The Good Old D.U.P.

+Extinction Rebellion will fail –as have previous climate change campaigns—if it doesn’t understand the public. In other words, it has to engage the public, not intimidate or seek to wrongfoot people. It has to carry the public with them. Perhaps this is too much of a compromise for some activists, not least the chap who climbed on top of an underground train and then appeared to be beaten up by passengers after he was dragged down.  His behaviour seems all the more extraordinary since it was targeted at public transport, which must feature centrally in any future solution to the problem of climate change. Given that the London underground is electrified it could more easily than most systems become carbon emissions free. So I award the ER activist no points out of ten for thinking it through.
 
+As a GMB member (retirees section) I have received ballot papers for an election of general secretary. This election has been a little controversial, given that one of the two candidates was originally deemed insufficiently qualified by the union’s executive committee. The other candidate, Tim Roache is the current general secretary, so allegations of a stitch-up even made it into the Financial Times. His challenger, Kathleen Walker-Shaw won an appeal against her disbarment. I hadn’t really expected to hear much more about her since she stood disastrously as Labour’s candidate in the 1998 North East Scotland European Parliament by-election. In the final week of that campaign it was revealed in the national press that her claim to have been born in Scotland was false—she was actually born in Stafford. The last few days of the campaign had the feel of trying to bake soufflé in the semi-submerged kitchen of the Titanic. I simply don’t understand how anyone could hope to get away with telling such an obvious porkie about their birthplace. It was reported that she later claimed she was conceived in Aberdeen. I somehow doubt she spoke to her parents about that, until maybe it was too late. Which is to say, I will be voting for Tim Roache. The mere fact that Walker-Shaw is a woman may be enough reason for some to support her and no doubt there will be grumbles about yet another woman falling prey to misogyny if she is not elected. 
 
+It seems odd for a Remoaner like myself to express gratitude to the DUP, but today, as parliamentary turmoil (aka democracy) once again dominates our existence it seems that Northern Ireland’s Nooo Suurrrendurrr!! Group have thrown us a lifeline, or at least a glimmer of hope that the whole Brexit nonsense could be derailed. It seems they haven’t even been swayed by the argument that the Johnson deal is less toxic than the possibility of a Corbyn government. Now really is the time for Sinn Fein MPs to get involved, instead of sitting isolated in their magnificent mansion of ideological purity.