When the late Rev Ian Paisley wanted to signal a political crisis he bellowed and roared and issued dire warnings. (Though we have just learned that within weeks of his “Never! Never! Never!” response to the 1985 Anglo Irish Agreement, he was privately seeking to negotiate a way out of the cul de sac he had just bulldozed.)
Nowadays, in the North, we seem to lurch from crisis to crisis with scarcely more than a shrugging of shoulders, a raising of eyebrows, a disheartened smirk.
After a long, slow descent into constant acrimony between our political leaders, the last few months have provided three crises, over each of which certain politicians have warned that the executive at Stormont could collapse, and about each of which statements have been made which suggest it probably should and almost certainly won’t.
We are wary of claims of success now, too. No Christmas cheer surrounded the announcement of the Stormont House Agreement last December, which was just as well, since it fell apart in March when Sinn Féin blocked the welfare reform bill. Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness accused the DUP of “bad faith” and of being willing to “strip benefits from children with disabilities” and such.
Vitriolic exchanges
First Minister
Peter Robinson
claimed that in all his long career he had seen nothing as “dishonourable and ham-fisted” as Sinn Féin’s behaviour. Further vitriolic exchanges have followed, and the issue has not been resolved. The North is currently operating under a “fantasy budget” (a misnomer for something so grim) since a real one cannot be agreed.
Then along came Mick Wallace’s allegations about a pot of money in the Isle of Man, a scandal that has not actually yet entirely broken, though an excitable loyalist has boasted that he is about to produce “explosive, career-ending evidence”.
The leaders of both the DUP and the UUP have both stated that they neither benefited nor were ever set to benefit from the controversial sale of NAMA’s Northern Irish loan portfolio, and the DUP said the First Minister had not, as alleged, suddenly changed his policy on it. Sinn Féin has now accused the DUP of attempting to stymie an inquiry by Stormont’s finance and personnel committee. The DUP says it does not want to disrupt a police investigation – Sinn Féin says the National Crime Agency has given the inquiry the all-clear.
And now the re-emergence of claims that IRA members were among those who murdered Kevin McGuigan, whose funeral was heartbreakingly led by a small boy with his hands over his face. Perhaps most extraordinary is the statement by Chief Constable George Hamilton that although the IRA is illegal, its continuing existence has been good for the peace process.
As ever refusing to grasp that Gerry Adams simply cannot be taken seriously as a commentator on the status of the IRA, given his stubborn denial that he was ever in it, Sinn Féin has pointed to his assurances that the IRA "has gone away you know." A certain set of Dublin journalists are howling. Ian Paisley junior has called for Sinn Féin's exclusion from the executive, unless the PSNI pulls a rabbit from a hat, and even if the stars fall.
The rabbits are staying put for now, the stars likewise. The people seem not unduly concerned about the prospect of the fall of the house of Stormont. The word “dysfunctional” is bandied about. A truly unimpressive record in relation to legislation is noted. The observation by the former head of the Community Relations Council, Duncan Morrow, that the regime at Stormont was not so much about powersharing as about sharing out power is widely held. Petitions of concern, which were built into the Good Friday Agreement to prevent the voting in of sectarian measures, are widely used simply to block anything the other side wants to do . The near total paralysis within the Office of the First and Deputy First Ministers (OFMDFM) is such that it is known as “the black hole”.
The Commissioner on Public Appointments, John Keanie, resigned this summer in frustration, stating that he was appalled at the failure of OFMDFM to provide leadership in bringing about transparency and diversity in relation to appointments, despite his having provided them with a comprehensive list of recommendations.
Horse-trading
Behind closed doors we appear, instead of negotiation, to have horse-trading, or the seeking out the lowest common denominator. Seventeen years after the Good Friday Agreement, there is no comprehensive strategy in place to bring about reconciliation, though a consultation is currently meant to be under way. No such strategy can possibly succeed however when the atmosphere between the two lead parties exudes so much antagonism and distrust. If people are worried, and they are, it is about hard times – unemployment, cuts to public services and benefits, keeping a roof over the heads of their children. The things the Executive is meant to sort out for the people who elected it.