TOPIC: Remember 1998 - 15 Years on - where is the leadership?

 

Where was NI’s First Minister when N Ireland’s greatest poet and probably the greatest poet of our generation, was buried? Was his absence indicative of the lack of leadership and responsibility increasingly experienced in the last year?  The flag issue, first encouraged was not controlled and allowed to slip into anarchy. The police got blamed and then we reverted to the easy option of getting an outsider to find a solution and will doubtless leave it to the US, British and Irish Governments to impose a solution. The other tribe’s efforts were little better, contributing to the parading issues complexity by adding support for their extremists parade building. We say we have made huge strides to a peaceful NI in the last 15yrs, if so why sacrifice it?

Peter Robinson has faced more than a few challenges during his time in office. With his apparent professionalism he has managed to avoid the ‘Chuckle brothers’ relationship with Martin Mc Guinness of his predecessor. He has even been able to deftly sidestep his way out of the fiasco in his personal life. Who would have believed that? And his political kudos has allowed him to retain his lofty position even despite losing his seat to Naomi Long. Not that he will ever forget that!

But just as with his Sinn Fein counterpart, Peter Robinson’s continued success lies in the No vote. The more he is seen to be working affably alongside ‘the other side’, the less popular he becomes among his voting lobby. The more he digs his heels in, the less he gives way, the greater the support he gets from ‘his people.’ So that is why he was remarkably absent in any criticism of the violence surrounding the flags issue. That is why in the summer he wrote that letter withdrawing support for the Maze Conflict Transformation Centre. That is why he even stayed away from any celebrations of Seamus Heaney’s life. Unforgivable! 

But he’s not on his own. Sinn Fein knew exactly what they were doing last December when they voted for the removal of the flag at City Hall. When support slips a little you need to be seen to stir it up. You rattle a few cages and your party comes out sunny side up.

The elections are looming. May is but a few months away. It is time to reclaim grass roots support.  And you can be sure that there will be no statesmanship in the process. Peter Robinson has gathered the force of the Orange Order behind him. He knows where his bread is buttered. Richard Haass has his work cut out for him. He has few expectations of any success and has declared his part well in advance. He and Meghan O’Sullivan are no fools. They know they are up against it. It is pretty much a losing battle. As the ‘two sides’ puff up their wings and go into battle, fighting their cause, who will be the winners?

My bet’s on Naomi Long. Naomi fought off Peter Robinson on his own home ground. Naomi hung in there tight through all the backlash to the flags issue. Naomi has consistently fought for her country, not her party. Naomi talks sense in our nonsensical community. Naomi has been waiting a long time. But maybe just, it is her time. Wouldn’t it be great to see a real statesman in this country again? And wouldn’t it be great if that statesman was a woman?

TOPIC: House of Lords - is it needed?

 

The Government in the South will hold a referendum on abolishing the Seanad in October. Despite the cost and unusual democratic make, doesn’t a democracy require a second house to oversee the government? The UK is trying to reform its second house, but got stuck with the definition of its role. Do you think there should be a second house and if so with what functions?

 

 

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Do we really trust our governments enough to not have a ‘stay’ on their powers? That’s the problem, isn’t it? If we knew they wouldn’t get the run of themselves there would be no problem, would there? The difficulty is that no-one in their right mind would let Michael (let’s bring back O’ levels) Gove loose to his own whims and you’d have to be totally off your head to let your government introduce a bedroom tax! (OMG!  That actually happened, didn’t it? It’s not a bad dream after all!)

 

So we do need something. We all know that. But do we need a House full of inherited peers and former professional politicians? More politicians? Are we crazy?

 

The problem is that no-one has come up with a way of providing us with what we want: a House where reasonable people with expertise in a variety of domains can work together to rein in our often over ambitious, under or uninformed and outrageously skewed politicians. Any ideas Naomi?

