´óÏó´«Ã½

Hot off the presses is a notice from the DUP which tells me that the First Minister and his party colleagues will be attending a breakfast 7.30am (ugh!) Monday morning. And what's more Peter Robinson will be giving a keynote address on the economy. Will it give Martin McGuinness indigestion, I wonder!?

Anyway, it seems that my esteemed colleague Mark Devenport has been landed with the early start on Monday. He'll be well able as he has been off on leave for a week!

Mark, you are very welcome back indeed!

In the meantime tune in to Inside Politics on Sunday with me, Martina Purdy, and a fantastic panel...

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

Hallowe'en can be a spooky time of year - especially if you are an Ulster Unionist MLA waiting to hear what your new leader has in mind for your future.

Tom Elliott made his decisions public at a news conference today but hinted there were a few changes still to be announced by the end of the week.

Mr Elliott's changes were not much of a surprise. It was widely known he would not move Michael McGimpsey from health (because it's a complex department and there's no time for a new person to settle in before an election - the official line). And it's also not a surprise that Sir Reg Empey, the former leader, lost his post, as this small department was easier to fill and all new leaders want to be able to show they have some power of patronage. Sir Reg was able to go to Washington last week for the US-NI Investment Conference, and was still a minister yesterday for his 63rd birthday (Happy belated Birthday Sir Reg - you know you share a birthday with Hillary Clinton and yours truly.)

His one consolation - besides his impeccable manners, and the fact he seems to be able to keep his head when all around him are losing theirs - is his future elevation. Yes, he could be wearing ermine soon. Word has it Sir Reg is heading for the Lords, while intending to stand again in East Belfast. And he is going to join the Justice and Education committees.

Basil McCrea didn't get a big job - but he got to keep his post on the Policing Board (so far.) Well, he has been good as gold since the leadership contest, and quiet as a mouse. (Basil - Ring me!) And while he has few friends in the assembly team - he did practically call some of them lazy during the leadership campaign - his best friend at Stormont, John McCallister, MLA for South Down, has been promoted to deputy leader. That's Danny Kennedy's old job but he's not crying over it. He's got the Executive job at last. Danny Kennedy joked as he arrived at the Department of Employment and Learning that he was an "overnight success after 25 years." He was clearly delighted and raced right in to shake hands with the security staff, before getting down to business. That is trying to replace the 30,000 jobs about to go in the public sector with private sector ones.

Speaking of jobs, Basil McCrea has also been given a position on the UUP election committee alongside the leader. There had been whispers at Stormont that bruiser Basil would be given the chairmanship of the First and Deputy First Minister's committee - taking on Peter Robinson and Martin McGuinness. Basil McCrea might be able to find out what happened to the Single Equality Bill. Instead, Mr Elliott has decided to take that post himself. It is high profile and he did keep his promise not to take a ministerial post ahead of the election.

So that leaves David McNarry not one bit frightened over Hallowe'en. He's still vice-chairman of the Finance Committee, putting the fear of God into the Department of Finance with his talk of black holes. They hate that expression in Finance! He's also the justice spokesman.

Anyway, you can log onto the Ulster Unionist website for the rest of the changes, in case you are going to a pub quiz and you're asked who the Agriculture or Environment spokesman is.

As for me, I'm going home now to rest my voice which got wonderfully deeper when I crossed the Atlantic into Washington last week, but my throat hurts like heck!

In the meantime, we can all try to guess what new title Sir Reg might adopt.

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

The Executive's meeting on the cuts today concluded with a decision to seek a meeting with David Cameron. Despite Owen Paterson's angry protestations that the government has not broken its word over the £18 billion capital spending pledge, Stormont ministers weren't convinced. Martin McGuinness described Mr Paterson's defence of the Spending Review as shameful and claimed that far from being a champion for Northern Ireland at the cabinet table, Mr Paterson was acting as a champion for the Treasury.

Mr Paterson pointed out this morning that Gordon Brown's original pledge contained cash from several pots - not just grants from the treasury, but money loaned under to so called Reform and Reinvestment Initiative and cash from third parties. He also said that whilts it's up to the Executive whether to sell assets like Belfast harbour he personally would favour such a course of action.

