Irish Political News

George Bridge’s article on the regional vulnerability of the UK housing market to the vagaries of the credit crunch and how that it is likely to play into the hands of the Tories over the next few years. Ominously, in a regional of Norhtern Ireland, the risk seems to run from medium to high risk. According to a follow-up in today’s Daily Mail, Gerry Adams’ west Belfast constituency is the tenth most vulnerable in the UK (with 59.4% of households at risk). Mark Durkan’s Foyle constituency not looking good either. 

A world first for Northern Ireland [Adds Apparently that depends on the definition of ‘commercial scale’].  The SeaGen tidal energy converter is the world’s first commercial scale tidal turbine and it’s being installed in Strangford Lough. Tom Rafterty has more here, although it’s worth pointing out that Marine Current Turbines have a number of corporate shareholders and strategic partners - company background here. Channel 4 report here, UTV has some video reports, and the Guardian’s coverage is here. Additionally, as the SeaGen project website notes,

The environmental impact of SeaGen will be continuously monitored by independent science team throughout the licensed 5 year installation period.  The project is being managed by Royal Haskoning with Queens University Belfast and the Sea Mammal Research Unit providing the science input.

According to the Irish Times breaking news report

The operation to fix the turbine on the seabed is expected to take up to two weeks. It was due to begin yesterday but had to be postponed due to poor weather.

Adds Wikipedia notes the fore-runners of this project.

Trials in the Strait of Messina, Italy, started in 2001 and Australian company Tidal Energy Pty Ltd undertook successful commercial trials of highly efficient shrouded turbines on the Gold Coast, Queensland in 2002. Tidal Energy Pty Ltd has commenced a rollout of shrouded turbines for remote communities in Canada, Vietnam and Torres Strait in Australia and following up with joint ventures in the EU.

During 2003 a 300 kW Periodflow marine current propeller type turbine was tested off the coast of Devon, England, and a 150 kW oscillating hydroplane device, the Stingray, was tested off the Scottish coast. Another British device, the Hydro Venturi, is to be tested in San Francisco Bay.

Although still a prototype, the world’s first grid-connected turbine, generating 300 kW, started generation on November 13, 2003, in the Kvalsund, south of Hammerfest, Norway, with plans to install a further 19 turbines.

SeaGen, a commercial prototype design will be installed by Marine Current Turbines Ltd in Strangford Lough in Northern Ireland in March 2008. The turbine could generate up to 1.2 MW and will be connected to the grid.

Interesting to note that, according to this RTÉ report, Northern Ireland First Minister, the DUP’s Ian Paisley, will be otherwise engaged when some, but not all, of those involved at the time memorialise the 1998 Agreement. The report doesn’t mention whether any other NI Executive ministers will be accompanying the “businessman of God..” From the RTÉ report

Dr Paisley is about to embark on what amounts to a lap of honour before he steps down as First Minister and DUP leader at the end of May.  He will be overseas, attending functions in New York and Washington, on the actual date of the 10th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, 10 April.

Derry City Council had been threatening to forcibly evict residents in houses in land around the City of Derry Airport vested to the Council by the Northern Ireland Regional Development minister, but the BBC reports that, two weeks after the deadline, while two houses are being demolished, some residents remain.  From the BBC report

Contractors are knocking down two of the 17 homes vested by Derry City Council last year.  Their former owners have already moved, but other residents have vowed to stay in defiance of the Council’s order.

Taoiseach Bertie Ahern has defended the global travels of Irish government ministers for St Patrick’s Day celebrations as RTÉ News revealed the cost of last year’s trips. Meanwhile, here, the Northern Ireland Department of Culture Arts and Leisure have announced that NI Culture minister, Edwin Poots - the Executive’s only young-Earther? - is currently on a visit to Tennessee and Texas, “build[ing] more meaningful links with Ulster-Scots communities.” He will also be attending the South by South West Music Festival (SXSW) in Austin, Texas, where he might bump into On the Record’s Jim Carroll.. He will definitely bump into others..

He is also meeting up with Belfast’s Lord Mayor, Jim Rodgers and representatives of Belfast City Council who are in Nashville at the same time promoting social and economic links between Northern Ireland through the Sister City initiative.

Oh, and there will be only one Irish government minister at home on St Patrick’s Day.  Who is it?  Answer below the fold.

It’s that man again..

