SAOIRSE32

Irish Times
28 Oct 2008

AT A TIME when living standards are under threat and economies across the world face into recession, it is a dreadful indictment of the political grandstanding of both the Democratic Unionist Party and Sinn Féin that the Northern Ireland Executive has failed to meet for four months.

The issues that have given rise to this impasse are surmountable, if there is a political willingness to compromise, while failure to provide the necessary leadership may threaten those community advances that have been secured with such difficulty.

Jobs are being lost at an increasing rate in Northern Ireland. And failure by the Executive to function as intended has sent an extremely negative signal to those investors who have expressed an interest in establishing businesses there. Perhaps more importantly, public confidence in the political process and in the powersharing structures established with the assistance of the Irish and British governments and the United States is beginning to erode. And men of violence wait in the wings.

Former Northern Ireland police ombudsman Nuala O’Loan has repeatedly expressed concern about the situation. International research findings showed, she said, that unless effective political structures were put in place and operated, the average length of a peace agreement was five years and the average length of non-violence was 15 years. Those scary statistics should help to concentrate minds and encourage political leaders to focus on the big picture rather than on petty party considerations. For so long as the Executive fails to meet, they are effectively abandoning the high ground to those destructive elements within both communities that would reignite violence and return people to sterile and destructive sectarianism.

The time for political hand-holding in Northern Ireland should be long gone. Both the DUP and Sinn Féin actively campaigned for devolution. But, now that they have it, they persist in old habits and look to the British and Irish governments and to the US to take sides and to resolve their difficulties. It is time they shouldered the responsibilities of office and engaged in necessary compromise that is the art of government. The political name-calling and posturing that has soured relations between Peter Robinson and Gerry Adams in recent months has no place in a well-run administration. It may mollify and divert traditionalists, but it is not what the majority of people want or voted for.

A clear peace has yet to be consolidated. And while the Provisional IRA has ended its war, disarmed and acknowledged the policing and justice systems, dissident republicans and loyalist paramilitaries remain active and dangerous. In such circumstances, four months of Executive paralysis represents a political failure by Mr Robinson, Mr Adams and Martin McGuinness that premature elections would be unlikely to resolve. The issues of devolved policing and justice, the Irish language, education standards and use of the Maze prison site would remain. The only way of surmounting these difficulties is through negotiation and compromise. The sooner creative discussion replaces political posturing the better.

‘By Rick Fulton
Current.com
Originally from Daily Record
27 Oct 2008

GARY Lightbody has spoken for the first time about a bomb attack his family narrowly escaped in Northern Ireland when he was a child.

The Snow Patrol frontman said his parents only recently told him how close they were to the explosion in his home town of Bangor when he was four.

The 32-year-old has never really written about the Troubles since his teens, but new single Take Back The City’ is a message to Belfast.

Gary said: “My family were quite close to the bomb, but I was only four, so I was too young to remember.”

He revealed his most vivid memory of growing up as a child of the Troubles is of going to school and seeing members of the British Army with rifles.

He said: “When you went to school, you were stuck behind the guys with the armoured vans and the guns.

“It reminded you every morning there’s something going on and the news is a constant reminder. But, you do get on with it.

“I grew up mistrusting politicians and completely at odds with religion of any sort.

“I was always confused as to what was really going on and why it was going on. Take Back The City is saying to people in Belfast ‘Take back the city for yourself and I’ll take it back for me.’

“It’s a European city these days with an incredible music scene that I adore.”

Gary formed Snow Patrol while at Dundee University and then lived in Glasgow.

Recently he has bought a home back in Bangor to be near his family.

The band celebrate the release of their fifth album ‘A Hundred Million Suns’ with a whistle-stop tour of four capital cities - Dublin, Belfast, Edinburgh and London.

The tour kicked-off at lunchtime yesterday at The Gate Theatre in Dublin before a gig in Belfast last night. This afternoon they will be at Edinburgh’s Assembly Rooms for a midday performance before heading to London for the final show.

The new album features song ‘Disaster Button’, which is about the singer’s own tendency during his 20s to all too regularly “self-destruct”.

Gary said: “The Disaster Button is a switch in me that used to happen to me in my mid-20s.

“My parents and the band have all been there for me at some point in my errant times to reign me back in again.

“Now, having been in so many nourishing friendships and relationships, I have finally broken the spell of affliction.

“‘The Disaster Button’ is a reminder of how far I’ve come.

“I’m concerned with my memory. On many occasions I forget my own lyrics, I forget large portions of my life.

“I sometimes used to make the lyrics up onstage. These days it’s kind of flattering that people sometimes carry the song for me.

“There was one time the crowd took over and I was almost in tears, it was just so moving.

“There was a feeling, people were more going ‘We’re all in this together.’”

Snow Patrol’s ‘A Hundred Million Suns’ is out today.