“Connor said that he is prepared to accept the Conservative whip, but, on matters concerning Northern Ireland, he will vote on basis of what he believes is in the best interests of his constituents.”Given that the pain will come long before the reward, in FST as elsewhere, where does Connor stand? Will he “accept the Conservative whip” when the knife starts to cut, or will he “vote on basis of what he believes is in the best interests of his constituents” (in the short-term, at any rate)?
How does Cameron’s announcement of pain-to-come play out on the doorsteps? What does Connor say when the point is raised? Or is it simply enough that he has wrapped a British flag around himself?
It might be interesting for the voters of FST to know where Connor stands on this issue – which seems to signal a glaring discrepancy between the two ends of one of his sentences.
Or is it all really just meaningless gibberish designed to dress up his sectarian campaign in fancy clothes?
1 comment:
Whether one feels that the public sector in NI is bloated or that it is slightly overweight due to very understandable extenuating circumstances (e.g. The Troubles), perhaps the most interesting insight recently has been David Cameron's strategy for it's improvement.
There is something very reminiscent of the traditional attitude of the English ascendancy to the 'Irish question' in his declaration of, "In Northern Ireland it is quite clear, almost every party, I think, accepts that the size of the state has got too big, we need a bigger private sector". One would have been forgiven for initially perking up and awaiting with excitement the details of his master plan for invigorating and rebuilding NI's private sector, but we would have been quickly disappointed. The sole strategy he set out was to spend less.
It's rather like in the 1840s when those feckless Irish insisted in dying of starvation. Surely they can't expect to be subsidized forever!
Thankfully his class no longer own the means of wealth creation in even the North of Ireland, so the implicit perception of us as parasitic will not be so catastrophic this time round. One might even hope that it could hasten those of a unionist viewpoint to the conclusion that they have better friends closer at hand.
For those of you who read today's Belfast Telegraph I wouldn't put any trust in his latest retraction statement of "At no point have I or any member of my team stated or inferred that we are targeting Northern Ireland for cuts." No, you didn't imagine his first statement. All that this demonstrates is that Paxman is a good interviewer and Cameron has since been better advised by public relations consultants with rather more political nous than he has.
Post a Comment