Ira

Thursday

Charles Moore

Was I abused by Jimmy Savile?

‘Twenty-six million people in Europe are looking for work. And whose jobs are they after?’ asks the Ukip poster for the euro-elections, beside a Lord Kitchener-style pointing finger. Obviously, Ukip thinks the answer is ‘Ours’. But this isn’t true. Twenty-six million people are not looking for British jobs, but for jobs in general. And even those who do want jobs in Britain are not trying to take jobs from people who have them (though this might sometimes be the effect): they just want jobs. If Ukip is opposed to unrestricted EU immigration, it should direct its anger at the politicians who support this policy, not at the blameless people who,

Tuesday

Douglas Murray

Truth, lies and Martin McGuinness

Melanie McDonagh wrote a piece on Friday objecting to ‘those pundits who find Mr McGuinness’s presence anywhere intolerable.’ As one such pundit I would like to exercise a right of reply. Not to pick a fight with Melanie – who was very nice about my book on ‘Bloody Sunday’ and whose judgement for that reason, among others, I would not therefore like to call into question. And not because I disagree with the blame that Melanie rightly says should be laid at the door of the Conservative Party. But to add to this last point and come back on another. Because Melanie says in her piece: ‘…unless anyone has got any actual

Thursday

Melanie McDonagh

If the sight of Martin McGuinness at state occasions repulses you, blame the Tory Party

Well, those who get themselves worked up about the presence of Martin McGuinness around the Royal Family would not have enjoyed last night’s musical extravaganza, Ceiliuradh, for the Irish president at the Albert Hall. They’d have been on their own, mind you. Everyone else had a ball; it was a packed house for Elvis Costello plus Fiona Shaw and Dermot O’Leary, but the knockout element was the combined band of the Irish Guards and the Irish Defence Force doing the Minstrel Boy, which made me cry. That was a nice touch: Tom Moore, its author, was lionised in London as much as in Ireland. And there in the Royal Box,

Charles Moore Charles Moore

After the Brighton bomb

It is worth pointing out yet again that Mrs Thatcher really was very brave last Friday. It would have been no disgrace to her if, once she had realised how narrow had been her escape, she had felt weak and — as did a few of the Tory wives in the Grand Hotel — had sat down and cried. There would have been nothing cowardly in cancelling what remained of the Conference in honour of the dead and injured. But the fact that she did neither of these things and the way that she conducted herself that day confirms that she has an extraordinary amount of that particular kind of

Thursday

Molly Guinness

The Irish Question, as recorded by The Spectator

As the Irish president is making the first visit to the United Kingdom by an Irish head of state, some people have asked what’s taken him so long. The Spectator’s archive offers some insights into the two countries’ rocky relationship. The British government has often been criticised for not doing more to mitigate the effects of the Irish potato blight in the 1840s. The Spectator agreed the government could have done more, but also voiced suspicions about one of Ireland’s national champions, Daniel O’Connell. He’s known as The Liberator in Ireland and was one of the early campaigners for the repeal of the Act of Union. In 1846, this magazine

Wednesday

Douglas Murray

Martin McGuinness at Windsor Castle. What an odious sight

I know that the official line is delight at the ‘progress’ allegedly represented by the presence of Martin McGuinness, in white tie and tails, standing to toast the Queen’s health at a banquet in Windsor Castle. But what an odious sight. Firstly because the idea that this constitutes some important step is all post-hoc prevarication. The steps that Martin McGuinness has taken in the last ten years were all open to him forty years ago. But he chose to turn them down then and pursue the IRA’s path of violence and murder. Pursuing that path should have caused him the worst imaginable problems; instead it has brought him only rewards. You

Friday

Charles Moore

Why are links with violence-justifying Republicans something to be proud of?

