OK – hand on heart: how did you feel that time when Arlene Foster (remember her?) said that the north had some surplus vaccines and would be happy to pass them to the people in the south who were short of vaccines. Did your little features light up with pleased anticipation? Here was unionism discovering its generous side and reaching across the border in selfless donation. Or did you swallow hard and try not to let people notice that you were grinding your teeth, because on the one hand the south couldn’t afford to turn away vaccines, being at that time short of them, but on the other you couldn’t help but feel political gloating and one-upmanship radiating from the DUP?
Anyway, it doesn’t really matter how you or I felt: it didn’t happen. Boris Johnson passed the word that the UK would need to get all its people vaccinated before it even thought of handing out surplus to the deserving poor of the south or anywhere else.
To be honest, the whole we-did-better-than-you is a bit distasteful. Boasting that you’ve had only X deaths whereas you lot yasuckboo have had Y deaths: it’s like a finger-pointing exercise in a graveyard. Those who indulge in it show things about themselves that they might be better not showing.
There is no doubt that the UK government has done a very good job of getting and distributing vaccines – better than the EU and the south of Ireland. The reasons for that are many, including the promised delivery of Astrazeneca which simply didn’t appear. Boris Johnson had his successful vaccine distribution to thank for the Tories’ successes in local elections a short while back. Unfortunately the people of the UK have short memories, and forget how unsuccessful Johnson was at saving the hundreds and thousands and tens of thousands of those who died from Covid. It’s a bit like a thief hitting you a belt on the head with an iron bar and then making sure you had medical attention before scarpering.
Anyway, that was long ago – back in the pre-Arlene days. We are now faced by a DUP leader who has odd ideas about the age of the universe and who has misgivings about allowing gays to donate blood. What’s that, Virginia – Edwin won’t be First Minister, Paul Givan will probably have that job? Paul Givan, Paul Givan, Paul Givan – oh yes, he’s the guy who withdrew the bursaries to the Gaeltacht just before Stormont’s collapse and then wished us all a Happy Christmas. And isn’t there a photograph of him, as Minister of Culture, lighting an Eleventh Night bonfire and grinning at the cameras?
Mmm. Remind me of that in a year’s time, will you?
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