The Deputy First Minister retorted that it's easy to urge the Executive to sell off the family silver, but this might not be a sensible course given the depressed state of the market.

As an example of supposed Treasury perfidy Stormont sources claim that capital spent on policing and justice since 2005 has been counted in to the £18 billion, even though this area wasn't devolved until this year.

For their part the Conservatives are annoyed about what they see as their generosity over the Presbyterian Mutual Society being thrown back in their faces.

So the London Stormont relationship isn't too harmonious. It will be interesting to see how long it takes for Downing Street to agree to a meeting. In the run up to the Spending Review the Stormont politicians were told to work with either the Secretary of State or the Chancellor. Some Conservatives believe Tony Blair devalued his own currency and that of his successive Secretaries of State by being available on tap to the Northern Ireland party leaders.

P.S. I am away next week but Stephen Walker will be at the helm for Inside Politics on Sunday, whilst I am hoping Martina Purdy might do a bit of blog sitting once she has recovered from her transatlantic travels (the high point of which wasn't Hillary Clinton but a brief encounter with Sarah Jessica Parker at a Washington hotel. Ms Purdy and one of the Sex and The City girls? How would a by stander tell the difference?)

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

The tributes have been coming in for the photographer John Harrison who died suddenly at his home last night. John had just returned from covering the US Investment Conference in Washington.

Those who had the privilege to know John don't need telling that he was a lovely, cheerful human being - a quality which helped him to be the great photographer he was. He was an eyewitness to so many of our historic events. Those who didn't know him could do worse than to visit The picture gallery there gives a good idea of the breadth of his experience and the consistent quality of his professional work. (If the link isn't working try typing in https://www.harrisonphotography.co.uk/).

I am about to head to today's Executive meeting where I understand the First and Deputy First Ministers will be recollecting their own memories of John Harrison. My warmest wishes go out to his family at this time.

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

After my last blog I got a call from a Stormont source telling me that come the end of this Spending Review period our budget will be down £1.4 billion on what had been projected.

This morning's local headlines pick up on Sammy Wilson's "cumulative total" with the Irish News going for "£4 billion of pain" and the News Letter "The £4 billion war of words". So job done, then - that's rather more arresting than the alternative "NI fares £600 million better than expected" (which no one went for).

What is undeniable is that after years of economic growth the tighter times will present a challenge to local ministers. The sharp downturn in capital spending means the loss of thousands of jobs in the construction sector (the trade unions are talking about 20,000 public sector and 16,000 private sector jobs at risk).

Local ministers start the business of grappling with the realities at an Executive meeting tomorrow. If you look at there's a series of target dates for how the process of setting a budget should be handled. According to these targets a draft budget is meant to be agreed by late October, with a final budget published in late December.

Even if the parties had been in agreement about how to respond to the Spending Review, those dates were always likely to slip. One educated guess is that the draft budget might move towards late November and the final budget sometime in January. The ultimate bookend for this is the end of the financial year in early April - if we get there without any agreement we could potentially get into the

Speaking to me this morning Gerry Adams said Sinn Fein is intent on agreeing a budget, but added the caveat that it must be the right budget.

As the haggling begins, it's worth bearing in mind the political calculations the parties have to make.

1. There is an Assembly election coming in May next year. Do local parties want to go into that campaign appearing to implement Whitehall cutst? If not could they be charged with irresponsibility?

2. Traditionally in budget negotiations ministers have always engaged in turf wars defending their own patch.

3. This time, however, the parties only know what their patches will be for the next six months. Under the D'Hondt system, they will have to take their turns at picking departments after the May election. So does a minister want to die in a ditch over a department which might be inherited by another party in the future?

Martin McGuinness told me on last weekend's Inside Politics that he believes a budget will be agreed. Today, perhaps surprisingly, Caitriona Ruane acknowledged that money was being squandered in education, pinpointing small A level classes in post primary schools. So maybe the cynics will be proved wrong and we shall see a deal.

If not, there are ways the system might cope until the next election - current departmental allocations could be rolled forward, with any cuts postponed until after the election, or the current allocations could be "top sliced" (each reduced in line with the overall cut in the Executive budget).

I have a feeling I could be drowning in numbers for months to come!

