´óÏó´«Ã½

I am writing this up in the Assembly building, just before heading back down to Stormont Castle to catch up on today's Executive meeting. With water charges, the Irish language and Margaret Ritchie's decision to axe UDA linked funding on the table, the meeting promised to be hot and heavy. It began with disagreements over the minutes of what had been agreed previously by the Executive, and a short adjournment.

No doubt there'll be more later in the day, but my current understanding is that although things got a bit frosty between Ms Ritchie and Peter Robinson, there has not been the complete Executive meltdown which had seemed a distinct possibility. It looks like the Finance Minister is going go away and seek his own legal advice. Whilst some hacks are dubbing Ms Ritchie "the Terminator" because of her attitude to UDA linked funding, others have decided that the Finance Minister must be "Robbo Cop" because of his zealousness in policing the Executive protocol.

If ministers have been getting a bit crabby lately, maybe it's because we have been landing too many of the beasts on our shores. In my latest attempt to provide you with a fact you didn't know, I can divulge that over the past 12 months fishermen here caught just over 724 tonnes of brown crabs, worth more than £590,000. Thanks to the Agriculture Minister Michelle Gildernew and Sinn Fein's Willie Clarke for this interesting "snippet".

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• |
• |
• - What's this?