Opinion

Tom Kelly: Political dysfunction is getting beyond a joke

Tom Kelly

Tom Kelly

Tom Kelly is an Irish News columnist with a background in politics and public relations. He is also a former member of the Policing Board.

While Sir Jeffrey Donaldson gave an impassioned performance last week about his commitment to devolved government, he looks very comfortable leading the DUP from Westminster. Picture: Kirsty O'Connor/PA Wire.
While Sir Jeffrey Donaldson gave an impassioned performance last week about his commitment to devolved government, he looks very comfortable leading the DUP from Westminster. Picture: Kirsty O'Connor/PA Wire. While Sir Jeffrey Donaldson gave an impassioned performance last week about his commitment to devolved government, he looks very comfortable leading the DUP from Westminster. Picture: Kirsty O'Connor/PA Wire.

Not sure what made me laugh more.

The news that ‘Jim from Coronation Street’ is going to do commentary on the Twelfth with Arlene Foster.

Or that yet another Tory MP had resigned over inappropriate behaviour, this time as deputy chief whip.

Or that Nadine Dorries - the minister for sport - didn’t know the difference between rugby union and rugby league whilst at a rugby league function in St Helens.

Or this quote from Liz Truss, the British foreign secretary, saying Britain would hold China to account because: “Today is 25 years since the handover of Hong Kong to China. Beijing has abandoned its legally binding commitments to uphold Hong Kong’s rights and freedoms”.

As Jim McDonald would say: “Elizabeth, catch yourself on!”

Northern Ireland continues in a state of semi-paralysis with MLAs in limbo, zombie ministers and a mothballed executive.

Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, despite a very impassioned performance in the House of Commons about his commitment to devolved government, looks decidedly comfortable leading the DUP from Westminster.

It’s not really surprising when the DUP presented the office of first and deputy first ministers to their followers as more bride and bridesmaid than an equal partnership. Better for now to look in charge from London than pay deference in Belfast.

The British government has ruined Anglo-Irish relations. Even Thatcher and Haughey had a better relationship than Martin and Johnson. And things won’t improve when Varadkar takes the hot seat later this year.

Unionists will also come to rue the end of Micheál Martin’s tenure in Merrion Street. He understands unionism in a way which Varadkar does not.

It’s actually pitiful to watch the British prime minister desperately search for cover beneath the coat-tails of an actual political hero, the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Transparency International estimated that nearly £7 billion of questionable funds has been invested in the UK since 2016. London was at the epicentre of dubious financial activities involving Russian oligarchs and kleptocrats.

Johnson and the Tory government were slow to act against Russian aggression and the imperialist expansionism of the tyrant Putin and his wealthy friends. And yet he now appears to seek some kind of political salvation from the misery of the war in Ukraine by going all Churchillian.

Just as Johnson views the plight of Ukraine as an political opportunity to save his career, he sees similar merit in a tough stance against the EU. Unfortunately it’s all about him and everything and everyone else is just collateral damage.

Liz Truss lecturing anyone on their obligations to internationally binding agreements is nauseating given her proposals on the NI Protocol and the implications for the Withdrawal Agreement. Brexit threatened the Good Friday Agreement and no Tory cared whether the public of Northern Ireland gave their consent or not.

Apart from trusting a mendacious government, the DUP is also gambling that Sinn Féin now want the symbolism and optics of Michelle O’Neill leading at Stormont, ahead of any election in the Republic of Ireland.

Power before principle has a certain allure in the graft of politics, even if it possibly means the end of the NI Protocol and its economic benefits. As they say, all things are possible in politics.

The so-called safety valve of having local ministers continue until a new executive is created has evolved into a legislative and political nightmare. Ministers are no more than caretakers - announcing things which were already in process before the recent elections. That’s not stopping some ministers and their parties taking credit for pre-agreed spending.

Ministers can visit schools, meet dignitaries, lay foundation stones and cut ribbons. And of course, they can do symbolic things like lay wreaths.

Michelle O’Neill is the former deputy first minister who is now first minister in waiting. So she is stuck playing second fiddle to a lead violinist who has lost his bow.

To paraphrase Shakespeare: “If this music be the food of politics - turn it off!”