Mick noted previously Garret Fitzgerald’s article on missed economic opportunities, and warnings about undermining US investors’ confidence, but as the report on the Irish Times frontpage today suggests those potential investors have much more pressing concerns at home. [no subs req]

TAOISEACH BERTIE Ahern has warned of a “hard year” ahead for the Irish economy in his most downbeat assessment to date of the repercussions of the sharp economic downturn in the US.  Mr Ahern said a huge range of companies in the US were facing serious problems, a situation that would have an inevitable knock-on effect on the world economy.

In a specific reference to the effects on Ireland on what many commentators say is a looming recession in the US, the Taoiseach said: “We won’t escape that. What we have to try to do is keep up the growth rates.”

In the wake of the Mairead Farrell commemoration event at Stormont on Friday, which seems to have drawn all hands on deck (to the point of stretching the party’s full time staffers extremely thinly on Friday), there have been protests and counter protests. The Assembly imposed a ban on filming within Parliament buildings to prevent the proceedings there being filmed and have inadvertently banned BBC cameras from Monday’s Assembly plenary. Gerry Adams has is not impressed:

As we work during the next few months to persuade US investors and others to attend an investment conference in May, which is about creating jobs for people, picking sham fights will only serve to dissuade business people to come here”

Garrett FitzGerald had an interest and informed perspective on this angle in his Irish Times column this weekend. It was highly critical of Unionists too, but for entirely different reasons:

I can recall meetings with parties in the North at which I endeavoured to alert members of different parties to the catastrophic decline in that area’s share of our island economy - but evoked only blank looks from both sides. I had hoped that when the time came in the mid-1990s for these parties to sit down together to seek a settlement of their differences, they might at last consider addressing crucial economic issues.

Perhaps it was too much to hope that Sinn Féin/IRA, which had spent a quarter of a century seeking to destroy the Northern Ireland economy, would at that stage start to reflect on the extent to which their activities had succeeded in throwing up a huge new obstacle to progress towards Irish political unity. But, unhappily, in that negotiation unionists of both varieties appeared equally uninterested in serious economic issues.

It’s a familiar theme from FitzGerald. Last year he laid out in great detail just how badly the IRA’s war against economic targets debilitated the potential for political union with the Republic. Meantime, the ‘sham fight’ seems to be turning into a game of reactive aggression, with the first play being negative, and spiralling downwards.

Adams may be right in essence, but as FitzGerald notes there have been two players at this mutually self destructive game for some years.

Money may have been “a great balm” in west Belfast but it, or rather the lack of it, looks like scuppering the proposed multi-sports stadium at the Maze prison site.  We’ll have to wait to see how accurate the senior sources within the DUP quoted in the UTV report actually are, but for now it’s worth noting the comments

Senior sources within Stormont`s largest party, the Democratic Unionists, have indicated that concerns about the financial feasibility of the project are likely to see it rejected.  One source said: “As the business case is unlikely to stack up it is unlikely that the Maze stadium will go ahead.”

Whilst opposition to the Maze development proposal by some within the DUP, and elsewhere, has been known for some time, the sticking point is reportedly the combined cost of the stadium and required infrastructure as detailed in this report [pdf file] - £240million.  Adds DCAL minister Edwin Poots has responded to the speculation.

The report is worth considering more carefully.

Because the problem may be not the initial costs so much, as an increasingly isolated Project Aim -

Project Aim

4.1 In keeping with the original DCAL Ministerial instruction, the following ‘working’ aim has been given to the Stadium Steering Group for the Multi-Sports Stadium project:

“To provide a Multi-Sports Stadium of international standards that meets the needs of Association Football, Gaelic Games and Rugby Football in a location acceptable to all and which supports the development of an integrated society through the provision of a shared space.” [added emphasis]

With Sinn Féin and, in a Peter Robinson era, the DUP potentially intent on a ‘back to basics’ approach the development of an integrated society may be a secondary consideration to [internal] party politics.

Meanwhile ursine mammals will continue to defecate in forested areas..

Adds From the BBC report

Mr Poots, who is in the United States, said that the Department of Finance and Personnel, is currently examining the economic appraisal.

He said that this would take another month, and then a political decision will be made.

He added that the project has been discussed by senior members of the party but there has been no firm decision.

Setting aside all polls and forecasts, and even the party’s reverse in its electoral fortunes last year, the Irish Examiner believes it is the party’s preoccupation with Northern Irish politics that poses it’s biggest difficulty in making headway in the southern polity. 

Mr Adams was strongest when talking about northern issues — the proposed transfer of policing and justice powers, the campaign by some unionists to force out Ian Paisley, the commitment to establish a “high-powered taskforce” to drive forward “the roadmap to Irish unity”.

By contrast, when he delved into the issues dominating the agenda in the south right now, there was little of substance.

