PfG2 - The Delivery Begins!

DEEP in the bowels of Parliament Buildings, Stormont lies a darkened room.

Occasionally a door opens letting in light, causing the denizens of this secret cabal to blink and shrink from the glare.

The rare times it does open is to admit a pizza delivery, or multi-packs of stimulant drinks.

Here lies the geek.

Here lies the programmers; that secretive bunch of nerds who crouch and stoop as they bend over their keyboards, using their programming skills to shape and adjust the figures and avatars flitting across their screens.

Here they are ready for their latest release, with a fanfare almost as big as any Xbox 360 release, dripping with the same hyperbole PlayStation3 games the nerds let loose their latest product “Programme for Government 2.0 – the delivery Begins!”

Players of PfG2 are immediately faced with the first challenge, controlling rival speakers as they bore endlessly without tripping up, or worse still, disagreeing.
Next navigate a host of media interviewers were reporters shoot barbed jibes and awkward questions.

Finally beware the end of level boss: earn experience points from ‘Da Speaker’ before facing the End of Level Boss – The Allister.

Pass by The Allister and you’ll move on to Level Two, where you must extract the secret elixir called ‘Money’ to deliver your Level One Promises into the strangest yet of environments. It’s called the real world. As yet few MLAs have passed that level consistently for more than a few fleeting moments.

The programmers of Pfg2 – The Delivery Begins promise four years of gameplay before the ultimate stage ‘The Election’. Before then thrill with your ‘Sword of Cuts’ as you slash into the bloated dragons of Local Government, reducing their numbers until you can manage them; and discover the secret hoards of gold hidden in the mysterious caverns called ‘Monitoring Rounds’.

Less advanced PfG2 players still have the option of downloading a player guide in hard copy where you can join in by picking a page and rolling a dice to see whether any Programme for Government promises can be met.

Collision course

THE prospect of closing schools seems a nice wee idea for saving money, although no-one has yet explained how this will be achieved as there is unlikely to be a queue to buy old school buildings, but at least they’ll save on the costs of those pesky teacher’s wages.

So, while we’re all welting away thinking about what the Education Minister, John ‘High Tower’ O’Dowd’s audit of schools will result in, some schools in the South Eastern Education and Library Board area are already ‘earmarked’ for closure.

One such school is Knockmore Primary School in Lisburn, an integrated school with a special needs unit. Who should pop up there on Friday, but Health Minister Edwin Poots. And the Department of Health’s press release duly issued a press release with much made of the speech and language work done there.

But surely it could be construed as inappropriate for an Executive Minister to visit a school while its future is being decided. If he was visiting as the constituency MLA then fair enough, but then the gathered press officers would not have needed to pull together a few well honed phrases and issue the release via the Executive Information Service.

Has a nod been tipped to ‘Big John’ or will this see mutual huffing?

Nothing like a crisis to get us all motivated

NORTHERN Ireland’s politicians have adopted the motto of the Boy Scout movement to “Be Prepared” by planning for a crisis over the next Justice Minister six months in advance.

For those of you too bored to pay attention, Alliance took on the mantle of the devolved Justice portfolio in April 2010 after much faux brinkmanship between the DUP and Sinn Féin. But that deal will end in May 2012.

Who will then become Justice Minister? Sinn Féin quite fancy a shot at it, but the DUP will not look forward to facing their core electorate with that in place, so are suggesting that the number of executive departments be reduced so the posts can be doled out to prevent such embarrassment. Either way we could be see D’Hondt run again (Oh, go and look that up on Wikipedia because we’re not going to explain it again!).

Alliance leader and current Justice Minister, David Ford said he would willingly step aside to make sure that the devolution of justice would not fall.

And, an agreed way forward? We can’t be having that! Otherwise there would be no sense of crisis to work towards in May. After all we’ve no election to get worked up about!

On yer bike!

HEALTH staff! Out, get out right now! Yep, Health Minister Edwin Poots wants you gone! And especially if you're what he calls non-essential staff...

Mr Poots claimed this week that he had secured £15m to offer voluntary redundancies and early retirement packages to health staff and wasn’t able to rule out that ‘frontline’ staff would not be included. So, does that mean that if a member of the ‘frontline’ turns up asking for early retirement,Mr Poots will say no until there are enough non-essential staff collecting their cheques? And, who exactly qualifies as non-essential? And, how soon will they be back as management consultants?

Past efforts have been less than successful, or have seen swathes of the health service, like cleaning services, contracted out to the private sector. And who are we to say that it was a mere coincidence that Mr Poots was recently in the US of A, where people who don’t have health insurance yearn for the luxury of the NHS, even our less than perfect version of it.

