Displaying items by tag: Northern Ireland

Friday, 20 May 2022 00:04

NI protocol and Brexit changes

Ireland’s foreign minister, Simon Coveney, has warned Boris Johnson against any move to change the Northern Ireland protocol. He said, ‘What we can’t do is accept that the British government would act unilaterally, they would pass legislation to effectively breach international law, to set aside elements of a treaty that this prime minister designed and put in place. That would cause more problems than it would solve.’  Foreign minister Liz Truss, announcing a new law to change the post-Brexit trade deal for Northern Ireland, insisted it would be legal under international law. She said the proposed legislation would make changes to the deal - rather than scrapping it - to resolve ‘the grave situation in Northern Ireland’. But in response, the EU said it would ‘need to respond with all measures at its disposal’ if the UK went ahead with the legislation. Pray that all decisions will be according to God’s plans.

Published in British Isles

The attorney general has been advised that it would be lawful to override parts of the Northern Ireland Protocol, the post-Brexit arrangement which requires some checks on goods between Britain and NI. This angers both Unionists and the EU. There has been no power-sharing executive for several months after the DUP withdrew in protest against the protocol. In the recent election Sinn Féin, whose goal is for NI to become one country with the Republic of Ireland, won the most seats and needs to form a government. It cannot take up the office unless the DUP nominates a deputy first minister. The DUP's leader said his party would respect the election result, but changes needed to be made to the protocol. Boris Johnson has said the most important treaty is the Good Friday Agreement, which established a cross-community power-sharing government to end decades of violence. 

Published in British Isles

A County Antrim GP practice will only be able to open a branch clinic two half days a week because of a Department of Health (DoH) funding cut. The practice can no longer cover the costs of a full-time service which opened in 2017 to take 1,400 new patients. DoH said additional payments between 2017 and 2021 were temporary, ‘to support the practice for a period of three years to enable them to manage the registration and complete an initial clinical review of these additional patients.’ Dr John McSparran, from the practice, disagrees vehemently. ‘We were never under the impression it was for three years, otherwise we would never have entered the agreement in the first place. We've tried to address this, continuing the service at our own cost. But financially the practice is unviable and can no longer cover the costs of a full-time service.’

Published in British Isles
Thursday, 17 March 2022 21:43

Northern Ireland poverty

A Joseph Rowntree Foundation report published on 16 March tells us that as Northern Ireland entered the pandemic, nearly one in five people lived in poverty, including over 100,000 children. 1 in 14 households are in food insecurity, and the recent spike in energy prices, and wider inflation. People in workless families, disabled people, carers, and people in ethnic minority households have much higher poverty rates. So people across Northern Ireland need the new Executive to focus on whether to reverse or partly mitigate the impact of the £20 per week cut to the basic rates of Universal Credit. It could also match benefit up-rating more effectively to the cost of living. A targeted payment, such as the Scottish child payment, would reduce child poverty. The Executive could also consider the role that DLA/PIP can have in helping disabled people into the labour market, including considering how the administration of payments could be redesigned with dignity and poverty reduction at their heart.

Published in British Isles
Thursday, 13 January 2022 21:03

Christian bakers win at European court

Attempts to overturn the Supreme Court ruling in a case against a Belfast bakery have been rejected. Seven years ago, Christian-led Ashers Baking Company refused to write ‘support gay marriage’ on a cake. Gareth Lee sued Ashers, then lost his case at the UK Supreme Court. He took the matter to the European Court of Human Rights, arguing that the UK had failed to protect his human rights. Before the Supreme Court ruling, a Belfast county court and an appeal court had both ruled that the bakery had discriminated against Lee on the grounds of sexual orientation.

Published in Praise Reports
Thursday, 06 January 2022 21:36

Gambling education programme

Lewis Keogh’s suicide note revealed a secret gambling addiction that he could no longer cope with. After his death his parents wanted to do something to prevent other such tragedies. They and other bereaved families designed a ‘Gambling With Lives’ teaching programme, telling 15- and 16-year-olds the risks of compulsive gambling. The programme pilots in 15 Northern Ireland schools and then across the UK. Its hard-hitting film tells the story of a teenager who starts gambling on arcade machines - as Lewis did. The film shows him becoming addicted and trying to cover up what is happening to him as his mental health worsens. Gambling With Lives is campaigning for tighter laws on gambling advertising, particularly in relation to televised sports events. An estimated 340,000 adults are ‘problem gamblers’, and 55,000 people aged 11-16 have a harmful gambling habit. Gambling compromises, disrupts, and damages family, personal and recreational pursuits.

Published in British Isles

Former first minister Arlene Foster has spoken out against those who say that religion and politics should never mix. When speaking at the St Patrick Centre to a live audience, she discussed her own faith as well as her political career. Expressing her frustration she said, ‘Christianity doesn’t call you to be neutral. It calls you to be salt and light about what you believe in. It does annoy me when people say you have to take religion out of politics and leave it at the door, or like it only happens at the weekend. It is part of who you are. Your Christianity and your faith is something that is with you all the time. You can’t just leave it at home on Sunday night and go out without it on Monday.’

Published in British Isles
Thursday, 04 November 2021 22:13

Northern Ireland: DUP leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson

After Arlene Foster stood down from the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), her replacement only lasted three weeks. Then Sir Jeffrey Donaldson took over the leadership at a significant moment for NI, as it has come to terms with the effects of Covid and battled the repercussions of Brexit. There have been significant changes on things like abortion and same sex marriage. Although the Church spoke out against changing legislation, Donaldson is concerned over the diminishing church voice. He said that church leaders now find it difficult to speak out in public to give a faith-based perspective on social issues and are not being salt and light in our society. He also believes prayer is the most important thing that the church has available to it: ‘I often encourage Christians to intercede and to give prayerful support to those of us who are involved as Christians in the political process’. 

Published in British Isles
Thursday, 28 October 2021 21:52

Northern Ireland hostage over 'fish wars'

France is threatening to block any UK-EU deal over the Northern Ireland Protocol unless the row over post-Brexit fishing licences is resolved in Paris’s favour. With presidential elections next year, he cannot afford to sell out his fishermen, as many hail from a stronghold of his rival Marine Le Pen. Macron has trodden this path before. In 2019, he blocked extending Brexit negotiations, risking a no deal to Theresa May’s withdrawal agreement. In 2020 he threatened to veto any Brexit trade deal that did not satisfy French fishermen, ratcheting up pressure on London. Judging by the negative reactions of the British fishing industry to the trade deal, the tactic worked. Now he is threatening extremely delicate negotiations over the NI Protocol. There is a greater risk now of the UK triggering Article 16 of the protocol than any time before. France also threatened to block the UK from joining the EU’s research programme. See

Published in British Isles
Thursday, 21 October 2021 20:42

USA / UK: ‘Build Back Better’

Joe Biden’s Build Back Better plan has a $3.5tn price tag that could transform millions of Americans’ lives. The bipartisan senate infrastructure bill proposes $66bn of new spending on passenger and freight rail projects over the next decade as the Democrats undertake the most ambitious and transformative domestic policy agendas since the New Deal of the 1930s. It also focuses on a long list of social policies and programmes ranging from education to healthcare to housing to climate. With Republicans unified in opposition, Democrats are using a special budgetary process known as ‘reconciliation’ to avoid the 60-vote filibuster threshold and pass the bill on a party-line vote. Boris Johnson’s Build Back Better plans to support economic growth through significant investment in infrastructure, skills and innovation, and will tackle the NHS backlog while capping social care costs for adults. Another aspect was for a Build Back Coronavirus recovery plan: see

Published in Worldwide