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1 month ago | 
newsletter.co.uk | Owen Polley
Devolution encourages assembly politicians to blame Westminster whenever they need to make difficult decisions. And Irish nationalists always have an incentive to allege bad treatment by the government and create another grievance to attack our place in the UK. Pic Kelvin Boyes / Press EyeIn the House of Commons, Keir Starmer’s government launched its plans to reform the welfare system last week, after previously pledging to cut bureaucracy in the NHS.
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2 months ago | 
newsletter.co.uk | Owen Polley
President Trump meets with the DUP MLA and Deputy First Minister Emma Little-Pengelly and her DUP colleague, the Communities minister Gordon Lyons, at Capitol Hill, Washington DC, for the St Patrick's Day lunch on Wednesday March 12. Photo by Kelvin Boyes / Press EyeThe headline in many papers, after Donald Trump met Micheal Martin last week, was that the president would do nothing ‘to hurt Ireland’.
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2 months ago | 
thecritic.co.uk | Owen Polley
Kemi Badenoch should be apologising for the Tories’ broken promises on Northern Ireland During the Conservatives’ time in government, the party’s opponents and hostile Irish commentators often claimed that the Tories treated the Republic of Ireland badly. Last week, Keir Starmer repeated this received wisdom at the British-Irish summit in Liverpool. The two countries, he said, had finally “turned a page on those turbulent years,” thanks to Labour coming to power.
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2 months ago | 
capx.co | Owen Polley
13 March 2025 @3000Versts British Prime Minister Keir Starmer welcomes Taoiseach Micheal Martin to the UK-Ireland Summit 2025. Photo: Peter Byrne - WPA Pool/Getty ImagesBritish Prime Minister Keir Starmer welcomes Taoiseach Micheal Martin to the UK-Ireland Summit 2025.
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2 months ago | 
newsletter.co.uk | Owen Polley
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch addressing the Northern Ireland Tory conference in Belfast. She left them in a conundrumThe leader of the opposition, Kemi Badenoch, told the News Letter last week that her party would not try to ‘unpick’ the Windsor Framework. Thank you for signing up!Did you know with a Digital Subscription to Belfast News Letter, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more.
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2 months ago | 
capx.co | Owen Polley
28 February 2025 @3000Versts Photo: Carl Court - Pool/Getty Images Photo: Carl Court - Pool/Getty Images This St Patrick's Day will not be the usual American-Irish love-in Ireland's woke posturing and anti-Zionism will not play well with Trump and Vance Long gone are the days of US presidents revelling in Irish kitsch Since the ‘peace process’ of the 1990s, the St Patrick’s Day event at the White House has become a much-anticipated junket for politicians north and south of the Irish border....
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2 months ago | 
newsletter.co.uk | Owen Polley
Donald Trump’s election has shaken up the West’s political order. Political trends eventually reach Northern Ireland, Pic: Ben Curtis/APIn the wake of Donald Trump’s election in the US, pundits have speculated that politics across the world are changing for good. Thank you for signing up!Did you know with a Digital Subscription to Belfast News Letter, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more.
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Feb 9, 2025 | 
newsletter.co.uk | Owen Polley
Keir Starmer had the gall to lecture unionists on the threat of a trade border with the Republic of Ireland. Meanwhile, unionists joined with nationalists against Benn’s justified remarks on funding rather than focusing on the Irish Sea borderLast year, the North Antrim MP, Jim Allister, introduced a Private Member’s Bill to the House of Commons, which attempted to replace the Irish Sea border with a system of ‘mutual enforcement’.
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Feb 7, 2025 | 
thinkscotland.org | Owen Polley |Brian Monteith |Stuart Crawford |Christine Padgham
ONE YEAR AGO this week, the Stormont Assembly was restored, after the DUP struck its Safeguarding the Union deal with Rishi Sunak’s government. The unionist party had boycotted power-sharing for two years, due to its opposition to the Irish Sea border. And during that period, its critics argued it prevented all sorts of progress by the executive and made Northern Ireland’s problems worse.
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Feb 7, 2025 | 
thinkscotland.org | Stuart Crawford |Brian Monteith |Owen Polley |Christine Padgham
I HAPPENED to be travelling along Edinburgh’s City Bypass last Saturday on my way to Glasgow at the same time as the farmer’s protest against Starmer’s inheritance tax (IHT) had taken to the busy route. Since 1984, agricultural property relief has allowed land used for crops or rearing animals – as well as farm buildings, cottages and houses – to be exempt from inheritance tax. But the UK government has now announced that a 20% rate, will apply ver a £1m threshold from April 2026.
