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Newton Emerson

Newton Emerson

The Irish News

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British and Irish governments cynically weaponising border in immigration row

The reckless cynicism of the British and Irish governments over the past week can be of no comfort to anyone in Northern Ireland. To distract from its...

previous day 8

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Why does suggesting the better-off pay more make me sound like I have two heads?

“Northern Ireland is divided in many different ways. It has been described as a 25/25/50 society with 25% of households living in hardship, 25% in...

02.05.2024 20

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Rwanda immigration law may turn out to be another Brexit

In their haste to claim the UK’s Rwanda immigration law is having an effect, the Irish and British governments are both glossing over the question...

30.04.2024 30

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

Newton Emerson: Buck stops with Beattie over UUP election mess

The hapless UUP is making a mess of what should be its most promising election in years. It has a solid chance of taking South Antrim from the DUP in...

27.04.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

New health service area planning boards are a mistake which councils and councillors will use to obstruct much-needed change

If Translink was being abolished so Stormont could take direct control of public transport, it is likely you would be aware of it. If it was happening...

26.04.2024 20

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Battle lines are being drawn in the North over sex education and hate crimes

Open culture war has broken out between the DUP and Alliance. An Alliance motion in the Assembly on Monday called on the DUP to implement a compulsory...

25.04.2024 30

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

Smuggling is the burning issue for any tobacco ban

The greatest concern with any restriction on tobacco sales in Northern Ireland is the smuggling opportunity for organised crime and paramilitary...

20.04.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Businesses are paying the price of keeping household rates down

The Number 7 cafe in Craigavon’s Rushmere Centre – an institution in the town – has made headlines by publicising its £71,000 rates bill for...

18.04.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Simon Harris was right. Many southerners know London or Paris better than Belfast

Simon Harris must be taken aback by the reaction to his comment that he is “of a generation where people are more familiar now with London and...

18.04.2024 8

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

Will funding for water just put up house prices?

Underinvestment in the water system has prevented 19,000 houses being built and Stormont must take action, the Construction Employers Federation has...

14.04.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Why are Stormont’s parties scared of sorting out the water system?

There is an ominous parallel between the decline of our water system and our health service. In both cases, Stormont knows action is required but has...

11.04.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Debate about banning overseas buyers of residential property is overdue

Ireland is overdue a debate on banning overseas buyers of residential property. This is very much a live debate elsewhere - EU countries are even...

11.04.2024 8

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

Have political ramifications of Donaldson resignation been overstated?

As shock subsides over Sir Jeffrey Donaldson’s resignation, it seems the political ramifications may have been over-stated. The DUP is determined to...

07.04.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

The DUP is a party badly in need of changing the subject

The DUP’s best route out of the crisis it now finds itself in is to focus on delivering a small number of concrete policies that improve everyday...

04.04.2024 30

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Unionist parties are not about to merge – it’s hard enough holding them together individually

Any crisis within unionism provokes talk of “unionist realignment”, and the resignation of Jeffrey Donaldson as DUP leader has been no exception....

03.04.2024 10

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

If Sinn Féin likes citizens’ assemblies so much, what’s stopping Stormont having one?

“Have the referendums killed citizens’ assemblies?” the Irish Times has asked, as have many others in the Republic following this month’s...

31.03.2024 8

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Is there anything to be said for another east-west talking shop?

In 1987 the Rainbow Alliance, a group linked to the Monster Raving Looney Party, proposed a devolved federation of Wales, Ireland, Scotland and...

28.03.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Northern nationalism regards itself as left-wing, but on most issues its views are centre-right

The Republic’s small but sudden turn to the right was bound to have implications for Northern Ireland, even before Sinn Féin decided to get in...

28.03.2024 10

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

Stormont needs to get serious about segregation if it wants US investment

Irish-American congressmen Richard Neal and Brendan Boyle have made headlines by saying talks should be held on preparing for a border poll. However,...

23.03.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Simon Harris has made his position on united Ireland clear

Simon Harris, Ireland’s minister for science and further education, appears to be heading for a coronation following the shock resignation of Leo...

23.03.2024 20

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

DUP’s best option is to say the Stormont brake has been tested and then move swiftly on

The DUP has almost no hope of blocking new EU single market legislation in Northern Ireland so why did it apparently try in Stormont on Tuesday?...

21.03.2024 9

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

DUP’s best option is to say the Stormont brake has been tested and then move swiftly on

The DUP has almost no hope of blocking new EU single market legislation in Northern Ireland so why did it apparently try in Stormont on Tuesday?...

21.03.2024 8

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

DUP’s awkward squad have accepted the world has moved on

The DUP’s Windsor Framework split is healing, leaving only some rather comically wounded pride, as the party’s Westminster awkward squad accepts...

16.03.2024 30

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Can Stormont pass the test of planning for fewer public workers?

John O’Dowd has offered some excellent reasons to keep Northern Ireland’s network of state-run MOT centres. As the Sinn Féin infrastructure...

14.03.2024 30

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

In both the UK and Ireland, even the left is starting to turn right

Last week’s referendums show Ireland and the UK have something in common: a gap in the market for mainstream conservative politics – mainstream,...

14.03.2024 10

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

Could the sliotar sisters actually have a good working relationship?