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

Budget days can be fairly confusing as journalists try to wade through a welter of statistics. But this Spending Review seems even more perplexing than usual.

First George Osborne told us we were doing very well, thank you, staying flat in terms of cash with a current budget of £9.5 billion in 2014/15.

Then from across the Atlantic we started hearing dark rhetoric, as both Peter Robinson and Martin McGuinness talked about hearing very bad news, especially on capital spending. Mr Robinson implied that the government had massaged the figures on capital spending and also raised a question over the security budget.

According to the Treasury website, we appeared to be doing better than other departments with This seemed to be the beneficial knock on impact of the ring fencing of health in England and the generous settlement for education.

But the website revealed that so far as capital spending is concerned (the money used to build roads, hospitals and other public projects) we were taking more of a hit, down 37%.

So that's clear then? Well I thought so when the Department of Finance put out different figures, estimating the current revenue cut at 8% and the capital cut at just over 40%. The explanation for this discrepancy is that the Treasury and the Stormont Finance department started their calculations at a different stage - the London arithmetic applied to the figures after the recent emergency budget, the Belfast sums started prior to that reduction.

Then to confuse matters still more the local Finance Minister Sammy Wilson came up with a global figure of £4 billion - the amount he said we are losing cumulatively over the next four years. This surprised me, as we have all been talking about a £2 billion cut in the run up to this Spending Review. So have we got double the cuts expected?

Mr Wilson says no - instead the previous Department of Finance briefings were based on the notion that we would be down £2 billion in four years time, not the amount we would lose in total on the way.

If you understand that get back to me - it doesn't seem to be borne out by the annual breakdown on the Treasury website.

Boiling it all down, it looks like Northern Ireland has done relatively well on the current side, but undeniably badly on capital spending. That's not good news for the local construction industry. Some experts are predicting as many as 20,000 job losses locally.

One group who will be feeling relieved are Presbyterian Mutual Savers, now the Chnacellor has confirmed a £200 million life line. The Stormont Executive has yet to sign off on their role in the rescue package. Local ministers will no doubt be busy not just considering that, but also deciding how they cut up their diminishing portion of George Osborne's cake.

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

The Assembly Public Attitudes Survey I referred to yesterday came out this morning. It suggests that a large proportion of people here don't feel engaged with the Asembly or Executive. You can get the full detail

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

Last weekend my colleague Gareth Gordon was covering the Progressive Unionist Party conference when he came across an activist he had come across the year before. Gareth hardly recognised the man. Previously clean shaven, he now sported a beard and long hair reminiscent of Gandalf from the Lord of the Rings.

Questioned about his transformation, the unionist had the most logical explanation - he had got a job as an extra on the filming of "Game of Thrones" at the Paint Hall in Belfast's Titanic Quarter.

I don't know whether the Conservative Peer and former UUP leader Lord Trimble is double jobbing on "Game of Thrones". But, he is also sporting a beard, which gives him "a look of George V crossed with Tom Hanks in Castaway".

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

If you wanted to bury some bad news during a busy time in the news cycle you could do worse than to launch it after 9am tomorrow morning. By that time the morning papers will have long since gone to print and the breakfast radio shows will have come off air. You will also be safe to assume that any lunchtime programmes will be gearing up for the Chancellor's Spending Review, as George Osborne is due to get to his feet at 12.30pm.

Now I haven't seen the Assembly's Public Attitudes Survey ( research intended to reveal the attitudes of the public towards the assembly), so I don't know whether it's good, bad or indifferent. But it's due out at 10 am tomorrow......

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

The Speaker told the DUP's Jonathan Bell off this morning for insulting other MLAs. During last week's marathon double jobbing debate Mr Bell had some fairly uncomplimentary things to say about the SDLP's Conall McDevitt. This morning Mr Bell said he was happy towithdraw any remarks which might have caused offence. So what ruffled the SDLP's feathers? Mr Bell first talked about Mr McDevitt as "the mouth from south", then "the mouth from South Belfast".

Nominations required for MLAs who could be described as "the beast from the east" or "the pest from the west"...

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

With the Spending Review tomorrow I'm sure there will be endless figures and percentages clogging up our news agenda. So it's appropriate that Wednesday 20th October is the first UN World Statistics Day.