Right here, right now more operations are being carried out, ever more complicated procedures are undertaken regularly, cancer sufferers have better survival rates and people are living longer than any other period of history.
This means that the ministerial portfolio attached to health is one which will forever be a victim of the success of those under their titular command.

Therefore spending £15m to get rid of some staff to save £9m a year seems a good deal. But, we suspect – regular Clouseau’s that we are – that all will not run smoothly, and the law of the health service unintended consequences will kick in almost immediately.

Fox, Tories and the UUP

WE hate the term lobbyists. It conjures up images of sharp suited types smarming round the corridors of the Congress and the Senate in the US to make sure more kids are addicted to tobacco and oil companies are allowed to kill wildlife.

Here in Northern Ireland there are few lobbyists. These include professional, dedicated consultants who work in an open transparent way with their clients and politicians. As opposed to say the way a certain Mr Werrity is alleged to have operated…

Mr Fox stood up in the Commons and, like a naughty school boy on front of the headmaster said he done wrong, but if it wasn’t for them touts in the media…

Now, much as we have the occasional dislike for the media and their scurrilous ways, it is a bit rich to say the media were misbehaving because I was misbehaving and that wasn’t fair; if you catch what we mean.

Instead of the mutual respect public affairs professionals here in Northern Ireland share with politicians, policy officers and their aides, the Fox affair has the potential to cause the sort of chaos that occurs when…well when a fox gets into the henhouse. (You can now park all your ‘long runs the Fox’ comments, we’ve heard them all)

While this year’s Tory party conference was marked by there being more “lobbyists” than Conservative Party delegates, here in Norn Iron party conferences are generally more sedate and, well more gentlemanly type of affairs. A long weekend, getting to know candidates and colleagues, influencers and decision-makers alongside the politicos and their acolytes.

And lo and behold this weekend the Ulster Unionist Party conference is to be a much truncated affair, a private session for party members to work out where it all went wrong this afternoon (Friday) and a brief opportunity for those lobbyist types to mingle tomorrow morning (Saturday), before the main session concludes at lunchtime.

Oh do behave!

THE ability for Norn Iron’s politicians to behave as clowns for the entertainment of the chittering and chattering classes has no bounds.

Whoever is in the Assembly speaker’s chair has to contend with TUV leader Jim Allister for a start – the politician with more red cards than Wayne Rooney. They also have to contend with people shouting, people making statements while sitting (a definite parliamentary no-no), people making statements instead of asking questions and at least one other language.

Deputy speaker Roy Beggs showed a red card to Dominic Bradley last week, who was asking a question/making a statement/ordering lunch in Irish but refusing to translate his words into English. While some other Gaeilge speakers in the chamber could understand Mr Bradley’s point, frankly we couldn’t really be bothered, when the comedy value of another MLA getting a red card was out there.

Of course, there was no real sanction. Not being able to speak in plenary sessions is a skill many an MLA has acquired and judging by the empty benches during debates, attending challenges more than a few.

So what would be a real sanction for an MLA? A cut in wages for a week or month or a fine should be one option. Repeat offenders could be made to apologise publicly to their party Assembly grouping, or better still their constituents?

But all of this belies the fact that most MLAs manage to work hard, both in committees and on behalf of constituents.

While much has been done to profile the Assembly and educate the population on its structures we feel that the real problem is that MLAs never really explain their work or profile their jobs. We fear that no amount of money could hire Max Clifford or other PR publicists to tackle that Herculean job!

We're all doomed

IN case you hadn’t noticed, we’re all doomed…and it’s our fault. Yep we’re not spending enough to buy our way out of recession.

This remarkable analysis appeared in a number of articles following the publication of Norn Iron statistics that showed that our manufacturing figures slumped deeper than thought and were taking longer to recover.

Amidst much handwringing, beating of brows and rending of garments one of the proposed ways out of the tumultuous terror of double dips (make one of ours a guacamole dip please!) is to spend more and more.

Okay therein lies a basic problem: with unemployment rising and wages slumping it is hard to see how we’re going to avoid a dip in sales figures (of course we could all buy hummus dips…).

But hope lies on the horizon! Yes, our money Minister, Sammy Wilson has said there are more civil servants (yes especially those ones from North Down who buy the really expensive dips). Despite a so-called recruitment freeze there were more civil servants hired to stalk the corridors of the Stormont departments.

Other public bodies may not be hiring as many staff, but it is reassuring that there are more civil servants. Sales of biros and clipboards are sure to rise.