He had a couple of good moments — a soundbite about how Dustin the Turkey could have done better than the Government when negotiating the Lisbon Treaty, and a call for the highest standards in public life. “Public office should never be used for private gain or personal advantage.”

But even that statement’s impact was lessened by Mr Adams’ reluctance to criticise Bertie Ahern directly — perhaps because Sinn Féin still needs the Taoiseach’s support on northern issues. And the rest of the speech lacked specifics. He said prosperity and job creation were “key priorities” for Sinn Féin, but didn’t really spell out how the party might improve matters.

He said it was unacceptable that a large number of people still lived in poverty and children still went to school on empty stomachs — but again there was little in the way of detailed solutions. He got the obligatory standing ovation — and a hug from Martin McGuinness — but they seemed almost cosmetic to events happening elsewhere.

Elsewhere Chris has argued that Sinn Fein must not shift from its tradionally socialist identity, which given the left is already a fairly small and unprosperous ground in the Republic may not be the easiest way to curry electoral favour with southern voters. But when one of the party’s four TDs suggests that the party still has not got a “credible tax policy”, all the media exposure world is unlikely to be enough to turn the corner.

It might not constitute the “change in material circumstances” that the Republic of Ireland’s Environment Minister, the Green Party’s John Gormley, eventually said he required, but the criticism of the road building through the Tara valley by Nobel laureate Seamus Heaney will likely reverberate throughout government.  He’s not the first poet to point out the implications of that development, but he is the most influential.  The Irish Times front page highlighted his comments today, and the BBC report has more quotes from the radio documentary.

“I mean the traces on Tara are in the grass, are in the earth - they aren’t spectacular like temple ruins would be in the Parthenon in Greece but they are about origin, they’re about beginning, they’re about the mythological, spiritual source - a source and a guarantee of something old in the country and something that gives the country its distinctive spirit.”

And from the BBC report

“I think it literally desecrates an area - I mean the word means to de-sacralise and for centuries the Tara landscape and the Tara sites have been regarded as part of the sacred ground,” he said.

“I was just thinking actually the Proclamation of the Irish Republic in 1916 summoned people in the name of the dead generations and called the nation, called the people in the name of the dead generations.

“If ever there was a place that deserved to be preserved in the name of the dead generations from pre-historic times up to historic times up to completely recently, it was Tara.”

Additionally

But whatever the views now, those who want to see the motorway come to Tara have won the day.

Future generations studying Tara will see the 21st century’s major contribution to an area charting thousands of years of civilisation in Ireland was the new M3 motorway and its associated development.

Now that he’s just an ordinary MLA, Ian Paisley Jnr may have more latitude in expressing support for the planning application by Seymour Sweeney for a Causeway Centre.. but I’d suggest there will be some raised eyebrows in the Environment Minister’s office over his comments on the news that Mr Sweeney has requested a hearing at the independent Planning Appeals Commission on the Minister’s ‘notice of opinion to refuse’ that application.  From the Belfast Telegraph report

Mr Paisley Jnr today welcomed the prospect of an appeal and said the merits of the planning case “have been somewhat distorted by political comment and controversy over the applicant”.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown has told the BBC’s Politics Show, in Scotland at least, that after ten years of devolved power he now backs a review of the powers of the Scottish Parliament, including taxation policy.  Or, as Brian Taylor puts it, he has joined the McChattering classes. Should we be concerned here?  If such a review here was to include a review of the mandatory coalition, perhaps not.  But if it does not, then these recent comments, from Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams, without going into the SF position on reducing corporation tax [here or there? - Ed], may be an indication of what some would seek to use any tax-raising powers to do.

“We don’t have enough money to do what we would like. The reality is that the Executive has to work within an inadequate block grant from the British Government.  It is a significant problem that taxation and public expenditure policies are determined in London.”

Expect more criticism of “lazy journalists”.. But the Assembly are reportedly set to release figures which indicate that, according to the NewsLetter report, the DUP’s Ian Paisley, Snr and Jnr, intend to jointly claim £62,500 a year from public funds for the rental costs of their constituency offices at 9-11 Church Street, Ballymena.  But, whilst the rental costs may be the subject of some debate, the background to the buying, and renting, of the property reveals the involvement of a familiar name.. less than two months before another DUP Minister was “of a mind to approve” that same developer’s plans for a Causeway Centre.  More below the fold.

Some of the detail from, firstly, the NewsLetter report

Sarcon 250 is understood to be a “shelf company” which has been listed with Companies House for some time. A shelf company is essentially created in name and then held (on the shelf) for later use, as and when needed.