To mark this the Finance Department has released a list of Northern Ireland related statistics. These include that the population here grows by one every 42 minutes, that Kelly is the most common surname and that average full time earnings are £23,153?

You can find out more over on the Furher nuggets include that:

2009 NI Population : 1,788,896
Pupils leaving with 5+ good GCSEs 2008/09 :71%
Number of recorded crimes 2009/10 : 109,139
Approximately 200 people in NI have reached the age of 100
2009 saw the lowest NI death rate at 8.1 deaths per 1000 population
NI has one of the highest birth rates in EU at 2.0 children per woman of child bearing age
Jack has been the most popular baby boys name since 2004 while Katie has been most popular baby girls name since 2003
In 2009/10, NI households created almost 900,000 tonnes of waste, roughly equivalent to the weight of 3,250 jumbo jets
92% of pupils have access to a pc or laptop at home
Each year each of us travels on average 6,000 miles within Northern Ireland by all means, the equivalent of travelling three times round the coast of Ireland

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

Three years ago the former Strangford DUP MP Iris Robinson didn't mince her words in expressing her opposition to integrated schools. Responding to the rejection of a proposal for a new integrated post primary school in her area she claimed that

Fast forward to Friday night and Peter Robinson makes a speech to DUP supporters in which he mentions that his first contribution to a party conference was in favour of integrated education. The leader then goes on to label the current segregated system a "benign form of apartheid" and to propose a ten year process during which the current sectors should be merged. "Consideration should be given" Mr Robinson argues "to tasking a body or commission to bring forward recommendations for a staged process of integration and produce proposals to deal with some of the knotty issues such as religious education, school assembly devotions and the curriculum. Future generations will not thank us if we fail to address this issue."

So how to explain the gap between these statements? Well DUP politicians have consistently argued there should only be one education system - but their point has been that the Catholic church should not have set up its separate schools in the days after the foundation of the Northern Ireland state. As Mr Robinson put it in his speech (using rather less extreme language than his wife) he believes the current integrated schools "more often than not....join in the competition for funds against the other two main education sectors and in truth will never create the critical mass needed to make a real difference."

The Robinson speech appears consistent with the previous DUP approach, although the mention of a commission to deal with a process of transition perhaps points to a readiness to see change in the state sector, rather than simply telling the catholic church it was wrong to go it alone.

So how will the vested interests respond? If the initial response from the Council for Catholic Maintained Schools and Sinn Fein is anything to go by, it looks like the Robinson initiative will be viewed as an unwelcome assault.

It's true, as the CCMS pointed out on Sunday Sequence, that across the water faith schools are being encouraged. However (perhaps with the exception of Islamic schools) the relevance of seperate schools to community cohesion and, potentially, future conflict is not as direct in England as it is here. The DUP leader has touched on a very obvious "knotty issue". But do our politicians, church and educational leaders have the will or desire to cut the knot?

UPDATE: Speaking to me a short time ago on "Inside Politics", Martin McGuinness described Peter Robinson's approach as "a big mistake" and a recipe for "a head on collision."

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

So are Sinn Fein's latest economic proposals "blue sky thinking" as Martin McGuinness put it, or

The mobile phone companies have yet to give their response to the suggested £2000 monthly charge for each of their masts. But it's hard to imagine they will happily comply with Gerry Adams' wish that they should not pass the charge on to phone users. Sinn Fein reckoned the mast charge was less onerous than the alternative proposal for a "text tax", which they thought would hurt young mobile users (I would have tweeted about all of this from the Sinn Fein briefing this morning, but on second thoughts decided I couldn't afford it).

Another question is whether Stormont has the power to levy such a charge. The assembly does not have tax raising powers. But the list of excepted matters contained in the 1998 Northern Ireland Act refers to "taxes or duties under any law applying to the United Kingdom as a whole" or "taxes or duties substantially of the same character". Mitchel McLaughlin argues that a mast tax would not be covered by this as it is "novel and innovative". That's might be one for the phone companies' lawyers to ponder should this ever get off the drawing board.

Peter Robinson described some of Sinn Fein's ideas as "off the wall", but welcomed what he termed the "reversal of their position". So let's see whether the parties now reach some common ground, or whether the various competing money saving and income generating ideas just become the stuff of next year's competing election manifestoes.

