Observations of the UK and its Earthly neighbours
Our great leader, Honest Boris the Incorrupt and Competent has had quite a week of wriggling. The long-awaited Gray Report on 10 Downing Street parties during the Covid lockdowns was released yesterday. It wasn’t flattering to Johnson, other than as a host. Johnson’s standard explanation (standard for a while, but into overdrive in the last …
Continue reading “An Apology: Work, Party, What’s The Difference?”
Here’s democracy: The Democratic Unionist Party, recently elected as the second biggest party in the Northern Ireland Assembly, have just prohibited the same Assembly from doing any work. The Assembly, a local state government, has responsibility for a wide range of things including health, social welfare and the local economy; all things that might need …
Continue reading “Northern Ireland Assembly – Here We Don’t Go Again”
Countries, like people, often disagree. Grown-ups deal with that through negotiation and compromise. Sometimes a bit of petulant shouting is part of the negotiation. Lookatme Truss, UK Foreign Secretary and Self-Publicist has made clear the UK intends to throw its toys out of the pram over the Northern Ireland Protocol, the UK-EU deal her boss …
Order of events: December 2020: (Honest Boris’) UK Government signs a deal with the EU over trade and Northern Ireland Every minute since: Same government jumps up and down about the deal being unfair and threatens to walk away 08/10/2021: EU announces that on 13/10/2021 it’ll offer ways to make the deal work easier 12/10/2021: …
It’s a shame Brits aren’t taught much of their own history. Any shortened story of Northern Ireland needs to begin four hundred years ago with the Ulster Plantation (when James VI+I was on the throne, a lasting Scottish achievement). It’s complex, and you can’t understand present cultural divisions without knowing their history. But if you …
Continue reading “Got A Light? UK Government and Northern Irish Borders”
(Headline could have been Northern Irish Political Turmoil, but that’s a bit of a Dog Bites Man one) Edwin Poots resigned as head of the Democratic Unionist Party, the largest in Northern Ireland, tonight. He was defenestrated by his colleagues after three weeks in office. Not because he’s a creationist who believes in fairy stories …
David Frost will be remembered for That Was the Week That Was, Breakfast with Frost, his political interviews and much else. Unfortunately that one died in 2013, there’s a much less talented David Frost in the news these days. Honest Boris has a Chief European Hating and Tub-Thumping Officer called Frost. I’ve never had the …
For those of you who were worried about the sanity of Northern Ireland: relax, they got a flush of youth today. Edwin Poots took office as head of the Democratic Unionist Party, the largest in the NI Assembly. Poots is a Young Earth Creationist who believes the Earth was created about six thousand years ago.