Last week, John Downey, the former IRA man, avoided trial for the Hyde Park bombings of 1982. One who stood bail for him was Roy Greenslade, the media pundit of the Guardian. Since Mr Downey has not been proved guilty, we must presume him innocent, but isn’t it extraordinary that Greenslade can cosy up to such a man without suffering in reputation? Suppose I were to stand bail for, say, Nick Griffin of the BNP (who, so far as I know, has never been accused of a terrorist crime), or for some loyalist oaf. I would rightly be shunned in my trade. Yet a link with extreme, violence-justifying, anti-British republicans

Wednesday

Rod Liddle

The police’s blunder over John Downey is one thing, the government’s cravenness another

So, the IRA terror suspect, John Downey, will now not face a trial for his alleged involvement in the Hyde Park and Regent’s Park bombings of 1982, in which eleven soldiers (as well as seven horses) were murdered by nail bombs. The former Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain seems to be delighted about this and expressed his astonishment that Downey had been arrested in the first place. Downey mistakenly received a so-called ‘comfort letter’ as part of the Good Friday Agreement, informing him that he was now effectively immune from prosecution. For what it’s worth, Downey denies the charges. It wasn’t a very good Friday, was it? I suppose we

Thursday

The Spectator

Letters | 20 June 2013

Being good without God Sir: It is a rash person who tangles with the Chief Rabbi, but his piece on ‘Atheism and barbarism’ (15 June) shocked me. After championing until his last paragraph the old lie that religious belief is a necessary foundation for morality, he suddenly says he doesn’t believe ‘that you have to be religious to be moral’, which effectively contradicts his whole thesis. But there are several derailments before that. He questions the ability of society ‘to survive without the rituals, narratives and shared practices that create and sustain the social bond’. Rituals and practices, OK, so long as they don’t entail any indefensible beliefs, but narratives

Thursday

Geoffrey Wheatcroft

Geoffrey Wheatcroft’s diary: Peter King, terror hypocrite, and the joys of Longhorns

As we landed at Houston, I suddenly thought of my first visit to America, in 1965 during what we didn’t then call my gap year. Forty-eight years does seem a long time, but my fascination with this country is undimmed. The occasion of this trip was to talk at the British Studies seminar at the University of Texas, which has become a regular gig over the years, and Austin is now a nest of old friends. This time I made a new pal. Holly McCarthy is a graduate student, who became my cicerone, offering to take me across Austin on the back of her motor-scooter. After a deep breath, I

Thursday

Peter Oborne

Will Boston still fund the Real IRA?

One of the first world statesmen to send a message of sympathy to Boston after last week’s outrage was Gerry Adams, president of Sinn Fein. ‘Just watching news of the explosion in Boston,’ he tweeted, ‘Sympathy with people of that fine city.’ Mr Adams has every reason to think fondly of Boston. Throughout the troubles, while he sat on the IRA war council, Boston was one of the major American centres which he (through Noraid) could rely on for support and funding. Bostonian money would have been used to help pay for the IRA attack on Margaret Thatcher’s democratically elected government in Brighton, the grotesque Birmingham pub bombings that left

Peter Oborne

The Boston bombings should make ‘Real IRA’ supporters in the US stop and think

One of the first world statesmen to send a message of sympathy to Boston after last week’s outrage was Gerry Adams, president of Sinn Fein. ‘Just watching news of the explosion in Boston,’ he tweeted, ‘Sympathy with people of that fine city.’ Mr Adams has every reason to think fondly of Boston. Throughout the troubles, while he sat on the IRA war council, Boston was one of the major American centres which he (through Noraid) could rely on for support and funding. Bostonian money would have been used to help pay for the IRA attack on Margaret Thatcher’s democratically elected government in Brighton, the grotesque Birmingham pub bombings that left

Wednesday

Douglas Murray

The forgotten victims of the Troubles

This post, marking the 40th anniversary of the Aldershot bombing, was published earlier on the Biteback website. But as its author, Douglas Murray, is a regular here on Coffee House, and as its subject matter is so important, we thought we’d re-post it here: The 30th January this year was the 40th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, the day when members of the British Parachute regiment shot dead fourteen civilians on the streets of a British city. The constant commemoration of that day by families of the dead and injured was one of the things that kept its memory alive and eventually led to the British government setting up the Saville