It means a company is fully formed, with nominal shareholders, and available instantly for operation. There are a series of Sarcon companies operating or which have been in operation and are now closed down, each with a different number.

Sarcon (No. 250) Limited appears to have become operational in May 2007, with the property at Church Street bought in July 2007. [added emphasis]

And from David Gordon’s report in the Belfast Telegraph

The Church Street building became the new north Antrim office of Mr Paisley Jnr last summer.

It is owned by a company called Sarcon (no 250). Its official returns to Government’s Companies Registry record that Mr Sweeney was appointed a director of the firm in May last year. [added emphasis]

They further state that Sarcon (no 250) obtained a mortgage from the Bank of Ireland for 9-11 Church Street, Ballymena in July 2007.

Whilst, also from the NewsLetter report

The North Antrim MLA stated: “I can confirm that a company called Sarcon 250 owns the DUP offices at 9-11 Church Street and has done so since the summer of 2007.

“During the run-up to the purchase, for a period of weeks, Mr Seymour Sweeney, as a member of the DUP, gave advice on the purchase of the office and became a director of the company to ensure the purchase could be completed. [added emphasis]

“He subsequently resigned before any rent was due, under the lease, in favour of a new director, as it was never intended that he would have any further role or be in receipt of any benefit.

“The rent paid for the property reflects the then current market value on the property.”

Mr Paisley added that he took expert advice from a “professional agent” in relation to the level of rent.

He concluded: ”This acquisition is a long-term commitment by the DUP to the constituency. The rent has been validated by the Assembly authorities.” [added emphasis]

And, again from David Gordon’s report

The current online returns for Sarcon (no 250) at the Government’s Companies Registry do not include any reference to Mr Sweeney’s resignation. [added emphasis]

Last night’s statement by the MLA also referred to the Church Street office as part of the DUP’s “long-term commitment” to north Antrim, indicating that it is party-owned.

And, given those details, a couple of questions come to mind immediately - Who is paying off the mortgage?  And who is receiving the rent?

It has the faint whiff of pork-barrel politics, and it looks like there’s some ministerial trespassing involved, but the BBC’s blogging Mark Devenport spotted some crossing Northern Ireland ministerial statements at the end of last week - on the apparent funding from the Republic of Ireland government for a study into a bridge at Narrow Water, County Down, following a North South Ministerial Council meeting.  First with the news, on 7th Feb, was the NI Education minister - although the statement was issued as a Sinn Féin South Down MLA - and County Louth resident, Caitríona Ruane, “This flagship project [the bridge] has wonderful potential and would, I believe, provide a major boost for the local economy.” Next up, 8th Feb, was the Social Development minster, and SDLP South Down MLA, Margaret Ritchie, “The new bridge joining Narrow Water in the North and Cooley in the South will be an exciting gateway to County Down.” Which prompted a terse statement from the Regional Development minister, and SF Newry and Armagh MP, MLA, Conor Murphy, “I am well aware of the Dublin Government’s proposal to construct a bridge at Narrow Water which would link County Louth and County Down.” All of which is neatly brought into focus by Mark Devenport

So the implication appeared to be that not much new had happened at Dundalk, and the minister did not sound particularly happy about his DSD colleague treading on his patch. Also whilst the south might fund a study of the County Down bridge, the Newry and Armagh MP’’s Department is funding a study of a Newry Road, something which Newry politicians are, in general, keener on than the bridge.

Meanwhile, more potential ministerial trespassing today, this time by the SF “Newry and Armagh MP”, Conor Murphy, who “has welcomed the Sinn Fein campaign to highlight the inadequate Ambulance Cover in south Armagh and demand that the issue be addressed and called on people to sign a petition to the Health Minister Michael McGimpsey.”

The 25th anniversary of the kidnapping, and subsequent disappearing, of the champion racehorse Shergar in 1983 sees a number of articles about those events.  Jockey Walter Swinburn reminisces here and, after a brief introduction of some the wilder conspiracy theories, there’s one of the more thorough accounts here. UTV’s Ivan Little also reports below - including on what “one veteran republican” had to say about the sanctioning, or otherwise, of “a spectacular own goal.”

If you check out the relevant statistics for the Civil Aviation Authority you discover that there are 896 private helicopters have been registered in the UK. The IAA stats are available but it’s harder to disaggregate the helicopter figures. Yet Slugger understands that back in 2004 there were a staggering 114 new registrations alone. Given that big sporting events like the Donegal International rally now have tight regulations on helicopter traffic (and charge €500 to park one of the things). First Post reckons its a sign of a rising Irish Oligarchy. H/T to Declan for the stats!

