The Brussels establishment should tone down the rhetoric and concentrate on what works in Europe
“When in Rome, do as the Romans do” is a well-used counsel to observe the local tradition or to defer to those with practical experience. This week, it has taken on a slightly different meaning. It is a counsel against heavy-handed foreign intervention in the political affairs of the Italians. Guenther Oettinger, the EU’s Commissioner […]
Boris Johnson has been weakened by his privately recorded indiscretions
In the age of mobile phones which can so quickly be turned into covert recorders, the very idea of Chatham House rules ( the convention that a speaker at an event may not be quoted for what is intended to be off-the-record discourse) is somewhat suspect at best and extremely dangerous at worst. So Boris […]
People these days often have only a dim and fading appreciation of the circumstances that brought us to this moment
The outcome of Friday’s referendum marks, I hope, the beginning of the end of a particularly fraught period in Irish politics and law. If the Eighth amendment had never been made in 1983, the complexity of all the issues surrounding the circumstances in which a pregnancy may be ended would most likely have been reflected […]
There is no appetite in Ireland for us to revert to a UK satellite
The White House is becoming for all practical purposes the Washington bureau of the Netanyahu regime when it comes to Israeli and Middle-Eastern affairs. Trump, Pompeio and Bolton are a hawkish triumvirate pursuing the most uncritical Zionist agenda that the US has ever pursued. The crude choreography in which Netanyahu attempted to tell us that […]
The British and the Irish should be friends and act like friends – that’s what the Good Friday agreement was all about
Is there just a little cause for optimism arising from the passing of a non-binding vote in the House of Commons suggesting that the UK should remain in a type of customs union relationship with the EU after Brexit? I think so. It follows an amendment to the Brexit Bill in the House of Lords […]
Theresa May’s Brexit juggling act is beginning to look very shaky
This week saw some important signs that Ireland’s future relationships with Britain and the EU are going to be very tricky. Leaked reports of the flat out rejection by EU negotiators of the British suggestions for a trading relationship that would allow free trade between the UK and the EU while at the same time […]