Meanwhile Owen Paterson says the Treasury remains on track to provide the £18 billion in capital promised by Gordon Brown after St. Andrews. A U turn? A victory for Messrs Robinson and McGuinness? NIO sources say no, they were always on track to pledge the money. But if so why did Mr Paterson talk about Gordon Brown making promises he couldn't keep when I first raised the matter with him on "Inside Politics" earlier this month?

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

If MPs have been bubbling with resentment over the cost and duration of the Bloody Sunday Inquiry, then today was the day they could get it all off their chests, as Lord Saville gave evidence to the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee at Westminster.

But if they imagined they would score lots of points over the 12 year duration and £190 million price tag of the Saville inquiry, they had another thing coming. The law lord calmly and politely swatted all their objections away. Some in the NIO might have thought the process would take a year and half, but he felt there had been no meaningful way to estimate the length of the exercise at its outset. His critics didn't have a benchmark to judge him against, nor any suggestions about how he could have carried out his work quicker or better.

Lord Saville defended his leading counsel, Sir Christopher Clarke Q.C., estimated by the arguing that if he'd stayed in commercial practice Sir Christopher would have earned 2 or 3 times as much.

He acknowledged the Inquiry's accommodation costs had been high, and said that maybe they should have bought a house in Derry and sold it at the end of their hearings for a profit. But like so much else this depended on hindsight.

Lord Saville supported carrying out a cost benefit analysis before ordering inquiries in the future, but renewed his assault on the 2005 Inquiries Act, arguing that Section 19 of the Act (which allows the government to put restrictions on inquiries) would destroy the general perception that such probes are independent. He specifically mentioned Pat Finucane in relation to this.

Questioned whether he would take on Bloody Sunday again, he admitted he might think twice before saying yes, but then made it clear that he thought chairing the inquiry had been a privilege and that he had no regrets.

• Bookmark with:
• del.icio.us |
• Digg |
• Newsvine |
• |
• Reddit
• - What's this?

Like the rest of the world, I'm enjoying watching the pictures of the Chilean miners being hauled to safety. So often our breaking news stories involve dreadful events - it's wonderful to see some unalloyed joy on our screens.

As an effete university graduate employed in a white collar job, my reality couldn't be further removed from the tough physical struggle which the miners have endured, not only during the last 69 days, but also during their hard working lives.

However, if I'd been born a couple of generations ago, things would have been different. My father's family moved over from Ireland in the wake of the potato famine of the nineteenth century and ended up working down the coal mines in the North East of England. My grandfather, Christopher, studied for a qualification from the Institute of Mining Engineers and became an "undermanager". In April 1916 the roof fell in at Harton Colliery, County Durham, trapping a miner called Hall under the rubble.

My grandad and a colleague, William Walker, dug out the trapped man, whilst the roof threatened to collapse on their heads. It didn't take 69 days, just one hour and five minutes, but it must have been terrifying and something I couldn't contemplate attempting (the roof collapsed thirty minutes after they got out, so if the rescue had taken one hour and thirty five minutes, there wouldn't be a Devenport Diaries).

Later both my grandad and his colleague were awarded The gallantry award, given to people who worked in industry or mining, no longer exists. In 1971 surviving recipients were invited to exchange their awards for the George Cross.

Sadly I never knew my grandad, as he died around the time when I was born. Understandably, my family remains very proud of him. When I see the pictures from Chile I think not only of him, but also of my uncles who had to get in a cage and go underground every day to earn a living. I have led a privileged existence thanks to my parents' hard work and the state funded education system which enabled me to attend university on a full grant - something which future generations may no longer be able to rely upon.

The Chilean miners have relied on the efforts of people throughout the world to pull off this great escape (with funding and technology supplied from abroad). But equally we all have to rely on so many others, ancestors, relatives, friends and strangers, to live our rather less dramatic lives. It's great to grasp a moment to celebrate our common humanity.

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

A late night for our MLAs. The debate on Dawn Purvis's bill was as rumbustious as could have been predicted. Sinn Fein, the SDLP and the Ulster Unionists backed Ms Purvis's measure. However the DUP and Alliance voiced opposition, preferring political parties to phase ther practice out on their own. The DUP accused others of hypocrisy, particularly concentrating on the SDLP whose 3 MPs have yet to relinquish their Stormont roles (even though this bill dealt with council, not Wesminster double jobbing).