Indicators of yet more potential problems ahead for City of Derry Airport are revealed in a Belfast Telegraph report today. Having been granted the power to vest land around the airport by the Regional Development minister, Sinn Féin’s Conor Murphy, the Derry City Council’s Airport Committee met today in private to consider a report on the preparations for securing that land for the airport’s use.. and to clear the CAA’s current variation on the airport’s licence.  From the Belfast Telegraph report

Councillors were today set to discuss the “forcible eviction” of residents at Donneybrewer.  They have been told to make sure vested properties are vacant by March 1, so they can be demolished as part of a safety works programme at the council-owned airport.  According to a report seen by this newspaper, it is believed some residents will not leave by the required date, and “ therefore it is necessary for council to take steps to enforce the vesting order”.

It’s all part of the process of “moving the airport into a position where it will be fit to go commercial..”

More from the Belfast Telegraph

The report by the town clerk and chief executive, which was due to be discussed behind closed doors today, said it was essential that the council had vacant possession of the land from that date, and that discussions have taken place with enforcement officers in case there is a need to physically remove residents.

The report said that “the houses included in the vested area are obstacles requiring a variation on the airport’s licence”.

It added: “The variation will be reviewed again in October 2008. The works programme to clear these obstructions will take four months to complete and the CAA (Civil Aviation Authority) will take up to three months to assess the impact of the works and remove the variation. Removal of the variation is essential to permit unrestricted use of the airport’s main runway.”

The report said that officers have had a meeting with the Chief Enforcement Officer of the Enforcement of Judgments Office in connection with this, adding that “whilst he has indicated that he wished to take legal advice on this process he has assured officers that the first step in enforcement is the issue of the warrant by Council. Thereafter the procedure as stated by the Enforcement of Judgments Officer is that enforcement officers will visit all the people with former interests in the land and make arrangements for vacant possession forthwith. If there is resistance the Enforcement of Judgments officers are empowered to enter by force and remove by force.”

The document went on: “Once the warrant issues the only involvement of Council is liaison as regards scheduling of evictions and securing the property post eviction.

“The Chief Enforcement Officer has stated that it is unlikely that all cases could be dealt with on the same day. However, subject to him taking his own legal advice - and receiving the warrant from Council - he has provisionally instructed his team to diarise possible evictions from the beginning of April.”

The report sought authority to “issue appropriate documentation to the Northern Ireland Court Service to enable enforcement of the Vesting Order.”.

And there’s a quote from the Council

A spokeswoman for Derry City Council said today: “Matters of legal, financial and commercial sensitivities are of necessity dealt with in confidential business, following which, when appropriate, Council always endeavours to make public decisions regarding City of Derry Airport.”

As I’ve already said, it’s all part of the process of “moving the airport into a position where it will be fit to go commercial..”

The Causeway row looks set to continue.  Prompted by an apparent leak from the Assembly’s Environment Committee by Sinn Féin MLA Daithí McKay, the BBC report that, as had been hinted at, the Planning Service Management Board had told the minister that they “agreed that a Notice of Opinion to refuse” the application by Seymour Sweeney should be issued in June 2007.. 2 months before the Environment minister announced that she was minded to “of a mind to approve the application”. The question remains - Why was the minister “of a mind to approve” that application at that time?  Especially when she eventually agreed to issue a notice of opinion to refuse? And if there was influence.. to whose benefit was it brought?

According the Sinn Féin press statement

Mr McKay said:

“One of the papers which the Minister refused to disclose to the Environment Committee was a memo from Planning Manager Tom Clarke to her office on 1st June 2007.

“This memo clearly states that the Planning Service Management Board had finalised its consideration of the Seaport application and “agreed that a Notice of Opinion to refuse should be issued”.

Of course it’s a “new dawn”.. and not just a distraction from real politics.. ANYhoo.. lots of coverage of the visit by Taoiseach Bertie Ahern to Northern Ireland First Minister Ian Paisley’s North Antrim constituency to tour the new Galgorm Hotel and Spa Resort.. which, while it was not [see footnote to report] the second item on Ian Paisley jnr’s shopping list, it did, apparently, receive over £1.7million from Invest NI in the past year.

There’s no figures to support this, but Orla Milligan an Associate Director at PRG, is pretty up beat about the future of the legal profession in Northern Ireland in The Lawyer. So all of you who thought that the end of the peace process meant an end to the ‘wartime’ bonanza for lawyers, can think again…