The news that the talks at Stormont, aimed at kick-starting the Northern Ireland Executive, are to be put on hold until after the summer break does not really come as…
Commentary
The (long) culture war
The emergence of an Irish Language Act as a ‘red line issue’ for Sinn Fein may be deemed to have its origins in the St. Andrew’s Agreement, indeed, under ‘Annex…
Wither nationalism… ?
So the election is over. Leaving aside the overall picture, it can be said that this was good election for Unionists.
Corbyn has betrayed Labour’s noble history of liberal internationalism
A noble tradition of liberal internationalism has pumped blood to the heart of the Labour Party since its foundation. It is an essential part of the Labour story. As a biographer of Clement Attlee, I…
BRIT!
The comment made this past week on social media by a prominent Sinn Fein Councillor Ciaran Beattie, subsequently removed, where he accused People Before Profit MLA and Westminster candidate Gerry…
Blair, Blair…
Two things stand out from Tony Blair’s comments around his visit to the European People’s Party meeting in Dublin last weekend. Both are puzzling. First, Blair has suggested in response…
Abstractions of reality
We are becoming used to claims that the UK might have to pay a very hefty bill in order to leave the EU. In contrast, one and a half years ago…
Keep your head on
In his excellent study of Ideology and the Irish Question, Paul Bew quoted a Ballymoney Free Press editorial of May 1912 at the height of the Irish Home Rule crisis. ‘The…
EU offers instability to North, or South, or both.
Indications from the EU leaders’ summit (now not including the UK) suggest they are minded to allow a post-Brexit Northern Ireland a seamless transition back into the EU if that Northern…