On the terrace last night people were working on a number of Irish jokes. These, of course, relating to Northern Ireland such as:
Ulster says: Yes
Ulster says: How much?
No surrender - well for £1.2 billion that's a different issue
A little bit of extra scrutiny is likely to be given to the minutae of the arrangements for the financing of the Northern Ireland Assembly.
It remains, however, that this was a saddening decision. The concessions given on 42days make it essentially unworkable and in principle undermine the separation of powers by bringing parliament in on individual cases. In any event the proposal if implemented would do more harm than good. It remains that post charge questioning is the key issue. Whether Brown's motivation was to try to do something Blair couldn't do (I suppose he didn't offer £1.2 Billion) or whether it is because it is superficially popular and allows him to posture on terrorism is unclear.
What was very good, however, was Diane Abbot's speech.
This is available for a while here
Her Hand signals were also part of the debate.
Of course the hurdle of the House of Lords and pingpong remains.
Ulster says: Yes
Ulster says: How much?
No surrender - well for £1.2 billion that's a different issue
A little bit of extra scrutiny is likely to be given to the minutae of the arrangements for the financing of the Northern Ireland Assembly.
It remains, however, that this was a saddening decision. The concessions given on 42days make it essentially unworkable and in principle undermine the separation of powers by bringing parliament in on individual cases. In any event the proposal if implemented would do more harm than good. It remains that post charge questioning is the key issue. Whether Brown's motivation was to try to do something Blair couldn't do (I suppose he didn't offer £1.2 Billion) or whether it is because it is superficially popular and allows him to posture on terrorism is unclear.
What was very good, however, was Diane Abbot's speech.
This is available for a while here
Her Hand signals were also part of the debate.
Of course the hurdle of the House of Lords and pingpong remains.
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