Irwin Armstrong, Leader of the Norn Iron Conservatives is my new favourite politician. Judging from his performance on “Hearts and Minds”, he will provide endless hours of Ian Parsley-like entertainment.
Having described the Tories as “centre right”, he then claimed that the DUP and UUP were veering towards Socialism.
Brilliant stuff!
So who are the Norn Iron Conservative Party.
A roundup of the usual suspects. Bill, The Boy Alex of course will be there. Maybe Felicity. Maybe Pauline (but if not there will be another token Catholic). A former Bank Chairman and a couple of occasional councillors from North Down. Some Sixth Formers from Campbell College. A blogger from Slugger? And a lobbyist …trying hard to keep a low profile.
Loads Journalists …especially if there is food provided.
The Conservative Party has been launched in Norn Iron more often than the Bangor lifeboat. And there is no reason to think that tomorrow’s launch will be any more successful than any other launch.
The Ulster Tatler crowd will love it. So will letsgetalongerists because one of their key objectives is bringing mainstream British politics into Norn Iron. No competition for left-leaning parties such as SDLP or Sinn Féin. No competition for DUP. A bit uncomfortable for UUP….although theres always the prospect of a merger at a future date. Mike Nesbitt is a natural Tory…he stood for that ill fated fiasco of UUP-Conservative Party in the Westminster Election of 2010.
So of course did Harry Hamilton, Paula Bradshaw and serial defector Ian Parsley. He has been back in the Alliance Party for months now and must be getting that urge to defect…again. If the Tories are to take any votes at all, it will be at the expense of that “liberal unionist” tendency which has never got anything right anyway.
A day out for local hacks covering the launch. But no serious contribution to political life here.
As I have stated here on several occasions, I voted SDLP from 1970 (Gerry Fitt was of course actually Republican Labour at the time) until 1993. From the period 1993 until 2009, I voted Sinn Féin. At first as anti-SDLP because of a dispute. And later as an act of conviction.
It is my perception that many of Sinn Féins vote is “soft”. It is also my perception that in the current decade of commemoration, Sinn Féin’s rush to be reconcilatory is compromising too much. This is exactly the same kinda behaviour which spooked moderate or mainstream nationalists to desert SDLP after 1998.
I think Sinn Féins “soft vote” or to characterise it another way…the nationalist/republican “floating voter” is under-estimated. Now in fairness during the ill-starred leadership of Margaret Ritchie (2010-2011) the SDLP could not capitalise on the earliest manifestation of Sinn Féin compromising too much. And of course SDLP had organisational difficulties.
Now SDLP is clearly addressing organisational difficulties. It is addressing recruitment. And for example last night SDLP Youth were leafleting Ballynahinch, Co Down.
But there are two distinct problems here. SDLP fights Sinn Féin all over Norn Iron. And it fights Alliance Party in suburban Belfast. Fighting on two fronts is difficult and SDLP has been using two different tactics on two fields of battle.
The tactic in dealing with the Alliance Party is to be reconcilatory. The tactic with Sinn Féin is to be confrontational. The SDLP must make a choice of one tactic.
Earlier today I was talking to a SDLP member. Political partisans are always different to mainstream voters. The SDLP person was extremely hostile to Sinn Féin. But I only stopped voting Sinn Féin three years ago. As the SDLP person said…….and I have of course heard it before “well I couldnt vote for murderers”. But the thing is….that view might well be held by a number of SDLP members. And held by a large number of SDLP voters. But the thing is that it is clearly not held by the persons who …..for one reason or another……stopped voting SDLP after 1998. And clearly it is not a view held by me.
I certainly had a problem voting Sinn Féin in the few years after 1993. I had even less problem after the Good Friday agreement. Now it strikes me that SDLP needs to win back a lot of voters from Sinn Féin. I certainly believe it is possible. But dismissing me as merely the kinda person who would vote for “murderers” is hardly the right way to go about it. A minority of SDLP members need to stop thinking as Sinn Féin voters as children of a lesser God.
Best leave that kinda moral high ground for the scumbags in the Alliance Party.
As “lost sheep” go….I am hardly a “big fish” to mix the metaphor.
But it strikes me as absurd that SDLP are not making a more realistic play for ex-voters while chasing after votes that were never SDLP in the first place. To recover its position…..certainly possible…..there is a choice. And the more realistic choice is to go after ex-voters rather than new voters.
Too many SDLP Conferences have been treated to the assorted opinions of Duncan Morrow, Rev Norman Hamilton, John McCallister MLA……and Davey Adams for Gods sake.
