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No nationalist should countenance British Rule in Ireland,but the vast majority of nationalists, North and South, exhorted to do so by every one of their political leaders,voted for British Rule in the North in 1998.

To criticise someone for accepting a New Years Award is laughingly hypocritical therefore😂😂😂

I disagree, the GFA was a peer based decision.

The awards are a not.

http://www.goqradio.com/news/q-radio-local-news/exclusive-plans-revealed-for-joint-northern-ireland-visit-by-the-pope-and-the-queen/

Q Radio understands that the Pope and the Queen will visit Northern Ireland jointly next summer.

Pope Francis, who's 80, is already scheduled to visit the Republic in 2018 for the World Meeting of Families.

Today we can reveal that not only will the Head of the Catholic church travel north of the border but he will be joined by the supreme governor of the Church of England who turns 92 in April.

It will be a deeply symbolic and powerful moment - The Pope and the Queen appearing side by side before a divided society.

Last year the then Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness revealed that the 80 year old Pontiff WOULD cross the border.

At the time - the then First Minister, Arlene Foster, said she would meet him.

Q Radio sources have revealed that plans for the joint visit are being worked on.

The location is being kept under wraps - it may be Armagh or Belfast-  but it certainly will be in Northern Ireland.

Meanwhile,

The Archbishop of Armagh, the Most Reverend Richard Clarke, says a joint visit by the Pope and the Queen to Northern Ireland would be "remarkable and wonderful".

The head of the Anglican communion in Ireland was responding to a Q Radio news report that plans are being drawn up for such a visit next August.

The Queen of England does not do joint appearances, she has no equal.

Any reason given for the Vaughan transfer?
From the outside it looks like poor form.

There's a lot of Irish people that still think the rest of the world should have paid for the bad behaviour of our banks and the cowboys they indiscriminately lent money to. Britain too had to bail out their banks to the tune of 500 million. The difference is we needed to borrow to bail out our bad boys.

Funny, the money wasn't subject to a national identity until it went to hell.

http://www.newstalk.com/Its-doggy-date-night-as-ban-on-pets-in-restaurants-is-lifted

Dogs in Restaurants.
You can't even walk down the street without getting tangled up dog leashes every 10 yards.
I'm sick of people thinking everyone is a fan of their dog and is understanding of the inconvenience (how ever slight) their dogs cause in public.

I will not be eating in these restaurants.

Why do you continue to write your fan fiction of events?

I'm having more fun than you.

So it's back to direct rule from Westminster till we get an All Ireland outcome??

I hope not.

[first]

There continues to be discrimination and abuse of authority/power in 2017 in relation to religion of job candidates by both communities where they give preference to 'their own' ahead of merit, often used an unofficial tie-breaker.  Thanks goodness for the law.

Are you talking about the private sector where the self employed employ from within their community? If so then that a natural state replicated all over the world. I am be willing to accept that.

We are a bigoted society, the first thought by too many of us is whether an individual is a Protestant or Catholic with Catholic good and Protestant bad or vice versa or how often do you hear, he/she is not bad for a Protestant.

Speak for yourself. I never hear that said.

The laws instituted in the early 70s put a lie to the freedom fighting IRA from early 70s onwards and a lie to the narrative being lured out to younger people that Catholics only had one route to the freedom already available to them and given by UK laws in N.Ireland and new organisations manned equally by Catholics and Protestants.

My points earlier regarding security policy in Ireland (plus your next point below) have addressed this.

The real fight that the IRA had was against the British Army but it became involved in a sectarian conflict against UDA/UVF whose innate hatred of Catholics was used in many instances by the UK government in a proxy war against the IRA.  No different than all of the proxy wars fought by governments of many countries through similar hate driven organisations willing to kill for a cause.

This was by design through British policy. The British Army could not be seen to be fighting a war within their own borders so they controlled the loyalists to provide the excuse of peace makers in a religious conflict. Sadly, they were all too successful and the community began to believe it. I have never and will never believe it was a sectarian conflict.

Just check out the individuals being appointed to the multitude of quangos we still have in N.Ireland despite rules being in place, the Executive Minister has final say in all such appointments. None of these memberships is unpaid, most are at the going rate of £300 per day.  The new discrimination over the last 10 years is a political patronage and the development of special advisers which will be split wide open as the RHI inquiry proceeds and we see how SpAds are recruited and the power they weald as unelected people.

This is the normalization we craved for. That does not excuse it nor does it mean it should not be dealt with through the law, however, it is standard politics.
From the White House to Sligo County Council, this is common practice.

[both]

If you read what I have written you will see that the institutions to remove discrimination as provided from the McCrory Report removed the main elements of state which were in place to allow discrimination.  As I have stated the issue of discrimination remaining was down to the people in state organisation and businesses who continued to discriminate and break the law in doing so. 

Up until the NIHE, ELBs, Fair Employment act and the local government act, all from earlier 70s, it was not illegal for state bodies and business to discriminate in the fields of housing, education and employment. 

The safeguards that ensure discrimination on a religious basis as had happened from the beginning of N.Ireland are no longer acceptable or legal in 2017 were in place from early 70s.  That is a fact.  Did discrimination still occur, yes, but it could be contested, beaten and compensated for thanks to the new institutions and parliamentary acts put in place from early 70s.

