Opinion

Newton Emerson: Glimpse of the ‘real Arlene' will cause her long term damage

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.

Martin McGuinness has turned up the heat on Arlene Foster. Picture by Hugh Russell
Martin McGuinness has turned up the heat on Arlene Foster. Picture by Hugh Russell Martin McGuinness has turned up the heat on Arlene Foster. Picture by Hugh Russell

JONATHAN Bell’s interview with Stephen Nolan, followed by a rebuttal from Arlene Foster, has turned the Renewable Heating Incentive (RHI) scandal into a game of he-said she-said - which the more powerful side always tends to win. It must be assumed that Foster will brazen this out. The damage she suffers will be long-term, as the unionist electorate gets its first up-close glimpse of ‘the real Arlene’. The resurfacing of splits inside the DUP is also a significant possibility. Foster is was always accepted on sufferance by the evangelicals, who respected Robinson's faith in her. The Paisleyites were even less impressed. Bell was a close ally of Robinson and his interview featured theatrical religiosity. It is a wonder he did not cite the parable of the fiery furnace.

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The Executive Office has refused to list all RHI beneficiaries due to “data protection”. Instead, claimants will be asked if they are willing to be named, which seems unlikely. If the DUP thought this was a clever stalling tactic, it was mistaken. Embarrassing examples - such as heating a Ferrari showroom - will now leak out one by one.

A golden rule of government is that whenever anyone says ‘data protection’ you should immediately smell bovine excrement. That seems especially true in this instance as the scheme subsidises businesses and organisations rather than individuals, yet the slightly better excuse of ‘commercial confidentiality’ has not been cited. Farmers and lawyers had their subsidies published despite cries of ‘data protection’ so there is no reason why the same cannot apply to RHI. Incidentally, bovine excrement is an important heating fuel in India. A post-Brexit opportunity for Arlene Foster’s next trade mission, perhaps.

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The House of Lords has completed a report into Brexit and UK-Irish relations that is more detailed than anything attempted by the British government, let alone by the Leave campaign. It still contains a number of howlers, however, including calls for bilateral negotiations with Ireland, which Dublin does not want because EU rules do not allow it. Devolving free movement powers to Stormont also looks implausible - can one part of a country have a different immigration system to another? Despite raising concerns for the political and psychological impact on the peace process, the report concluded that Brexit does not substantially undermine the Good Friday Agreement. This is notable because the report made reference to the appeal on those grounds just heard by the UK Supreme Court, which is just another part of the House of Lords.

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The Labour Party has been ridiculed in England after coming fifth in the Sleaford and North Hykeham by-election, where its members now apparently outnumber its voters. Many reports have identified this as the logical end-point of Corbynism and some have declared it unprecedented in UK politics - but arguably Northern Ireland got there first. In this year’s assembly election, Labour won 1,500 votes with a membership of 3,000.

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The Irish government is taking extraordinary action to address a crisis in the private rental market, with rent rises being capped in certain ‘urban pressure zones’. This is front page news and a major political issue. Meanwhile, Stormont’s review of the private rental market is still missing in action two years after a DUP minister commissioned it, one year after a discussion document was released and 10 months after a public consultation exercise was meant to begin. There has not been a squeak about it from the DUP, which still controls the relevant department. Nor is any protest on record from Sinn Féin, despite the full opposition role it is playing on this issue in the Republic. Is there any reason why these parties may be loathe to take on the rental market’s private wing?

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The courts have witnessed yet another instance of aggravation as mitigation, after lawyers for a Carrickfergus man blamed his participation in a riot to consuming Buckfast, crystal meth and cocaine. The law requires longer sentences for intoxication, while drug possession is an offence in itself. The judge was unimpressed and jailed the man for 20 months but if people now expect leniency on these grounds, it can only be due to a signal from the judiciary in general.

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RHI is being widely described as the worst financial scandal in the history of devolution, based on its projected loss to Stormont of £400m over 20 years. At £20m a year, there might be come competition for that accolade - and how quickly everyone has forgotten the Jobskills fiasco, which spanned a period of devolution and direct rule. Set up in 1995, by 2003 it had cost £485m for a success rate of 13 per cent - wasting £53m a year. Stormont and the Northern Ireland Audit Office missed this but when their reports were passed to Westminster’s Public Accounts committee, horrified MPs described them as “crap”, “waffle” and “the worst I’ve ever read.”

newton@irishnews.com