It would be nice if an upcoming SDLP Conference was actually adressed by……say……Brian Feeney.
Apologies that yesterday’s post on By Elections was in fact total rubbish.
When I got an email yesterday, I was informed that five Sinn Féin MPs had resigned…..from Westminster. In fact only one…..Martin McGuinness resigned his Westminster seat.
The other four have resigned their Assembly seats. Therefore four new MLAs will be co-opted. I daresay its possible that Niall Ó Donnghaille will be rewarded. Or Máirtin Ó Muilleoir. Or Vincent Parker. Any could fit into West Belfast.
Mid Ulster….Ian Milne to succeed probably Michelle O’Neill.
A few days ago my #2 son was cutting down some trees for his ageing parents. And he discovered a wasp nest. Not very big. But about the size of…..an average sized Easter Egg. Hmmm sorry but I can describe it in no other way.
This morning I phoned Environmental Health at our local council. I assumed they had a service for this kinda thing.
Well they kinda do………and they kinda dont. The guy at the Council was very nice. He asked me my postcode. And rather oddly there is no funding from DRD or DSD (I get confused) for reemoving a wasp nest in our garden. We are not in a designated regeneration area.
I find this odd. Even unfair. Now I dont in any way resent the fact that I have to pay for a service. I can afford it. What bothers me is the arbitrary nature. A person within my postcode area may or may not be able to afford this. A person in a regeneration area may or may not be able to afford the service…..but a postcode seems a very bizarre way to make a decision.
Happily a very nice man (found thru Yellow Pages) removed the wasp nest about 7.15pm tonight. Apparently even within this small nest there might be around three hundred wasps. They should all be dead in the morning and the nice man will come back on Wednesday to check that all is well. All very reasonable and a snip at £35. I dont feel that I was………stung…….geddit?
But heres the thing. We have a blue wheely bin. We have a green wheely bin.
But some of our neighbours have a brown wheely bin. In which they put grass cuttings etc. We have to transport ours to the local amenity. Now every few months I phone the Council and get the same answer….funding has run out.
Again services provided on an arbitrary basis.
This folks……is wrong.
I have long thought that people have been over-stating the dates of the next “Election” and the boundaries on which those elections will be fought. And by “Election”…I mean Westminster and Stormont. And yes I do know that fixed term parliaments make that more difficult.
The decision by five Sinn Fein MPs to stand down from Westminster to concentrate on Stormont provides an opportunity for Sinn Féin and SDLP to again battle for nationalist/republican votes. Ironically the last time, there was mass resignations …by unionists……over the Anglo-Irish Agreement, it allowed Seamus Mallon of the SDLP to take the Newry-Armagh seat of Jim Nicholson.
If there is a unionist unity candidate in Fermanagh-South Tyrone, Michelle Gildernew looks vulnerable. Over to you Mr Nesbitt.
As this is not a General Election there remains the intriguing possibility that there might be some tactical voting by unionists in other constituencies. And with the exception of Fermanagh-South Tyrone, these are straight fights..if a tad uneven between Sinn Féin and SDLP. The Alliance Party, west of the Bann is a total irrelevance……and in a political sense…West Belfast is west of the Bann. For some bizarre reason UTV quote an Alliance councillor….new rent-a-quote Councillor Conrad Dixon from Craigavon on the weighty matter.
Yet the people of West Belfast may not be thrilled to discover that they are being asked to vote in a by-election for the second time in this Parliament. Gerry Adams stood down in 2011 to concentrate on an Dáil. An opportunity perhaps for Colin Keenan the SDLP man who broke the Sinn Féin monopoly of the Lower Falls at council level. Or Conall McDevitt in anticipation of a South-West Belfast Assembly constituency. An opportunity also for Brian Heading, former Mayor of Lisburn. Sinn Féin will win…….but who will their candidate be? Will one of their MLAs stand down (Gerry Kelly?) for the co-option of another to the Assembly.
In West Tyrone, Sinn Féin got 50% of the votes in 2011. SDLP got less than 10% so clearly not winnable. Allowing for a fall in the SF vote, increase in SDLP vote and tactical voting by unionists…..there is not really enough for a SDLP candidate……Daniel Wray McCrossan or Barry Brown to do anything other than increase their profile ahead of Assembly and Council Elections. SF candidate….Barry McElduff?
Newry-Armagh…..is actually winnable for SDLP. And I expect that is the message that they will want to project. Conor Murphy is the only real SF big hitter in the area. And the SF lead over SDLP is just fifteen points…..unionists score around 30% here so do the maths. SDLP ……probably Dominic Bradley will run very close to winning the seat and will be a major threat to SF.