Does discrimination still occur in 2017, yes it does but by both sides of the community and those affected have the legal right of challenge and recompense thanks to the laws enacted in 1970's and amended on occasions since then to make them broader and more effective.

There is nothing introduced since the early 1970s that has suddenly made discrimination disappear apart from amendments and improvements to the existing legislation.

I agree 100% that there was discrimination against sections of the Protestant community by the State. The State discriminated against the poor in general, unfortunately the protestant victims were given a false enemy to blame. Much like now where the poorer working class are given the immigrants to blame.
I've always maintained this to be a social conflict but the strategy of the State to paint it as a religious conflict has been so successful we are still paying that price.

[place because of the hardline stance taken by Ireland]

Vindicated in the sense that it will be a very watered down Brexit. However, it got to that place because of the hardline stance taken by Ireland - ie the guarantee of no border. However, no border can only be guaranteed if the 6 county regulations are aligned with the 26. Then the DUP stepped in and an untended consequence of this is that for the six counties to be aligned with the 26, the six need to be aligned with Great Britain. And for Britain to do that, Britain has to be back aligned with EU rules. The whole thing is self-referential. The UK did not arrive in this place through any strategic thinking but rather accidentally. If they want the Brexit they voted for, it's becoming clear that the six counties are a big problem. The agreement is written ambigiously enough that the border still ends up again in the Irish sea. That is perhaps the one area where the British side were not found wanting.

This is't the case. The hard line was engineered by the UK and the EU. Ireland had no knowledge of the whole set up. That's why the documents were leaked, the press conference called and the expected response by all interested parties in the UK were made.


It must have been a crazy week if we all accepted Monday was a massive day but have forgotten those events by Friday.
Nothing happened on Friday that wasn't planned before Monday morning.

This wee scenario makes some sense apart from the British PM being completely embarrassed on the international stage.  I may even buy that, as a crafty political move if she had been a strong leader up to that point and had the points to recover from it.  But she didn't, she has been through embarrassment after embarrassment, and I would struggle to accept that she put herself through a charade that she will get pummelled for quite a while to come.  There is no way she deliberately done that.

When the deal is done I think she will be vindicated. I think labour shouting and roaring is just making hay.

I was going to happen ffs!

Health and Safety act was started in 1974, it became an act in NI in 1978.. we were always last to pick up on these things

Corporal punishment in schools two. I had the head slapped of me while the wee brother got scolded. He was a wee brat too.

[You're looking at this in too short a time scale]

It doesn't matter how hard or soft the brexit, there won't be a border in ireland.

You're looking at this in too short a time scale. From my reading if UK and Ireland/EU diverge (which won't happen for some time yet, and may not at all in the key areas) then they need to agree what to do re north. If they can't agree, then NI exec decides for itself. Theres a few fair 'if's in there, prob would never come about, and if it did will be years down the line.

Seems to me from a UI aspiration point of view, best thing that could happen now (assuming that phase 1 agreements are 'banked') is that brexit is hard, and subsequently disastrous so north aligns itself closer to south

You are looking at it from a bubble. More important than the border is that Germany wants to sell cars to the UK and France want's to buy weapons from the UK.

[Therefore, all talk of discrimination by the state after the early 70s is largely inaccurate,]

Therefore, all talk of discrimination by the state after the early 70s is largely inaccurate, it still existed with some individuals unless challenged using the agencies that had been created by the UK government.  The problem from early 70s lies with the greater segregation and polarisation of the population caused by the on-going violence of the IRA and UVF/UDA.  From early 70s anyone can get a job or a house or an education anywhere but they will not feel comfortable in the segregated society that has formed.  Polarisation of the communities has become much sharper over the last 40 years and whole populations have moved to make new small towns and some people have been moved in the ethnic cleansing (N.Ireland style) that occurred in the 30 year conflict.

Big introduction to get this far and then leave out Policing and the British Army.
Do you think Internment from 1971 - 75 was not discriminatory? Or the following removal of political status and prison conditions into the 80s?
Bloody Sunday in 1972 and the following investigations into it.
The Establishment, Arming and supporting of the UDR criminality.
Further cover ups and framing by security forces.

There are many more. Discrimination was not based solely on civic opportunity and it's false to claim it was. I fully understand that many of these discriminating decisions by the State were in response to the IRA. However, we are discussing the discrimination by the State. The State used the IRA to further discriminate after the end of civic discrimination. It's not true to say the State could not address the IRA without discrimination of the Catholic/Nationalist community.

These things were not individual discrimination. It was policy.

I think this is better than Monday. Ensures north/south trade, and West / East. Does specify East / West. So NI could have best of both.

It does mean that NI could have higher regulations that both EU / UK that allows trade into both.

The north will be no different to the rest of the UK.

The EU and the UK will agree on regulation that is aligned, probably along existing custom union lines. The UK will call theirs something else, UK continent export regulation or something (CER).

Monday was a 'false flag operation'. To test the response. It was the response they wanted and the one they helped provoke by sending Varadkar out with special deal for the north. It seems Varadkar didn't know anything about this but the DUP were prepared. As soon as Varadkar called his press conference and the leaked documents came on line, every interested party in the UK were shouting for special status. Now everyone is happy.

Let's hope Corbyn keeps his mouth shut for a few weeks.