Three Thousand Versts of Loneliness

We’ve had Ian McCrea’s campaign to prevent the Pope visiting Northern Ireland, Iris Robinson’s hate-filled remarks about homosexuals, Sammy Wilson’s climate change denial , Edwin Poots et al with their five thousand year old Earth and Jim Wells versus wifi . But if anyone still harbours a suspicion that the DUP might be remotely connected, by even the flimsiest thread, to the mainstream of British politics, they should examine Gregory Campbell’s contribution to a Westminster Hall debate aimed at pressuring some of the more unpleasant regimes throughout the world to abandon the death penalty. Across party divides agreement was reached that abolition should be sought in countries including Iran, China and Belarus. A rare accord, which did not include the East Londonderry MP, who rejected ‘cosy consensus’, on the basis that a ‘small number of serial killers who treat the prospect of redemption with utter contempt’ could ‘commit another crime against an innocent person’. A scenario ...

Ten years after the Belfast Agreement the draft proposals for a Northern Ireland specific Bill of Rights are set to emerge today . Mark Devenport has got hold of a provisional copy of the report and has produced it in full on his BBC blog . I have been consistent in arguing that human rights are universal and that there are no human rights which need to be enshrined in legislation specific to Northern Ireland. Any bill will simply overlap existing provision for human rights and encroach on other areas of law for which the human rights remit is not appropriate. Unionists also fear that the bill will advance an agenda of diminution of Northern Ireland’s constitutional status under the guise of the rights agenda. This fear is not simply unionist paranoia. Both unionist parties as well as the Alliance Party have expressed concern regarding the composition of the Bill of Rights Forum and are likely to record opposition to proposals in the draft report. Given Sinn Fein’s proclivity f...

Yesterday I attended a lunch with Shadow Secretaries of State, Theresa May and Owen Paterson, as well as the Conservative and Unionist women candidates, who will stand in May’s election. May, whose role includes women’s issues, as well as the work and pensions brief, accompanied the candidates to meetings with the FSB and a group in Antrim, concerned with domestic violence. The Conservatives and Unionists are putting up four female Westminster hopefuls on this occasion. At least three are standing in winnable constituencies. For Sandra Overend, in mid-Ulster, the task is, by her own admission, to grow the vote. Daphne Trimble takes on the sitting MP, Jeffrey Donaldson, in Lagan Valley. With the TUV fielding one of its strongest candidates, Keith Harbinson, the constituency is a fascinating battleground. Daphne has received an enthusiastic welcome at doorsteps so far and she is justifiably optimistic. Paula Bradshaw also has realisable ambitions in South Belfast. The DUP’s Jimmy ...