Opinion

Would Stormont's airline subsidy pass the EU's Apple test?

Newton Emerson

Newton Emerson

Newton Emerson writes a twice-weekly column for The Irish News and is a regular commentator on current affairs on radio and television.

Apple CEO Tim Cook. The company faces a tax bill of €13 billion
Apple CEO Tim Cook. The company faces a tax bill of €13 billion Apple CEO Tim Cook. The company faces a tax bill of €13 billion

The European Commission’s tax ruling against Apple and the Irish government could have major long-term implications for Northern Ireland but it raises one interesting question right away. Would Stormont’s £3 million a year subsidy to the New York air route pass a ‘state aid’ inspection by Brussels? Europe’s state aid rules for aviation were rationalised in 2014 into a single set of guidelines, which only permit an airline to be subsidised for up to three years to develop a new route. Stormont appears to have complied with the first requirement - it has only budgeted for three years of payments to Continental. However, the New York route is not new and the guidelines are unusually clear that this disqualifies any grant. Is the executive hoping Brexit makes this academic before Europe notices?

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For the past two weeks, DUP assembly member Lord Morrow has been vowing to call the police over the Stormont witness coaching scandal, despite nobody being able to say how coaching a witness at Stormont might constitute an offence. Things have finally come to a head with the PSNI confirming it has received a letter, which the DUP insists it sent a week ago. Yet still, no actual crime has been alleged. According to the DUP the letter merely asks police to “investigate whether any criminal offence has taken place.”

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The problem with a Shinner on their high horse is that they have ignored so many elephants. Eighteen members of the party have resigned in North Antrim over the witness coaching scandal, claiming former MLA Daithi McKay was unfairly treated. Less than a year ago, following an IRA murder, an official report suggested Sinn Féin was controlled by the IRA and IRA members were involved in organised crime. Anyone in the party for longer than a year has come to terms with much more in the same vein and of course anyone in Sinn Féin for five minutes must know it is a (how shall I put this?) disciplined organisation. Yet a local selection difficulty is what has finally caused North Antrim members to walk out clutching their pearls. Honestly - pass the smelling salts.

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A great deal of the trouble Sinn Féin faces in North Antrim is due to the need to co-opt a replacement within one week of McKay resigning, in order to avoid a by-election. If every constituency association had to agree an understudy for each of their MLAs there would be less panic and disappointment whenever someone stood down. That is more or less the system Stormont had up to 2009, with the Electoral Office having to be notified of so-called ‘substitute’ MLAs. But the Northern Ireland Office scrapped this and allowed party leaderships to co-opt anyone directly into vacant seats - a change that, at the time, appeared to very much please the control freaks running Sinn Féin and the DUP.

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The first ever inquest into a stillbirth in Northern Ireland has uncovered the extraordinary resistance women can face in obtaining a caesarean section, even when NHS guidelines require one and despite the entitlement to demand one regardless. In this case, Causeway Hospital cancelled a planned section at 38 weeks for a mother who presented with a baby in the transverse position and whose previous two births had been an emergency section and a difficult natural delivery - all indicators of risk requiring a further section. Michelle Rocks was told she was “capable” of delivering naturally, her pleas to reconsider were ignored and her daughter, Cara, died. The Northern Trust has apologised and admitted multiple failures but the larger problem across the NHS is an ideological objection to caesareans that is overriding clinical need. Sadly, that is beyond the coroner’s remit.

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The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination has completed its latest biennial report on the UK. While largely positive, it expresses concern that Northern Ireland does not have the bill of rights mentioned in the Good Friday Agreement and recommends the British government “expedite the process”. In fact, the process was fully expedited. It did not produce a bill because a decade of deliberation by the rights sector failed to identify any need for one under the terms of the agreement. The committee received submissions from leading rights sector organisations, including the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, the Equality Commission and the Committee on the Administration of Justice. How did it still end up so misinformed?

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The return to school means up to a month of ‘phasing in’ for nursery and primary one children, who may start with as little as one or two short mornings a week. This creates a nightmare for parents, forcing many to give up income and annual leave. But could insisting on it be unlawful? Three years ago, the Office of the Schools Adjudicator for England ruled that phasing in must never be compulsory because schools are legally obliged to provide a full-time place for every child from the beginning of September. As Northern Ireland has similar legislation, it should only take one test case to have phasing in phased out.

newton@irishnews.com