Tuesday

Alex Massie

Martin McGuinness Asks Ireland to Forget History

Martin McGuinness’s campaign for the Irish Presidency is, of course, a disgusting affair. How could it ever be otherwise? But even by Sinn Fein’s grim standards, it’s off to a loathsome, disingenuous beginning. Speaking on Irish radio this morning, McGuinness complained that a coterie of “West Brits” in the Dublin media are out to get him. Only someone whose loyalty to the Republic might be questioned by the more rancid brand of nationalist, you see, would be vulgar enough to bring up McGuinness’s murderious past. Indeed, it’s just “people who are hostile to my candidacy” who have the gall to mention McGuinness’s IRA past. This is strange since, as Fintan

Tuesday

Alex Massie

Peter King Comes to Westminster

From the Department of Irony Overload: Congressman Peter King says he admires the United Kingdom’s counter-terrorism efforts: King also praised the United Kingdom’s government for its work on stemming Muslim radicalization, noting that its “Prevent” strategy “offers a candid assessment of the problem and a model for effectively addressing and countering this problem.” The Prevent strategy is one part of the UK’s Home Office counterterrorism program, and focuses on preventative measures to stop people becoming terrorists or supporting terrorism. Better late than never, I suppose and even a sinner such as Congressman King may be permitted a moment of repentance and all that. Still, the gall and the irony and

Friday

Jonathan Jones

From the archives: The Good Friday Agreement

On Sunday, it will be thirteen years to the day since the people of Northern Ireland voted in a referendum on the Good Friday Agreement. The result was one of overwhelming support: 71 per cent to 29. Here is Bruce Anderson’s take on the Agreement from his Politics column at the time:   Mr Blair was rough on Mr Ahern (and while Unionists were there), Bruce Anderson, The Spectator, 18 April 1998   Occasionally, one is glad to be wrong. In this column last week, I wrote about the imminent collapse of the Ulster peace process. It seemed then as if everything was unravelling; the gaps between the various sides

Tuesday

Nicholas Mackey

When Dublin trembled

On 17 May 1974 — 37 years ago today — I was a 19-year-old student at Trinity College Dublin, celebrating the end of term in the Pavilion Bar near the sports fields. The summer exams were still to come, but we were carefree; the main subject of conversation was whether we could organise a disco party later on. Then, a little after 5.30 p.m., everything changed. First, all about us seemed to shiver, as if there were an earth tremor. Then, just as it occurred to me that Dublin did not generally suffer tectonic stress, there was a deafening bang that seemed to go on for an age. Somebody shouted:

Saturday

Martyn Frampton

Desperate rearguard

The murder of a police officer in Northern Ireland once again proves that the threat from dissident republican terrorism remains only too real. This latest attack comes against a background of various attempted bombings and hoax alerts that have disrupted life in the province. Back in January, a sophisticated “double-tap” bomb attack on a police patrol in north Belfast was only narrowly averted. Since then a series of incidents have occurred in Derry, Belfast and Fermanagh. Going back further, the last two years (since the triple murder of March 2009) have seen the bombing of banks, courthouses, police stations and even MI5’s regional headquarters in Northern Ireland. Just over fourteen

David Blackburn

BREAKING: Car bomb explodes in Omagh, County Tyrone

Not clear as yet if there have been any casaulties. More to follow. Reports are sketchy, but it seems that the blast took place in a residential road, away from the crowded central shopping areas that were the scene of the bloody atrocity committed 13 years ago.  The bomb was planted underneath the car of a local Catholic PSNI officer .The officer is critically wounded.  This act is very likely to have been perpetrated by extreme Republican dissidents; and it follows a trend of Republican/gang violence against police in the province, a battle for which London and Stormont allocated more than £240 million last month. UPDATE: DUP MP Jeffrey Donaldson reports that the

Tuesday

James Forsyth

Cameron is dignified in trying circumstances

As David says, the conclusions of the Saville Inquiry make for grim reading. One person with close links to the services who served in Northern Ireland just told me, ‘it is far worse than we expected.’ In the House, David Cameron’s statement on it was heard in subdued silence. It would be remiss not to say that David Cameron dealt with this situation as well as anyone could. There was no equivalent to Jonathan Powell’s disgraceful statement that ‘the war against Irish terrorism was not our war’. He pointed out the context of the event and the fact that it was very much the exception rather than the rule of