Northern Ireland

On this twenty-fifth anniversary of the Argentine invasion of the Falkland Islands (at Margaret Thatcher's invitation, and which was only defeated because the Royal Navy staged a sort of coup against her for the duration of hostilities), the words of Enoch Powell at that time are as relevant as they were then: why are those rightly so keen to defend British Dependent Territory thousands of miles away also so keen to sign away an integral part of the United Kingdom?

Furthermore, the form of government now to operate in Northern Ireland presupposes no Opposition, and thus no meaningful way of changing the government at the ballot box. The UUP, the SDLP and the Alliance Party should have no part in this, and should instead refuse office in a coalition designed to carve up vast sums of British public money, including as funnelled through the EU, between those in favour with the grandees of the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster and those in favour with the Provisional Army Council of the IRA.

Come the next elections, the people of Northern Ireland will need, want and deserve to be able to vote for organised, credible, consistent opponents of this state of affairs. Of course, those candidates ought to be drawn from the parties that ought by then to have replaced Labour, the Tories and the Liberal Democrats. But that will only happen if we, at the grassroots of all parts of the United Kingdom, do our duty and create such parties. I'm doing my bit. Are you?