TOPIC: Realignment of world political leadership and power

 
Are we experiencing a realignment of world political leadership and power? Is ‘the West’ stepping away from its world policing leadership? The US steps away from its ‘line in the sand’ about punishing the use of chemical weapons in Syria and allows Russia to take the lead. Britain refuses to back the US’s possible use of force on the chemical weapons issue. Is this a result of the rebalancing of world economic powers; the weakening of Britain’s and France’s wealth, the effect of the US recession, China’s rapid economic growth and Russia’s huge gas wealth? If so what will be the effect worldwide of the Western values of democracy and human rights?
 
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Maybe the recession is no bad thing after all. When the economy’s thriving, when everyone’s in a job, when you have all the money in the world to build bigger and better weapons, when your citizens expect you to buy more and more battle ships, when you have all the Drones, all the missiles, all the weapons of mass destruction you want, it kind of makes sense to use them all, doesn’t it? And you can always take the opportunity to reinforce your country’s ability to roll out such worthy ideals as Democracy and Human Rights, can’t you? And if you decide to go to war you need to have an enemy, don’t you? That makes everyone very patriotic, doesn’t it? And that’s a really good thing. All that people pulling together thing, the fighting against the enemy thing. The stuff of history. Remember Hitler!
No-one, but no-one can deny the atrocities going on in Syria. But there is an added complication here. Who exactly is the enemy? Assad? The rebels? What is clear is that the atrocities are on both sides. Now that complicates things.
So shucks! What do you do when there is no clear enemy? And what happens when you don’t have any substantial support from America’s long time lackeys in Europe.  And is that Russia now daring to raise its ugly head above the parapet? And China? Is China really ready to play its role?

Is this all a sign that the UN is actually finally starting to kick in? All those agreements are really starting to mean something? We are no longer prepared to live in a world where America decides which battles to embroil us all in and which atrocities in the world we are to continue to ignore?
 
We all know that the leaders of the Top 5 breathed a sigh of relief when it became clear that there would be no attacks on Syria when Obama stood back from the line. Now perhaps the world leaders will get together and work out a strategy for useful engagement in Syria. Perhaps when Richard and Meghan have finished up their talks here they can nip on down to Syria and nudge Assad and the guys to lay down arms. Syria needs help in building peace, not Drone attacks.

TOPIC: Jamie Oliver - Immigrants work harder than locals

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Jamie Oliver has hit the headlines for claiming that his immigrant employees work harder than his local ones and that the poor waste money on ready meals rather than fresh food he cited a scene from one of his TV shows in which a mother and her child eat takeaway chips in front of a massive TV. Many commentators have objected to his views, what are your views?
 

 

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Oh come on! We all know that immigrants work harder than local people. Everybody in the world works harder than your average home grown job seeker! ‘What? Brush that floor? No way! Who do you think I am?’ If you’ve been brought up to think that it’s ‘not cool’ to scrub a floor, that it’s ok to keep your bedroom like a pigsty and someone else will pick up your litter it must be pretty hard to change overnight into employee of the month. Jamie was slagged off in the press but he has done a lot for young, deprived people here and we all like to think his intentions were honourable. People need to realise the competition is tough out there and you do have to make yourself very useful if you are to make it in the world of work. Perhaps Jamie’s right?
 
I’m a little more sceptical about his thoughts on the poor wasting money. Good, fresh food is expensive and is not always so easily available locally. Not so easy to get to the out of town supermarket with a buggy and toddler in tow. And the corner shop veg leaves a lot to be desired. So you’re down to growing your own. If you have a garden that is! That and the expertise to fight off the slugs, the bugs, the squirrels and even the neighbour’s dog. Bring back allotments, say we! (I think I have already mentioned my son-in law’s allotments, haven’t I? Cheap at half the price. Still some availability) And good on Nick Clegg and his free meals for infants! About time we started investing in proper food provision in schools. Just hope that they take a tip from Europe and spend a little more than the presently allocated 67 pence per dinner!