As Dawn Purvis summed up, she talked about Mr Girvan's contribution, only to find the DUP wondering why she was referring to an MLA not present. Ah, it was the old Givan/Girvan chestnut again.

In the end the bill proceeded with one amendment building in a 60 day delay to a ban on a politician serving as a councillor. 60 days, that is, after the politician becomes an MLA.

The independent unionist Alan McFarland expressed concern about the DUP standing its "big guns" in council elections only for those well known figures to stand aside for substitutes. The DUP responded by wondering whether Mr McFarland would himself stand in North Down under the umbrella of local "big gun" Lady Sylvia Hermon.

The measure now goes to its further consideration stage - for some bills this is a formality but Dawn Purvis will only believe it when her measure gets what's known as "Royal Assent".

As I write at 22.20 the Ulster Unionist David McNarry is summing up his It's a very different measure from Dawn Purvis's bill, but what both items have in common is that they have been drawn up individual MLAs not by the Executive. Although nationalists expressed reservations, the McNarry bill passed its second stage without a formal vote.

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

Apologies for the delay in blogging, caused by a mixture of bugs. First an electronic one which robbed me of broadband at home, then a biological one, which robbed me of the will to analyse the north south meeting in Newcastle, Nick Clegg's response to the St. Andrews Agreement capital budget argument or the Peter Robinson scheme for eight departments.

For the record - it was wierd passing a candlelit vigil on the way into the north south meeting on Thursday night, the Deputy PM was obviously being polite when he agreed to consider the capital spending case, but didn't give anything away, and whilst almost everyone agrees the Stormont bureaucracy should be cut, the Stormont parties will look long and hard at what any reductions might mean for them before agreeing any reductions.

I am now watching Stormont proceedings, where the Ulster Unionist George Savage just got his terminology in a twist, confusing "paramilitary" and "paralympic" sports. Later this afternoon we have two interesting private members' bills - Dawn Purvis's attempt to ban MLAs' double jobbing as councillors and David McNarry's proposal to ensure all departments "have due regard to the impact that the exercise of their functions has on members of the armed forces and their families and veterans and their families."

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

Unionist MLAs have traditionally been cool about formalising links with TDs for fear the resulting gathering will be viewed as an "embryonic all Ireland parliament". So maybe it's fitting that as both sets of parliamentarians gather to discuss how to go about "building strong pillars" between themselves in Newcastle tonight, elsewhere in the same hotel health professionals will be attending

The Catholic bishops and the anti-abortion group Precious Life have denounced the Family Planning Association conference, and Given the coincidence of the venue and the date, the politicians might have to be careful to make clear which gathering they are attending.

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

The prospect of swingeing cuts may be gnawing away at the stability of the Stormont Executive. But up at Stormont castle this lunchtime, waiting to talk to the First and Deputy First about their combined call with Scotland and Wales for the spending review to be slowed down, I stumbled over a more immediate attack on the foundations of power sharing. the castle lawn is currently potmarked with sandy patches. They aren't mini golf bunkers erected in honour of our golfers' role in the Ryder cup, but evidence of the nocturnal excavations of a cete of badgers, who inhabit a sett in the trees nearby.

Given their protected status, the Stormont gardeners are patching up and putting up with the digging - but a couple of ministers appeared keen to get their shotguns out to deal with the intruders.

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

Having already famously condemned dissident republicans as "traitors to the people of Ireland", Martin McGuinness finds himself in need of a thesaurus these days to go one better. This morning he described those responsible for last night's car bomb in Londonderry as "conflict junkies" and "neanderthals" (presumably using the term in its informal sense of ultraconservative or reactionary, rather than trying to blame the bombing on the inhabitants of Europe in late Palaeolithic times).

When the assembly got underway, MLAs immediately condemned the attack. But you could tell by their choice of insult which political axe they had to grind. So the SDLP's Pat Ramsey called the bombers "born again Provos" - a taunt designed to underline the fact that mainstream republicans used to justify the same kind of violence. The DUP's Gregory Campbell didn't join the insult game, but talked about the bombers and their "predecessors" - another reference to the Provisionals.

