Today the Tory party are reeling. In Clacton, their former MP has run as a UKIP candidate and has taken the seat with a majority of some 12,000. In a second by-election in Manchester, the UKIP candidate came within some 600 votes of taking what was always thought of as a safe Labour seat. So both the Conservatives and Labour, about five months from a general election, are truly worried about this UKIP surge. On the BBC’s Question Time last night, foreseeing the massacre, they tried to make positive-sounding noises about a protest vote. This is a protest vote that could carve a few vital organs out of the Tory and the Labour body. On BBC Radio 4′ s Today programme, Nick Robinson was saying how at first UKIP were ignored, then derided, then attacked, then feared. Or words to that effect – the usual pattern when something terrifying appears on the political horizon.
In the south of Ireland today (well actually the south-east and west, since we’re talking about Dublin and Roscommon), there are another two by-elections. The bookies make the Sinn Féin candidate in Dublin a racing certainty to take the seat. In Roscommon the Fianna Fail candidate is expected to win, although the Sinn Féin candidate there, Martin Kenny, is expected to draw a considerable number of votes and is tipped by many to make it to the Dail in the next general election. Almost exactly the same pattern has emerged with the rise of Sinn Féin. Like UKIP, they were seen as a bad joke, then they were sneered at, then they were attacked and now both Fianna Fail and Labour are sweating blood that the Shinners may not just become the main opposition party – they may very well become part of government. I heard the Dublin Sinn Féin candidate make the remark on RTÉ that “if Doherty is the next minister of Finance” and there was nobody laughing.
Although they’re totally different parties, Sinn Féin and UKIP have made their way under similar fire from the big boys. UKIP is hostile to laws and control in Britain emanating from Europe; Sinn Féin is hostile to laws and control emanating from Westminister. Nigel Farage, hitherto dismissed as a music-hall cheeky chappie, is seen as a charismatic, popular figure. Gerry Adams, for years dismissed as a pathetic Irish speaker, an economic illiterate and a dead weight as leader of his party, has become one of the most formidable political figures in Ireland.
There are few sights more pleasing than seeing once-smug people having to stuff their faces with humble pie. Not a diet they’re fond of, particularly.
One similarity between the two parties is that they are benefiting from the widespread apathy and disdain people feel for the long established political parties and the systems in which they operate.
So I suppose the test for both parties over the coming years will be to implement some of the changes that they promise assuming they do attain sufficient votes which will translate into sufficient political power.
If Sinn Fein ‘do a labour party’ and continue with an austerity program if they get into government ,or fail to ease up on it sufficiently to satisfy those who have voted for them, then they will simply be wiped out come the next election.
UKIP will never be large enough to form a majority government but it is possible they could be part of coalition. But they will be there forcing the Tories further to the right at all times.
The clear difference is that Farage was not involved in a murdererous campaign and didn’t shield a convicted child abuser it should be a matter of concern that somebody like him should be close to power
“neill”
…. not involved in a murdererous campaign and didn’t shield a convicted child abuser it should be a matter of concern that somebody like him should be close to power…….”
Totally agree – how Winston Churchill was voted into power is beyond me too.
Neil
stop whinging Unionists and the British state spent 30 years murdering as well so would you ever get off your high horse you’ve no right to be there
It says it all about you and the party you support when the leader helped to shield a sex abuser have you no dignity or self respect?
Neill – no he didn’t and yes I have..
Er yes he did Jude still the sheep blindly follow and ask no questions still he must be a great leader he has had 30 years of experience he would put some dictators to shame
Er no he didn’t neill and I presume you’re referring to yourself when you speak of blind sheep? I don’ remember you playing anything but a single note since you started commenting on blogs. Did I miss something?
Stop licking those lips, Jude you’ll get all chapped…
God help us all if UKIP ever get power at Westminster.Thatcherism at its worst with an even more racist tinge.
There used to be a band from Tallaght called Tallaght Fornia and there is a s. possibility that the term Tallaght Ban might be heard in muttered tones by supporters of parties confined to the Free Southern Stateen. Even as the Shinner candidate is seen to canvas in his canvas shoes through the mean streets of said parish.
How they must be lamenting the fact that Section 31, the RTE version of the Tallaght Ban is not in operation. That would have, ironically enough, the effect of muzzling the Shinner with the right royal name in reverse, or ought that be, reverse? Cathal King. A back to front name, they would mutter, just like the economic policies of the Shinners. Why he might even, whisper it, be a relation of M.L. King.
