It’s not immediately obvious why Sir Keir Starmer thought it necessary to fly over here on Monday morning at a time when he should perhaps have been heading to Gatwick with Mrs. Starmer and the kids for a week in Magalluf.
He didn’t meet any of our local political leaders, possibly because – unlike the PM – they are luxuriating on their ultra-long summer break interrupted only by an afternoon trying to out-platitude each other at Stormont during the recent riots. Then again, maybe Keir timed his visit just because they were all away. Saved him a lot of grief….
But the PM did meet Jon Boutcher, who doesn’t appear to take any holidays, ostensibly to share tea and sympathy about the latest battering the PSNI took during the immigration-fuelled street disorder.
While Jon Boutcher probably doesn’t mind a bit of sympathy and head-nodding from the Prime Minister, he needs something else a lot more. Money, and plenty of it. Because he’s well over a thousand police officers short and probably needs a few other odds and ends as well. And none of that comes cheap.
Did Sir Keir come up with the readies? It seems not. He kept his hands in his pockets and gently reminded the Chief Constable that his government sends lot of dough over to our lot at Stormont and it’s up to them how they spend it….on schools, roads, health or policing. And, warming to his theme, he might point out that if our devolved government is a bit light on cash, then it’s welcome to raise some of its own. It’s what government, after all, is all about.
And so Jon Boutcher got to wave the Prime Minister off back to the government jet at the City Airport, slam the front door of PSNI Headquarters and wonder what the point of the whole visit was.
But he didn’t stop at that. He said that he’d be waiting for our First & Deputy First Ministers, the Finance Minister, the Justice Minister and the rest of the gang to get back from their caravans and talk money to him. Now that will be interesting….
Scots Cut Their Cloth…Over To You, Belfast
While our Executive treats Northern Ireland’s finances like the deckchairs on the Titanic, one glance across at Scotland tells us where we’re headed.
Angela Rayner, Sir Keir’s gritty deputy, was up amongst the Jocks just last week, making it fairly clear (and she’s a straight talker) that they won’t be getting any more money from Westminster. So, if they want to do things in a uniquely Scottish way, then they have to find the money for themselves.
The same is going to go for us here in Northern Ireland, and anyone clinging on to the hope that we’ll get more money because we’re a ‘special case’ is sadly deluded. The clues are all there, for heaven’s sake. Rachel Reeves trying to plug a £22 billion black hole in the Treasury is one of them.
Of course, they somehow found the cash to lavish a nice pay ride on those poor, impoverished train drivers. Or did they? Someone has to pay for that, and it’s something that may become clear when Ms. Reeves reveals her first budget in the autumn. She’s probably poring through the tax calculations at the moment.
Jon Boutcher won’t be the only one waiting for our lot to come back bronzed and refreshed. The Health Service is a gaping chasm which swallows money. And all others must wait patiently behind.
Water charges, anyone? Prescription fees maybe. It’s time to think the unthinkable, lads.
Pulling The Rug On Doug
What’s the link between the Ulster Unionist Party and Chelsea Football Club? Yep, you’ve guessed it. Neither of them can hang on to a leader.
The Ulster Unionists’ revolving door approach to its leaders continued this week with Doug Beatt’e’s departure. Apparently it was the result of a spat about the co-option of an MLA to replace newly elected MP Robin Swann, but it’s since emerged that the party is a bit of a basket case.
Meddling party officers (and lots of them), in-fighting, warring factions…..they seem to have it all in the Ulster Unionist Party.
The once dominant party in Northern Ireland politics has managed to become a bit of a laughing stock. In the same way that no one is too keen to step up as the new Chelsea manager, were it not for the huge salary, who’s going to take on what looks increasingly like a poisoned chalice at the UUP?
Robin Swann can hardly make a comeback now that he’s achieved his dream of sitting on the green leather benches over in London. Mike Nesbitt, for his part, is surely too busy as Health Minister to have any spare time. If he did return as leader, he’d come in for a fair bit of flak, so sacrosanct is the Health Minister’s role. But he hasn’t ruled it out, significantly.
Then there’s Robbie Butler, the current deputy but a man who allegedly considered giving up politics for another public role not too long ago. Apparently he hasn’t ruled it out either.
Some have even hinted that Doug Beattie might put his name forward in the new leadership process, no one would stand against him and he’d be back. Like Bobby Ewing stepping out of the shower all those years ago. Doug Does Dallas.
One man who won’t be all that worried is Gavin Robinson. Given the travails of the DUP in more recent times, he could have imagined that the Ulster Unionists might have made hay while the sun shone. Instead, they’ve shot themselves in the foot….again.
Work? Who Needs It?
We love a good survey, especially the ones that come up with conclusions that were blindingly obvious in the first place.
How about this one? New research from talent solutions firm Robert Walters found that 76% of UK professionals say that the current working week doesn’t suit them. What? Of course it doesn’t suit them. Did a Monday to Friday working week ever suit anyone? It gets in the way of doing diddly-squat, after all.
Presumably it means that they’d rather have a four-day working week, three-day working week or, better still, a working week that doesn’t involve any work at all.
The survey goes on…….51% think that switching to a four-day working week would improve productivity considerably (although some more traditional employers might wonder how?). On the other hand, 28% of UK employers would extend the working week if they could.
But, if they were to do that, 82% of workers would leave.
You couldn’t make this kind of stuff up, could you? Or maybe you could.
Irish Till He Dies
Here we go again. Tim Walz, Kamala Harris’s running mate over in the US of A, looks as though he can claim Irish roots…..as well as all the others. Despite his suspiciously Germanic-sounding surname, the genealogists say that his great grandmother was a Sullivan from County Wexford. Ferns, to be precise, a hole in the hedge that one passes through en route to Rosslare from Dublin.
Of course, his opposite number in the race, JD Vance, has also made something of his Scots-Irish roots, although its not clear whether the self-proclaimed hillbilly from the Apallachians meant Ulster-Scots or Scots-Irish. He probably doesn’t know the difference, or care.
And then there’s Kamala herself, apparently descended from a man from Antrim who went on to run a Jamaican plantation and own 120 or more slaves. Nice.
Still, at least Donald Trump hasn’t taken the Irish route. He can’t really, though. His mother was born and brought up on the Isle of Lewis in the Hebrides…..a very far cry from the gold-leaf walls of Mar-A-Lago.
Back to Tim Walz, and he’s added a bit of hail fellow well met appeal to the Harris ticket, something that seems to have left the orange-tinted former President flailing. It’s going to get very interesting.
A Brewdog, then The Ivy, Anyone?
Good news on the hospitality front this week. First up, Belfast’s very own Ivy will open its doors in mid-September at Cleaver House in the city centre.
From its original and iconic location amongst the theatres of the West End, The Ivy has grown into The Ivy Collection, a series of 39 (and counting) restaurants across the UK and Ireland. Having been to a couple of the London brasseries, particularly the one in Soho, we’re already fans.
The thing about The Ivy, Belfast included, is that you can go virtually any time – for breakfast, brunch, lunch, afternoon tea, cocktails or dinner. Or the whole lot if you’ve got real stamina.
The other piece of hospitality news? Brewdog, originally a craft brewer in the very north of Scotland but now a much larger player, is to open its first bar here. It will be in the new Grand Central Station due to open this autumn.
Sounds good to us. We could hop on the train from Bangor, have a swift pint on arrival at the brand new station, then head round the corner to The Ivy.
Living it large…….