Sinn Fein's Martina Anderson did all the other Stormont politicians might have asked of her - not only condemning the bombing, but calling on people to give information about those responsible to the police. However the jab at "born again Provos" obviously irked her. She rounded on the other speakers, claiming they were providing "a degree of comfort" for the dissidents by associating them with the Provisional IRA's campaign. Ms Anderson then argued that the dissidents and the Provisionals are completely different because the Good Friday Agreement had changed everything and removed the previous justification for resorting to violence, namely that Northern Ireland had been an unreconstructed "Protestant parliament for a Protestant people".

This in turn annoyed the Ulster Unionist David McClarty, who accused Ms Anderson of providing a jaundiced and misplaced history lesson. Mr McClarty seemed most angered that the bombers had taken the shine off Graham McDowell's role in the Ryder Cup victory.

Finally, Alliance's Stephen Farry went a bit academic with his insults - calling the dissidents "nihilistic".

Of course, the insults don't go all one way - the dissidents have their own names for Mr McGuinness who on the Derry 32 County Sovereignty Movement website is referred to variously as a "tout" and "British Deputy First Minister".

Superficially this clash of insults sounds almost pathetic. However last night's attack, combined with recent statements from the dissidents admitting responsibility for a spate of murders, underlines the fact that this is just the visible aspect of a largely subterranean battle with all too serious and sinister consequences.

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

Trevor Ringland has been on the Talkback programme within the last few minutes confirming his decision to resign from the Ulster Unionist party. As previously noted here the need to reach across communal barriers, especially in relation to sport has been a guiding principle for Mr Ringland for some time. So Tom Elliott's casual dismissal of attending GAA events was always guaranteed to alienate the former rugby international.

The audience response has been divided between those traditional unionists who regard Mr Ringland's All Ireland final ultimatum to Mr Elliott as "silly politics" and callers who think the former east Belfast candidate is ahead of his time.

In setting out his case, Mr Ringland argued that the UUP should be leading the opposition to what he called the DUP's tendency towards "managed segregation" of Northern Ireland society. That remark takes us back to the Stormont debate on the Cohesion, Sharing and Integration strategy at the end of last month. The debate saw the SDLP accusing Sinn Fein of preferring a "carve up before power sharing".

Today with a detailed critique of the OFMDFM's draft Cohesion, Sharing and Integration policy. The Rowntree analysis claims that, in comparison to the old "Shared Future" policy, the CSI strategy has jettisoned "reconcilaition", replacing it with "mutual accommodation". It also criticises the CSI strategy for moving away from "a fluid interpretation of culture" instead treating "culture and identity as though they are fixed and given entities." Rowntree argues that "this is a simplistic view, which fails to recognise the capacity of individuals and communities to make ongoing choices in ways which are open to influence and change. While this may suit political parties with a deeply rooted sense of conflicting priorities based on ethnic division, it overlooks the potential social benefit from processes that question traditional cultural identities."

The OFMDFM is currently consulting on its CSI strategy, with a deadline for responses at the end of this month.

P.S. (and this dates me) Who can name a 1980 single which features the words "Equal But Different" in its refrain?

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

Yesterday on the Peter Robinson played a legal card in his negotiations over the Spending Review, insisting that the government had obligations under the St. Andrews' Agreement to honour Gordon Brown's committments to maintain capital spending in Northern Ireland.

In response on Inside Politics, Owen Paterson insisted he wasn't going to negotiate over the airwaves, but questioned whether Gordon Brown had made promises he couldn't keep.

In turn that prompted Mr Robinson to claim that Mr Paterson apparently "believes that International Agreements and binding commitments with devolved Institutions have no standing if governments change or economic circumstances alter."

So what does St.Andrews say about our finances? The deal, reached in October 2006, concentrated on policing and power sharing. However it contains an annex which deals with a projected financial package. "In the context of restoration of the institutions" St Andrews says "the Governments remain committed to ensuring the Executive has the capacity to provide quality public services, to continue the process of necessary reform, to plan for the future, to make the long-term capital investments to underpin the economic transformation of Northern Ireland, as well as bringing long-term benefits for the island as a whole."