Actually, this is not to say that it the Section 31 County country is not thriving. Take Patronising Kenny over on Newstalk. This morning, Friday 10, he hosted (almost said refereed !) a discussion with a 3-1 line up: PK, Alan Dukes and a typical tut-tutter from TUT on one side, and Mary Lou McDonald on the other. This is called, erm, balance. In the item immediately preceding this ‘discussion’ PK had shown his world-class versatility by conducting in the classic watchdog position (oops, almost wrote lap dog !) a hole-hoovering hagiographical interview with the chosen litterary one, Dr. Royden Keane, author.
The boy Kenny is priceless: no amount of dosh could buy him.
The by-election (oops, almost wrote boy-election!) in the constituency of South Dublin was caused by the departure on the red-white-and-blue eye special to Brussels of the Boy Wonder, Brian Hayes. One of the e-generaton it came natural to him to slot in the extra letter: from MP to MEP.
He is also known as the Boy Soprano for his choirboy looks and as his favourite colour is blue, not least when it pertains to his taste in shirts. Thus, it is not difficult to imagine him singing from the same hymn sheet as his fellow parliamentarian, the Rev William McCrea. (not hum sheet as both know and use the exact same words, even unto the last syllable of recorded rhyme).
They could even be twinned as say, the parishes of Tallaght in South Dublin and the parish of Tamlaght in South Fermanagh might be. (The leprechaun for Tallaght and Tamlagh alike, is, coincidentally, ‘plague pit’).
Perkie sincerely wishes B. Hayes, MEP well as he toddles down the mean streets of Brussells and that, erm, he manages to sprout some facial hair. For his own good. Otherwise he might be mistaken for another baby faced, MP. None other than the….Manikin Pis.
The blueshirted MP most associated in the public mind with Tallaght, of course, is the tallboy himself, Alan Dukes. Specifically for his, erm, Strategy. That is, the Tallaght Stategy. Which had something or other to do with the Dismal Science which automatically disqualifies Perkie from commenting. On the grounds of bias. Being an unreconstructed Main Yard Keynsian himself.
A Strategy is this context, involving as it did a Tallboy and a sprawling suburb, indicates an elongated Tactic, ie, tic tac with the enemy, back to front stuff again. (see above).
Of course, Perkie and A. Dukes go back a long way, albeit just down the road from Tallaght, in the Highest Parish in Eireland itself.. Back to the time, coincidentally when ‘Mary Lou’ was riding high in the hit parade. Back, back to the time when ‘Duke of Earl’ was also riding high in the hit parade, as sung by Gene Chandler. This was a golden time for chandlers: the steel-haired Jeff Chandler was as big a movie star as Audie Murphy himself. Who in turn was as boyish featured back then as B. Hayes, MEP is today.
A. Dukes in fact, and unwittingly, was party to P. Warbeck’s first foray into political controversy.
The Dukes family was the highest family in the highest parish in the land. Their abode was on the slopes of Mangerton Road and the ancient Family Sept of Warbeck lived in the next door road of Brandon. Thus, despite their aristocratic leanings both familiies came from a deprived background: being denizens of Dublin roads named after/for Kerry mountains.
The patriarch of the Dukes clan was known back then, affectionately, as General Dukes. For it was he who used to lead the annual military parade at Easter time. Truly did he cut a resplendent figure in the uniform of Oglaigh na hEireann (official) even as he strode mightily down O’Connell Street. Alone, all alone, at the head of the parade. He even reminded doddery onlookers (old soldiers who never died) of Kelly the Boy from Killane.
-Seven feet in his stockinged feet !
We gurriers from Brandon Road would faithfully crush into a neigbhour’s VW every Easter to be driven down to downtown Dublin to witness ‘General’ Dukes at the head of the parade. The number of gurriers varied between 14-18. No wonder the VW was known as the Wee Folks’ Wagon.
(Note the inverted c. which act as aides de comme for the general there. This was because it was not till many years later our boyhood naivety was shattered when it was leaked that the resplendent uniform was not that of a General, but was, to be more particular about it: that of a Sergeant in the FCA. Which is leprechaun for the Free Clothes Association or Local Defence Force. ‘General’ Dukes was in fact a higher civil servant who went on to complete a dazzling bureaucratic career as, yes, Chairman of the Higher Education Authority’).
Little wonder then that his son went on to study Economics to the highest level and become the dismal scientist he is. Oddly enough he was schooled in Colaiste Mhuire in Parnell Square (aka the Parnellogram) the leading academy for education through the medium of leprechaun at the time. ‘One size fits all, including the tall’, being their mana/motto..
