vote. Surely the highly principled MLA had not been bought off?

Next issue is how did we get to this state of affairs? How did we end up with people living in a developed country that has so many people struggling with their fuel bills?

And finally, if Mr Attwood can get to meet the utility companies and oil suppliers so quickly, can he please pass on their phone numbers to see if we can cadge a discount too?

Oh fudge it, it’s the budget

WELL hurrah! Gosh darn it we have a budget for l’il ole Norn Iron!

After all the hullabaloo, backbiting and overall nastiness we have a NI Executive budget for the next four years.

Rest easy people because we now know just where the money will be spent…okay that’s a wee bit of a fib. We sort of know where it will be spent, and officials have been beavering away allocating the pounds, shillings and pence to various programmes.

But programmes are part of the picture. You see after all the fighting there is still a Programme for Government to be agreed post- May 5th. Take a deep sigh folks, because we have an election fight – already underway – and the rows over the Programme for Government.

We were watching the shenanigans over the budget row and a debate occasionally broke out.

It is hard not to feel a little depressed at the sheer predictability of the fights and shouting matches. Did anyone really expect mature, thoughtful consideration? Did anyone really expect our elected members to discuss in a calm, deliberate deployment of facts and figures?

So, what did we, the electorate learn from the debate that preceded the 67-31 vote budget approval?

Well, the biggest suspense was whether the UUP ministers would pack up their ministerial bags. Well, they didn’t. But by not voting they were in breach of the Stormont Assembly Ministerial code. Would Peter Robinson and Martin McGuinness call on the Speaker to investigate? Would they be kicked out of office?

Of course not! If Michael McGimpsey or Danny Kennedy really expected the First Minister and deputy First Minister to give them more publicity through the process of investigation then it was a tactical error.

And, had they resigned it would have been seen as a futile gesture with barely three weeks until the dissolution of the Assembly.

On the other side of the row was it a tactical mistake to have such a public spat over health? Was the millions added to the health budget enough to stave off the very real picture of cuts to the frontline?

Ultimately the budget was a bun fight over cuts. As the Finance Minister Sammy Wilson was at pains to point out, cuts have to be made – end of story, no more debate.

Well apart from a couple of asides that are worth noting. Firstly, Social Development Minister Alex Attwood of the SDLP was not at the final vote – draw from that what you will but we cannot be bothered as boredom with the whole thing is now a wholesale malaise.

And, Sinn Féin are implementing cuts in Northern Ireland and fighting cuts in the Republic of Ireland – surely this is not an all-island approach.

Aperitif for the main course

CONGRATULATIONS to each and every TD who thinks they did well in the south of Ireland’s general election.

But, for political anoraks here the whole brouhaha was but an appertiser for the main course here in Norn Iron.

Heck, even the electorate in the south got it pretty easy – here voters will have to contest with two ballot papers and a referendum paper.

So that’s two, 1,2,3’s and a vote on 1,2,3’s that’s almost like our STV but is AV and is part way to PR.

If you’re a political anorak – or someone who pays attention when the news is on - all of that last paragraph will make sense.

For the other 98% of the population that translates as putting a ‘1’ on the ballot paper beside the one you want to be your assembly member and putting some other numbers by those who you don’t like but don’t hate as much as other people on the ballot paper. Some may call this tactical voting, but we didn’t come up the Lagan in a Bubble (for foreigners, or those from Bangor who got through passport control at Sydenham that means we in bountiful Belfast are not naive...).

Once you have decided who will be your MLA, you also get to choose who will be your councillor. Again you get to choose your favourite, then put numbers against those who aren’t quite favourite, those who are not too bad, and avoid those you don’t like at all. If this was any English shire or advanced state with real paved roads and running water such council elections would be fought on local issues, but this is Norn Iron...

As to the decision over whether we will get the proportional representation halfway house of the ‘Alternative Vote’ for Westminster, we will have to take a lie down in a darkened room before even thinking about that...

Well you can please some of the people...

THE old saying goes that you can please all of the people some of the time, but never all of the people all the time. And when it comes to Northern Ireland rest assured nobody is ever happy all of the time no matter how many times you try to please them.