The first and deputy first ministers have denied they are engaging in “gesture politics” for the sake of it. Speaking during a visit to St...

09.03.2024 30

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

London clearly responsible for plugging Casement funding gap

The comparison increasingly made between Casement Park and the new Dundonald Ice Bowl is daft whataboutery even by Northern Ireland’s lamentable...

07.03.2024 70

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

What’s Micheál Martin’s long game: a stronger North or a United Ireland?

Micheál Martin addressed the Alliance Party conference in Belfast last Friday. It was an official engagement: he was billed as the Tánaiste and the...

07.03.2024 10

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

DUP sourness and Sinn Féin sweetness over Shared Island cash

The DUP has been rather sour about the Irish government’s €800 million Shared Island initiative funding. Leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson welcomed...

26.02.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

North’s underfunding myth merely a distraction from Stormont’s failures

We may be witnessing the birth of a new Northern Ireland myth, false but as fondly believed as ‘Rathcoole is the largest housing estate in Europe’...

22.02.2024 30

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Upgrading the A5 and A8 is not only about safety - this is constitutional politics in concrete form

Leo Varadkar is getting only two cheers in Northern Ireland for the €600 million the Government has announced to upgrade the A5 road through...

22.02.2024 10

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

London seeking proof that Stormont can make tough decisions

The government wants revenue-raising from Stormont not because the Treasury desperately needs £113 million – it is about to give Stormont £3.3...

17.02.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

If water charges are a no-go, borrowing is the only way

Sinn Féin and the DUP agreed to govern together at St Andrews in part to avoid being blamed for domestic water charges, so it is no surprise they...

15.02.2024 20

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

The best thing Varadkar could do for Stormont is to lay off Sinn Féin

Balancing Stormont’s budget is not just about money. It is being seen as a test of the new Executive’s ability to make difficult decisions. The...

15.02.2024 20

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

Nothing unites Stormont parties like asking for more money

Whatever else may divide them, all four executive parties have been immediately able to issue a joint statement asking London for more money. As well...

10.02.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Sinn Féin’s day as the party of cost-cutting may have come

It is obviously a bad sign for the new executive that the DUP pulled a last-minute switch in its choice of departments, taking education instead of...

08.02.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Nationalism would have let the DUP baby have its bottle, except the SDLP threw the toys out

The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) is fortunate nationalism is not laughing openly at the party’s deal with the British government. It is not just...

08.02.2024 10

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

Welcome to the real ‘joint authority’, where the EU graciously permits more trade within the UK

The most significant aspect of the DUP-Conservative deal is that the European Commission has gone along with it. There is little new or substantial in...

03.02.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

The price of opening a back door into university

Queen’s University Belfast has found itself at the bottom of an embarrassing league table. The Sunday Times has discovered it is one of 15 elite...

01.02.2024 7

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Stormont now has no plausible excuse for failure. That doesn’t mean failure is impossible

Naomi Long is hardly alone in fearing Stormont will return only to collapse again. “Given the fragility of relationships, not just between the...

01.02.2024 9

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

Donaldson finally confronts unionism’s ‘100 percenters’

Sir Jeffrey Donaldson has finally confronted unionism’s Brexit “100 percenters”, as former US senator George Mitchell witheringly described them...

27.01.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Why is the DUP ignoring Labour’s Brexit escape route?

Hilary Benn sent an unsubtle message to the DUP in the Commons last week. Labour’s shadow Northern Ireland secretary said his party supports...

25.01.2024 8

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Is ‘British-only’ direct rule really direct rule if it needs consent from Ireland?

For much of the past week, it looked as if a new interim method of governing Northern Ireland was about to be unveiled. Chris Heaton-Harris, the...

25.01.2024 30

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

Would a Windsorsceptic return to Stormont really be unbearable for the DUP?

What has been most pathetic about Jeffrey Donaldson’s dithering over a Stormont deal is how little unionist dissent he is likely to face. Sammy...

20.01.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

If Stormont does not return imminently, direct rule is needed while talking begins on what comes next

Does indirect rule still have any rules? Speaking outside Hillsborough Castle on Monday, Secretary of State Chris Heaton-Harris said he could not...

18.01.2024 5

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Northern Ireland’s public sector strike may have been doomed before it began

It will be hard to gauge the reaction to Thursday’s huge public sector strike in Northern Ireland, and not just because many people will be kept...

18.01.2024 7

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

You get what you vote for - eventually

Emergency general surgery at Newry’s Daisy Hill Hospital was moved to Craigavon two years ago due to staff shortages. The Southern Health Trust said...

13.01.2024 10

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Belfast City Council carve-up shows Sinn Féin and DUP can work together far too well

Sinn Féin’s explanation for the latest funding carve-up at Belfast City Council is that “not all applicants can be successful”. This statement...

11.01.2024 7

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

Gerry Kelly’s mix of righteousness and victimhood fits the cry-bully culture of Sinn Féin

Sinn Féin’s legal actions against the media are not a “co-ordinated campaign”, TD Pearse Doherty has told Newstalk, while discussing a libel...

11.01.2024 7

The Irish Times

Newton Emerson

Can dual-market Donaldson square Sammy’s circle?

In a new year message to DUP members, leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson says his aim this year is “safeguarding our place in the UK internal market both...

06.01.2024 9

The Irish News

Newton Emerson

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