Back in the fabulous Fifties it was the habit of Dukes Major to take Dukes Minor by the hand for a Sunday afternoon stroll. On their way to the Long Mile Road they passed Warbeck Towers. There was no just avoiding that aristrocratic edifice.
And as I walk through the world
Nothing can stop the Duke of Earl.
They could, pere et fils, have been doo-wopping this, their signature toon, even as they walked past. They had reckoned without the cheekie chappie known as Perkie.
-Hello Lankies !
Was what they heard as they strode by in grim unison, with their military two step precision. Now, some anachronists might argue that Perkie could easily have chosen the more emollient ‘Hi, Al !’ There is but one slight snag with this bockety thesis, as there is with all arguments put forward by the Brotherhood of Anachron. Paul Simon had yet to pen his wunnerful ‘You can call me Al’.
It was not the first time Dukes Major and Minor had been addressed thus if one is to judge by the speed with which Dukes Major broke stride, vaulted the decorative front gate and entered unto the manicured lawn of Warbeck Towers. To grab an unsuspecting Perkie by the collar, lift him up, knock three times loudly on the door knocker until the Dowarger Lady Warbeck deigned to open it.
-Deal with this brat, Madame, or if you won’t, I most assuredly will !
And with that he deposited the poor put upon Perkie upon the soft deep pile of the Warbeckian hall carpet.
The suitably recompensed Dukes could be triumphantly heard chanting in military unison
even as they turned the corner into Slieve Bloom Road:
Duke, Duke, Duke, Duke of Earl
Duke, Duke, Duke, Duke of Earl.
Thus, whenever Alan Dukes comes on air, with his dismally scientific strategy of anaesthetising his gullible listeners into surrendering to the belief that he has something of interest to say, with his mind-numbing mantra of macro and micro economics Perkie thinks of the above mantra. And falls asleep anyway. Probably muttering: Hi, Lanky. (singular).
As to how PW was ‘dealt’ with that day. Not, perhaps in the way Dukes Major or indeed Minor, might have envisaged. For the Dowager Lady Warbeck who, in her dotage, doted on the house devil, street angel, that was Perkie in those dear dead days (not) beyond recall, raided the larder and stuffed him to the gills with sticky cream buns, his favourite high-cholesterol snack in the highest parish in Eireland at the time.
Little wonder, he has never shirked the opportunity of contributing to political debate ever sense. In his trademark civilised, measured and disinterested way ever since.
It is, as has been hitherto noted, the Warbeckian way of conducting business.
(Housekeeping: by the time Dukes Minor had reached the dizzy heights of Government Minister of Fiasco, the military parade at Easter time had long since been abolished by the Gandhi chanting, tandoori chomping TDs of Dail Eireann. The v. same parade ‘General’ Dukes has so memorably led in years of yore. Indeed, the only outbreak of militarism since were the all too infrequent excursions of those piece-work peaceniks of the SAS coached UVFers on their game-changing, legislation-influencing forays into downtown Dublin. To which the dolly boys and the dolly girls of Dail Eireann turned a magnificent Martin Luther Queenly deaf ear and blind eye to. Salud.).
That’s all, folks.
Er no he didn’t neill and I presume you’re referring to yourself when you speak of blind sheep? I don’ remember you playing anything but a single note since you started commenting on blogs. Did I miss something?
Jude that is a rich irony indeed
Why would you expect me to nice to a party that wants to get rid of my country?
Ach neill – there you go again. Same old response…Tsk, tsk. Why can’t we be friends?
I wasnt aware that we were not friends come up to my home town and I will buy you a coffe and we can have a chinwag?
That’s very kind of you, Neill. Alas, I have been removed from pasture for this academic year and am scrabbling like a mad thing to keep pace. I also do large lunches rather than coffee…But go raibh maith agat aris – thanks again – very civilized of you. Actually I was thinking about your comment re not being friends with people because they want to take your ‘country’ away: if that were followed by all nationalists/republicans, they’d never form a friendship with a unionist, or want to. I think that isn’t the case – au contraire, as we say about Knockmoyle…
Sorry perhaps i didnt make myself clear i dont mind the people who vote for parties like Sf etc because they are flesh and blood just like me its just the party that i dislike in the same way many people strongly dislike the Dup on this site
But the party is composed of people – in both the case of SF and of the DUP. I quite like some of the DUP people. I even quite like Jim Allister. I don’t agree with them but I quite like them.
So SF won neither election the one in Dublin should have been a shoe in looks like FG and FF will have cause to celebrate this evening
They will indeed. Sure they might as well. While they can.