And with so much at stake, you would have thought that the collective parties associated with this blighted and blessed patch of land would have brought together their wisdom, acumen and accumulated knowledge to bring home a budget to please at least some of the people, some of the time.

As they say in Belfast: “Aye right!” For those not fortunate enough to live in this most beautiful city, the phrase “Aye right!” represents more than a soupcon of sarcasm and a load of irony.

After the wrangling and bitterness surrounding the budget, it was finally agreed by the Executive yesterday (Thursday, 3 March) amid...wait for it...wrangling and bitterness.

Finance Minister, Sammy Wilson unveiled the budget plans with a degree of relish with plans for a special Assembly meeting today (Friday, 4 March). Now we are putting together this l’il old article ahead of the special Assembly meeting. And, it is without fear of contradiction that we can say there will be a certain amount of wrangling and bitterness.

This is also known as party politics, or electioneering.

Amazingly, for a man who proclaimed – and we paraphrase here – “we’re all doomed” a few short months ago, the Minister claims there now seems to be a wee bit of cash floating around the system.

Among those due for congratumalationwelldone accolades are the Land and Property Service, which apparently has gotten better at collecting our rates (local tax).

The result is that health and education are not quite as doomed as we thought. The Department of Employment and Learning is also getting some extra moolah. Pity the poor old Department of Social Development, which is losing £70m.

Of course, there are howls of disappointment and rants a plenty set for the coming months, but whether the Executive got it right, or whether the UUP and SDLP were right to vote against it at yesterday’s meeting of the Executive, we have a budget.

Now everyone gets to row about the detail and after the election fight about the Programme for Government.

Politics is such fun here. We can hardly contain ourselves!

Kicked into touch

PASS through to the centre forward, intercepted by the full-back, who punts forward, only for the ball to be missed by the winger and roll through to the keeper.

No we’re not talking about the latest round of European soccer matches, but rather the health service.

It’s not that the health service is receiving more soccer related injuries.

It is, however, reference to the fact that the acting head of the NHS Confederation, Nigel Edwards, has appealed for health not to be used as a political football.

Which, we suspect exposes a little bit of naivety on his part – surely health is, and must remain, a political football. From the Bevan reforms, through to the Tory creation of trusts, health has always been a political football with the word ‘ideology’ emblazoned on the ball itself.

The latest consideration is, of course, the Conservatives’ plans to semi-privatise/open up to community groups…oh hold on a moment perhaps the Confederation head was speaking about Norn Iron (well he was over here on Wednesday speaking at its local annual gathering…).

Given that, it is another piece of naivety: he must understand that in Norn Iron everything is a political football.

And the local health service managers Mr Edwards was addressing know all too well that the report into the children’s hospital, cancer waiting times, and so on and so on means that the football is getting walloped all over the park.

And, as a footnote to this story – the Department of Health, Personal Social Services and Public Safety issued a press release on Friday (25 February) which noted that the number of people waiting more than 12 hours for emergency care rose from 702 in December to 1,236 in January. Do we hear the sound of a another soccer match getting ready for kick-off?

You only sing when you’re winning, sing when you’re winning…

YOU’RE going home in the back of an ambulance! The referee’s a w****r! Okay we’ll stop there before descending into the less cerebral and even more offensive football chants.

This week’s passage of the Justice Bill through the Assembly suffered a hiccough along the way when an amendment to end sectarian chants at sports events was defeated.

Ulster Unionist MLA, Basil McCrea was among those that were at the heart of the debate. We say “hear, hear” because the amount of interventions recorded in the Assembly’s Official Report during the debate meant that anyone who managed to stay focussed had managed an achievement of some sort. And a rousing 'hear, hear' and an obligatory 'Amen' is what we expect for any achievement - we may even tip into a 'well done!'

And as to sectarian chanting! No, we never hear such things at rugger or GAA grounds.

We did think of asking Gregory Campbell for his thoughts on this vexed subject after one of his visits to see his beloved Rangers. But after his team were beaten 3-0 by the ‘Hoops’ last weekend we thought better of it!