Nothing very specific there, but the then Chancellor Gordon Brown produced a funding package, which included a pledge to provide "an updated strategic capital investment plan totalling £18 billion over the period 2005 to 2017 to underpin long term economic growth, and facilitate substantial capital spending on roads, health, schools, tertiary education and other priorities."

This is the committment to which Peter Robinson is referring. It's smart politics for the First Minister to throw in St. Andrews to the current negotiation with the Treasury, on the grounds that the other devolved regions will no doubt be marshalling whatever arguments are at their disposal. But it's hard to imagine this one going all the way to the If it did the lawyers would have to decide whether Chancellor Brown's subsequent funding package was covered by the government's treaty obligations, or whether the rather more vague wording of the Agreement's Annex C gives Chancellor Osborne the flexibility to cut the Executive's capital budget.

P.S. As flagged up previously on this blog entry, Ian Duncan Smith's plans for welofare reform could have a major impact on Northern Ireland. Figures given to me previously by the DSD were that in 2009/10 more than £4billion was paid in welfare benefits to tens of thousands of claimants. In May 2009 61,704 people here were recipients of Incapacity Benefit, 91,500 people here received Income Support and 44,585 people here got Job Seekers Allowance.

This morning the DSD Minister Alex Attwood told the Nolan Show that he may seek flexibility or even an "opt out" in relation to one aspect of the proposed welfare reform package - the cut in child benefit to high rate tax payers. Departing from the "parity principle" in relation to welfare could be fraught with political and practical dangers, given the way the local DSD is reliant on the London Department of Work and Pensions systems. But aside from his own objections to Mr Duncan Smith's reforms, Mr Attwood probably doesn't want to be outflanked on this by Sinn Fein, which criticised his predecessor Margaret Ritchie over her defence of parity.

In seeking to argue that the government could find the cash to close its deficit elsewhere, Mr Attwood suggested the MOD's purchase of two new aircraft carriers should be scrapped. Of course this would go down badly with minister's Scottish counterparts who have been lobbying intensively to preserve the jobs at stake in their shipyards. It's just another illustration that whilst there may be talk of the regions putting pressure on the centre to blunt the cuts, come October 20th it may very well be every man for himself.

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

Inevitably the focus this week has been on the woman the Ulster Unionists scorned - Paula Bradshaw, whose rejection by the UUP in South Belfast leaves the party looking, as David Gordon put it in the Belfast Telegraph, a bit stale and male.

However in North Down (where Ms Bradshaw's partner Ian Parsley is expected to stand for the Conservatives) there is growing interest in the potential candidacy of another female politician - Alliance Councillor Mrs Wilson has been an Alliance member for 31 years and a representative on North Down council for the past 15 years, so why shouldn't she put her hat in the ring when it comes to next May's Assembly elections? Alliance already has a local MLA in Stephen Farry but , given the tumult within unionism in the area, it's thought they may well stand a second candidate to try to maximise their vote.

However besides being an Alliance stalwart, Anne Wilson is also wife of Northern Ireland's first Green MLA, Brian Wilson, who is planning to retire from Stormont. Clearly some of Mr Wilson's 2,839 first preference votes came from Green Party supporters who will happily transfer their allegiance to the former European candidate Steven Agnew. But a sizeable slice of his support also stemmed from his assiduous work as a veteran councillor. Should his wife stand for election, it will be interesting to see how much of the Wilson vote transfers to her and how much stays with the Greens.

To solve the conundrum, of course, it would be good to know for sure what Mrs Wilson decides to do. When I chatted to her this afternoon, she told me nobody had approached her to stand. She wasn't ruling an Assembly campaign out, but she wasn't ruling it in either. So watch this space.

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

Paul Givan might not have been an MLA for very long, but he's quickly built a reputation as a DUP hitman, after telling Michael McGimpsey he should stand down at a recent joint meeting of the Health and Justice Committees.

if you want to find out more about Edwin Poots' special adviser you might click on his where you will find Pond park Primary School, Laurehill College etc.. etc...

But what if you want to check up on his near namesake new South Antrim MLA Paul Girvan? Well at the time of writing you will also find that he has a Now don't tell me the DUP themselves have got their Givans and Girvans mixed up?

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