In public and in private, people have gone with the local tide or actually made decisions to change their behaviour.

I’m writing this on the day the hairdressers re-opened.

It is both reasonable and understandable that the Stormont Executive is trying to facilitate a Christmas that will allow families to meet and businesses to trade at the end of what has been a hugely difficult year.

The latest developments in the Brexit saga which now means that the Northern Ireland Protocol will be implemented just after January 1 given the climb down by Boris Johnson and his government from the contentious clauses of the Internal Market Bill underscores that the light of democracy must be allowed to shine.  

In recent times two dimensions of the debate on Ireland’s future were on display: one on the streets of Belfast and the other on social media.

Four years ago to the week, I wrote in this newspaper: “There is no position on Brexit that is good for Northern Ireland and it matters little whether it is soft or hard”.

The days back in 2017when Britain sent out its then international trade secretary Liam Fox to declare that the process of reaching a post Brexit EU/UK deal should be `one of the easiest in human history' are long gone.

Towards the end of October Health Minister Robin Swann stated that he had received additional funding to provide free parking for healthcare workers

SECTARIANISM here received a boost this week when two developments elevated it from the grubby politics of Stormont to the more sophisticated, but equally grubby, level of international affairs.

IT is a year to the day since the fateful general election which saw Boris Johnson and the Conservative Party secure a remarkable landslide victory, propelled to an 80-seat majority by the promise that he could 'get Brexit done'.

NORTHERN Ireland has been given a sea border arrangement better than almost anyone could have hoped.

HAVING forgotten about the bridge to Scotland, at least until he wants to troll Sammy Wilson again, Boris Johnson's latest transport-related Big Idea is to ban the sale of new petrol and diesel cars by 2030.

''Until then I had not realised how much Northern Ireland is a place apart.

THE relaxation in coronavirus restrictions from today will be widely welcomed, but must be tempered by extreme vigilance to prevent an already dire situation becoming even worse.

Yet again the British government covers itself in shame and utter disgrace as the rest of the modern world looks on.

EU officials will want to inspect your luggage when you arrive in Northern Ireland from Britain, according to reports this week.

As we approach the end of 2020, a year where the days seemed long but the months flew by, politics here seems to have reverted back to pre-pandemic level bickering.

The political impact of the sea border will depend heavily on how noticeable it is in everyday life.

This time last year, we were in the middle of a winter of discontent in our health service, with nurses taking unprecedented strike action.

As Covid-19 related deaths continue to surge throughout Northern Ireland every one of us should be asking what is going wrong?