We oppose!

THE Ulster Unionist leader Tom Elliott last week floated the idea that mandatory coalition government is perhaps not the best way forward.

In a speech to business leaders he floated the idea of a formal opposition in the Assembly chamber and other assorted ideas such as reduced numbers of constituencies.

We, have to wonder, has Mr Elliott thought this through.

First of all – under the current system and most people’s guesstimates over the May election results this would mean no seat in Government for the UUP or SDLP.

Second – the whole committee system would need to be over-hauled.

And then we – the public – would have to cough up for the ‘opposition’ parties. That’s not even to mention the confusion this would create for the Alliance Party.

But, as a party with no MPs, it may have escaped the notice of the UUP that at Westminster – even with the new fangled Conservative and Lib Dem Government, opposition parties rarely, if at all change policy, law or practice of governments. They do get soundbites on the news headlines, but we wonder if that will be sufficient comfort at passing on ministerial and committee chair salaries.

And that’s not to mention the changes to election boundaries – a tricky issue, which can lead to accusations on all parts of gerrymandering; and look where that has landed us!

Excuse me, but it is our money!

NOW we may be ignorant as to the mystical and mythical ways that bean counters, treasury officials, auditors, management consultants, actuary managers and others with spreadsheets work, but even they must despair at the labyrinth that passes for budget discussions in Northern Ireland.

C’mon politicians it is the budget for all of Northern Ireland, for all of Northern Ireland’s population, for every man, woman and child, for each and every one of our services.
It is not your budget, apart from the fact that you too – hopefully – pay taxes on your earnings.

So while you are bickering, wrangling, fighting and waffling here’s a brief guide to understanding the budget…

First we pay taxes. The taxes go across the water to people in England. Those people agree how much of that tax money can come back to Northern Ireland.

Then you, as responsible, mature, thoughtful politicians agree how to those taxes can be used to provide services to we, the public.

Okay that last sentence may have contained a fib or two – like the adjectives ‘responsible’, ‘mature’, and ‘thoughtful’ when applied to the mass of MLAs. We are, of course, not suggesting that there are not some who are responsible, thoughtful or mature, but then again….

When it comes to putting a semblance of decision-making behind the whole budget business (and we’re not even going to mention the regional rate!) one would have expected at least our Executive, our committee members and other assorted MLAs to have some common purpose.

Then again, we are generally hopeful that Utopia will eventually be created somewhere outside Belfast (given our luck it will be somewhere in north Down…) and all will be well with the world.

Instead, we have the Finance Committee telling, in effect, their party colleagues, that the budget was delivered too late, and that some departments weren’t engaging with scrutiny committees.

So, it is a mess, the Executive will do what it wants, and in many cases civil servants will have prepared all the programmes for ticking off by their political masters (who, we hope have given appropriate political direction).

And with an election coming down the track all too rapidly, we can at least expect everyone to disagree with everyone else. As they do that, we hope that they remember that it is all our money they are talking about, and it is us who will be queuing at the ballot box.

Dear Columnist

I note with alarm that Minister for Justice, Mr David Ford MLA, is suggesting that solicitors be allowed to appear in the High Court or the Court of Appeal.

As a practicing barrister, I believe that while this may coincide with some superannuated civil service review, it breaches my inalienable, long established right to cream off as much legal aid as one humanly can within one’s lifetime.

I am sure that Mr Ford is working to ensure that criminals, sorry I meant clients, will be able to access a range of legal services. For goodness sake, how can a solicitor, who can earn money ‘conveyancing’ as well as doing ‘proper’ legal work hope to provide a better and more robust case than us who need to recoup the cost of a silly cape and wig.

We barristers have very little steady income to rely on, and if Mr Ford has his way there will be even less for the high court to contend with in the event of reduced criminality and better community justice. If it keeps going this way, then I shall have to sell the second holiday home and renege on my membership of the yacht club and reduce my golfing to just three times a week.

Yours,

Ex-millionaire Barrister

PS – I know that the Government in London has said there will be no more ‘Saville-type’ inquiries, but can we please, please have at least one big one to keep the pension pot alive?