Mid Ulster…..the most likely SF candidate here is Michelle O’Neill…which would allow Ian Milne to be co-opted. SDLP candidate……Patsy McGlone surely. Clearly with SF on 50% and SDLP on 15%…..that is too big a gap even allowing for unionist tactical voting.
Fermanagh-South Tyrone……impossible to predict without knowing what unionism is doing about an agreed candidate.
Still shades of those mass resignations by unionists (DUP and UUP) in 1986. Sinn Féin go into these by-elections with five seats and clearly cannot come out of the by-elections with more. There is at least an even chance that they could lose one seat or more.
The SDLP problem here is ……money. Finding the money to fight elections is clearly an issue…..but under Alasdair McDonnell there has been more cash coming in. And SDLP fundraising events are now likely to have a degree of urgency which will persuade donors to dig deep. The SDLP (and indeed Sinn Féin) wont lack resources….there is a highly motivated army of SDLP Youth…….and they will be descending en masse….particuarly in Newry-Armagh and Mid Ulster.
Reassuring news for Letsgetalongerists. The Belfast Telegraph has an opinion poll. What would “lets getalongerist” message boards do without the Belfast Telegraph and its opinion polls?
The prominent Norn Iron Political Message Board/Blog site…..Slugger O’Toole……celebrated ten years online last week and I wish to add my congratulations.
I first contributed to Slugger O’Toole about seven years ago….for maybe two years…using about three “names”….not because I was a “sock puppet” but because of my inability to remember my passwords. Since January 2010, I have been a regular.
Slugger O’Toole is of course a partner….but I am told only on occasions…of Stratagem, the lobbying company. Stratagem is of course advisor to the nice Rowntree people who have generously donated £98,000 (since 2007) to the Alliance Party.
Does Slugger have an agenda? It would claim not although it does not have the transparency it seeks in others. The core team have actually their own agenda and weaken Slugger credibility as a consequence. Sinn Féin and DUP tend to ignore Slugger ………and increasingly the SDLP ignore it. The consequence has been a kinda “group think” (to use the over-used “new” word) where there is a kinda vague “lets get alongerism” …where “good” things are believed to include integrated education, the Norn Iron Football team, the Alliance Party, importing mainland politics, using new media and dealing with the past . “Bad” things are believed to include Religion (especially Catholicism), the nation of Ireland, big walls dividing the population, an inclusive Executive, anything that isnt the BBC.
While the core team, excluding the excellent Mick Fealty are the weakness in Slugger O’Toole..the strength is a motley coalition of commenters (sic) who act as a kinda opposition to the “group think/agenda”. Much is made of the “play the ball, not the man” rule but refereeing seems to be more often Graham Poll than Pierluigi Collina. Or rather like a junior League rugby scrum….the weak are over-protected.
At its best….the Norn Iron Water Story…….Slugger is actually very good. At its worst……the sectarian rants of some commenters……Slugger is awful.
I tend to think of it as akin to the satirical magazine Private Eye. It is a kinda house magazine of local journalists. The eccentric “Space” threads are scacely relevant to anything unless a meteorite is going to hit and there is too much deference to fellow journalists. Well only some journalists of course.
Personal highlight for me was when prominent Alliance members outed me as a “failed SDLP politician from North Belfast” and became convinced I was Brian Feeney. I enjoyed this even more when a prominent journalist addressed me directly as “Brian”. I also took a lot of pleasure getting a mis-directed email from one of the Slugger team “who is this bastard Fitzjames Horse?”
Low point? Easy…….Slugger did not acknowledge the death of 100 year old James Kelly who had been a journalist for over eighty years. I declare an interest. James Kelly was a friend of my father. Why was he shamefully ignored on Slugger O’Toole? Possibly Jimmy was not in really part of the wider freemasonry of journalism.
But in all…….Slugger adds to the pleasure of living in this God-forsaken place.
At Fitzjames Horse Castle we are flying the flag……obviously the Italian Flag…..as we dont want Willie Frazer to get all hot and bothered.
Bad result for Ireland tonight. But I still think it is possible to take a point from Spain or Italy. Always a tall order to qualify in this group …Ireland being the 18th ranked nation in the World and Spain (#1), Croatia (#9) and Italy (#12) in the Group.
Norn Iron are actually #103 in the World, one place behind Sudan.
Keeping An Eye On the Czar of Russia 