SCHOOL EDITION 29 MAY 2024 - Flipbook - Page 12
12
WEDNESDAY JANUARY 22 2020
editor@irishnews.com
www.irishnews.com
THE IRISH NEWS
Pro fide et patria
OPINION
Prints of
Ian Knox
cartoons
are
available
to buy
from £15
at shop.
irishnews.
com
Change must
be properly
managed
B
ORIS Johnson and Leo Varadkar were at Stormont yesterday to put the seal on the
restoration of a devolved administration and to enjoy a rare political success story in Northern Ireland.
It has to be said there has been a
fair degree of positivity over the past
few days, the SDLP’s dismay over
the appointment of Alex Maskey as
speaker rather than the expected
Patsy McGlone, one of the few
discordant notes.
Few could blame the Irish and British premiers from wanting to share in
the upbeat mood, although much of
the hard work to get us to this point
was done by the estimable Secretary
of State Julian Smith and the impressive foreign affairs minister Simon
Coveney.
Now the new ministers have been
appointed a honeymoon period is
traditional but, given the vacuum of
the past three years, it is likely to be
brief.
In other words, people will want
the executive to quickly get stuck
into the major issues that have been
at the forefront of public concern,
with health a key priority.
Health minister Robin Swann will
be expected to move swiftly to resolve the industrial dispute over
nurses’ pay and safe staffing levels but there are wider and deeper
problems that must be addressed.
The health portfolio is generally
regarded as a ‘poisoned chalice’ in
government terms and while it is
crucial that sufficient funds are released to tackle the most urgent issues, the reality is we need radical
reform requiring tough decisions.
In that respect it is important that
the executive takes collective responsibility for changes that may
well be unpopular and may attract
considerable flak but will need to be
achieved if we are to ensure a healthcare system that can cope with the
demands of an ageing population.
A failure to move forward on the
reviews of the past has brought us
to a point where the health service
is experiencing an unprecedented crisis with waiting lists that are
nothing short of shameful.
However, while accepting that difficult choices lie ahead, it is also vital
that the process of change in health
and other departments is properly
managed with a transparency and
openness that was singularly lacking
in the last Stormont administration.
Fancy footwork and a
motley new cast but we
have been here before
I
N THE aftermath of that sashay to the
cameras on Stormont’s grandiose hill
the two directors stepped away, leaving
a motley cast to put on the show. Big
questions, right there.
Is Julian Smith going to stick around,
keep his eye on this production? Well, how
would he know, being only a minor player
himself in Boris Johnson’s crew.
Though if Johnson, as some believe,
is playing downbeat slogger rather than
exhibitionist and maverick, the promised
cash may flow and it makes sense to keep
Smith here. Chief Whip in Theresa May’s
battered government, as his haggard
demeanour eventually testified, judicious
alternation of bludgeon and soft talk
presumably is now second nature to him.
That somewhat sinister skill served him
well with the DUP, prime laggard about
signing up. Smith might, of course, have
had a considerable yearning to lean on
them, having had to feign more sweetness
over their wretched 10 votes than anyone
reasonable could have felt in reality.
He tweeted sympathy to Nigel Dodds
on the loss of his seat, after all, and a
cheery photo of them together. The man
has good manners and a way with
him. As witness his care to meet the
institutional survivors, straight after
arm-twisting and curtain-raising,
and the fact that he was able to
repeatedly postpone meeting the
Irish language lobby without turning
them dearg with fearg.
Then there is the diplomatic
Cork man who looked, perhaps,
less conflicted as Smith’s partner
than he may secretly feel as Leo
Varadkar’s sidekick. Simon Coveney
landed back home into another
demanding part of his business,
Fionnuala
O CONNOR
questions about EU negotiations with
Johnson to really ‘get Brexit done’. But at
least as urgent, there is the run-up to an
election. A couple of months down the line,
where will Coveney be?
The locals who will now spend a chunk
of their lives on the hill are a study. The
most positive can see a list of arguments
for them behaving well, if not actually
taking baby steps towards reconciliation,
that holy and perhaps unrealisable grail.
The RHI report lumbering up the hill slowly
slowly but surely on its way, soonish if not
soon? A court case any day now.
Lessons in December’s election for DUP
and Sinn Féin both. SF on election footing
across the border, with ground to make up
and people to impress with their northern
statecraft. Last chance for devolution.
As against all that are the inconvenient
facts of mutual mistrust, total lack of
bonds. The executive has been recreated
out of elements whose electoral mandate
is not what it was. The DUP and SF are
supposed to be chastened, separately and
behind closed doors may even be more
than a bit shaken. Yet here they are still
heading the table, fluffing up their tails,
doling out the lollipops. (Minister Diane
Dodds? SF passing over the experienced
and considerable John O’Dowd for Deirdre
Hargey, co-opted MLA?)
Alliance has a right to be acknowledged
as the real cool dude, thanks to all those
runner-up votes, the delicious way they
sliced the majorities of Sir Jeff and Ian
Paisley down to mere human size. Yet
Naomi Long had to be invited, by the
supposedly humbled DUP/SF duo, to take
the justice job. The SDLP has wind in sails,
funds refreshed via their two new MPs
in Westminster, the meticulous Nichola
Mallon a genuinely promising minister and
an intriguing recruit in former Downing
Street press officer Matthew O’Toole.
But what are the chances of Alliance and
SDLP, open competitors now for the
centre ground, cooperating to keep
an eye on the bigger parties?
What else? This executive has
one fluent Irish-speaker; himself a
beachhead? (Maybe too fluent in
English.)
This is all without mentioning
the absence of sanctions on
special advisers, civil servants.
Reporters tasked to Stormont are
even less excited than the public.
They admired the Smith-Coveney
footwork, but they’ve been here
before.
The locals who will now
spend a chunk of their lives
on the hill are a study. The
most positive can see a list of
arguments for them behaving
well, if not actually taking baby
steps towards reconciliation