But what of the rest of the economy? Newspaper headlines scream meltdown; talk shows offer anyone with an opinion their slot on the airwaves and never have so many economists offered so few options to so many media outlets.

Who is offering solutions? No-one apparently has any realistic answers. The much-mooted corporation tax cut for Norn Iron has disappeared off the immediate horizon.

Which is all a lot of words to say that while economies crumble, nation states waver, financiers and bankers sweat and governments quail there is no immediately viable solution to the problems that beset a small part of a small island on the fringes of the European Union.

In the meantime we’re off to get some of that really expensive ‘caviar’ dip, taramosalata, wash it down with some top notch retsina… or a meal deal and a bottle of buckfast…

Thus the golden generation departs off stage

THE golden generation of Ireland has sloped from the stage, heads bowed, acknowledging that for them the dream is over, the faint hopes that once were so stirring and exciting gone forever.

Instead ahead lies oblivion and taunts; old injuries bedding in as arthritic joints loom in the not too distant future.

Oh, and the Irish rugby team lost too.

Yes, where once a succession of Marys held the promise of a Celtic Tiger surging forward, bolstered by energy and reckless daring, we now have symbols of an Ireland confused by its identity. Asda shoppers, a disability claimant, a quangocrat, a Eurovison ‘winner’ and pensioners are numbered in the Irish presidential race.

Is this really the best that can represent Ireland? Will Asda be doing deliveries to the presidential palace? Would Mr Norris still be able to claim his disability payments and by now does anyone care?

The Irish presidential campaign promised much in the way of early excitement, with McGuinness and Norris bringing controversy and colour, but so far like the flaccid Irish forward line and the insipid tackling of the Irish rugby team it has faltered into something only the media really, truly care about.

One might almost be tempted to suggest that there is no hope for statesmanship in the wake of race, but this we are sure: it makes Norn Iron tribal politics seem at least a wee bit daring in comparison.

And He’s Been Shown the Red Card!

WITH all the tension of waiting for some referee in the premiership to decide whether it really was a two-footed challenge, Speaker of the Assembly William Hay gave TUV leader and anti-power sharing cheer leader Jim Allister a yellow card warning before, as the crowd bayed, showed the North Antrim Assembly man the red card…

Defiantly striding from the chamber, publicity mission accomplished, Mr Allister readied to serve out his extension.

Yes the suspension will restrain Mr Allister from being called to speak however we are worried about the sanity of officials in government departments.

The suspension will give Mr Allister more time to scribble some more written questions, of which he is quickly proving to be the master, with more than 200 in his name slapped down to answer since his election in May.

This could be the work of a man determined to assess whether the laws of pedantry have stepped into the realm of legislative and constitutional juxtaposition, or he is aiming for an Asian job creation scheme whereby answering his questions can be out-sourced to a call centre on the sub-continent.

We, of course, believe that all MLAs only ever ask questions for two reasons: to establish facts; and, to ensure transparent democracy. No MLA would ever ask a question to score political points.

Marching to the 'Field'

R&B ARTIST and possessor of fine assets Rhianna caused Norn Iron to hit global headlines after DUP councillor Alderman Alan Graham told her to cover up those assets and leave the field.

Some of you may suspect that Rhianna got confused about the date when a proportion of Norn Iron’s population march to the ‘field’. Others will suspect a masterstroke of PR by the Tourist Board, yet others have claimed it shows we’re just as backward as a Bible-belt, end of times evangelical from the southern states of the US.

Whatever way you want to look at it (and there were plenty trying to look at it across the aforementioned field) Rhianna’s bare-chested cheek at exposing herself put Norn Iron on to global news pages instead of our traditional summer ‘glories’ (winning golf majors and recreational rioting).

Condemnation and congratulations are a successful Norn Iron participatory sports, reserved for athletes lithe enough to dial a radio phone-in. Rhianna’s welcome into Norn Iron’s bosom (Editor’s Note: Stop those chest references right away!) meant that we exported our call-in condemnation/congratulation merry-go-round across the world.

Rumours that a major Hollywood porn studio is trying to book up fields here to get some shock PR were proved false when it was revealed [Editor’s 2nd Note – now really stop that!] that Norn Iron’s climate is normally dank, damp and mildly miserable.

What it did prove to the world is that Norn Iron can now collectively turn its hand to video, TV and film production for top studios, producers and directors from across the world.

But we wonder, was this an unexpected side consequence of Peter Robinson and Martin McGuinness talking up our production facilities in the US. If it was we hope that the pair have not made tits of themselves. And now we really must draw a modest curtain across this story…