07 October 2009

What does this crisis mean for the future of Irish democracy?

Irishelection.com is asking all the right questions of this crisis... As Cian notes (and it is worth following a few of their internal backlinks just to see the depth and quality of some of the debate over there during the last few days and weeks)...

Yes, JOD needs to go, yes he is sacrificial and yes he is an egregious example of wasteful expense. Yet the whole system is screwed up. Take a look at thestory.ie - they have documents as long as your arm detailing lavish outlays on behalf of our office holders. A good play by the Greens over and above Ciaran Cuffe’s concerns raised on Morning Ireland would be to pitch for the CC role as part of the Programme for Govt and get guarantees of freedom to reform the expense system. Might be good for all sides.


To be fair though, this is only the tip of the iceberg. Parliamentarians and other democratically elected officials have grown up with the assumption of what happens inside those institutions is matter of privilege and secrecy... The way governments treat Oppositions and even junior partners in government demonstrates that many of them still 'just don't get it'...

The genus of this story was Ken Foxe's work for the Sunday Tribune with a series of FOI requests on John O'Donoghue's expenses when he was the Arts and Sports Minister... What helped give it legs through the summer recess however was the public sharing of that information (including sight of the original receipts Foxe got) by Gavin Sheridan and Mark Coughlan at thestory.ie.

In effect the CC was gotcha-ed by an Internet-borne project that both he and his party have severely underestimated at some considerable cost to themselves and their reputations.

No one is going turn that tap off... Now if you want to see what TD or Senator got from what donor or which party gained most from which business sector or profession, you can get it all at from thestory.ie. Hell you can even join in and help join the dots in the vast data dumps and help make all manner of correlations in the data that were only fleetingly thought about before...

The era of Open Government is upon us whether we like it or not. The Houses of the Oireachtas or Stormont, Holyrood or Wesminster for that matter are no longer scenic icons. They are living breathing institutions whose almost every move now has a life on the internet too its denizens still seem think is some kind of petty add on the real business they do on behalf of the nation.

In truth all democracies are in danger of being outrun by the exponential pace of technology and although fall of the walls can be exhilarating to watch, something is being lost in the process...

As I noted in yesterday's Slugger Awards post, 'consultation' is likely to become more important, and not just as a last minute means of resolving log jams in the decision making process, but as a way of making government smarter and more responsive to fast changing societal demands.

As this presentation from a couple of years back highlights, we are living in 'exponential times', and government cannot afford to get left behind:



As it does get left behind, then it's own authority and legitimacy will suffer. Pinning hopes on the Greens reform programme (you can get some indication of the wider Green agenda from this earlier submission) is not likely to be enough.

But this is as much about the culture of politics, as its law or practice. The Irish way has always been to get the hand-shakers and the backslappers in at the expense of people who might have a clue about how to run the country. And there has been an extraordinary level of 'control freakery' around the business of policy formulation and public debate thereof...

And yet in the recent crisis, the first instinct is to reach out and pull in expertise almost from whomever or wherever it can be found (empty suits syndrome)... That's one of the penalties of 'closed government'... But the real penality in the longer term is the way information loops and informalising and speeding up... Citizen journalism projects like thestory.ie have the capacity to wage asymmetric warfare on comparatively 'stupid' institutions.

As Churchill once said, democracy is the worst of all systems, except for all the rest. The bottom line here is that politicians need to think now about how they communicate authoritatively an outside world that will only exponentially smarter than it is today... As Olivia O'Leary noted in her podcast yesterday: "We should know from Northern Ireland what happens when the citizens withdraw their consent to be governed"...

Those who don't may find themselves without that arse in their political pants they once almost took for granted... And the 'smart mob' does not always equate with a wise crowd...

02 October 2009

Slugger's Daily Blogburst: Gordon's flesh wound and the President's manic depressive maltese terrier...

Okay, kicking off I'm afraid with another Gordon Brown blog, this time from Angus in the western Isle's whose response to the Labour leaders call to arms is to post up Monty Python's Black Knight video...

- Unnoticed in all the self promoted hype around the Sun's defection from Brown is another, politically more significant defection: that of Sue Nye, one of Brown's 'inner court' who has made it clear she does not want to be around next May when the action starts...

- And twisting the blade, Shane's a got caption competition going...

- (Via Guido) Another YouTube this time Boris Johnson getting some free publicity on East Enders (yeah, right Boris is going to stop in to the East End for one pint and one pint only)....

- Iain Dale's getting up a head of steam in his campaign against the decidedly illiberal Mail for calling him 'overtly gay' in the run up to a Conservative Open Primary in Bracknell (though I suspect it was the accusation that Iain was using his blog to 'pack' the assembly that may have stung the more)...

- (Via Stephenspillane) Stephen Tall supports him in his campaign against the Mail... (Though I note Tom Watson is keeping a discreet silence having been himself a recent victim of the Mail...)

- And this nonsense from the same paper which is pro-Cervical cancer vaccine in Ireland (because the government is against it, presumably)...

- BTW, Iain has absolutely no faith in the Irish people to make the right decision today...

- Future Taoiseach over on Irish Election picks up an allegation that the German Ambassador has be 'pressurising' the Czech Constitutional Court Chairman Pavel Rychetsky to make an early decision on the constitutionality of the Czech parliament's ratification of the Lisbon Treaty.

- And David Vance has this: Pope favours Nation State Shocker...

- Those of you who followed the Lisbon Essays will understand that a Eurosceptic line of thought is not intrinsically left or right... Sholto Byrnes puts it into a mainstream British context...

- Martin Kettle warns David Cameron about the need to get with the CDU project...

- I'm hoping to make it to the Personal Democracy Forum in Barcelona, to talk about some of the work we've been doing on Slugger recently, not least the Lisbon Essays... Over on the website they carry news of the new online Tory vote winning machine: MyConservatives.com... It's modelled on the My.BarackObama.com, and focuses almost entirely on front facing campaign work... (expect something similar to emerge from Fianna Fail after their engage engagement with Blue State Digital?)

- The Samosa's a brand new British Asian blog and comment site... The start balance is left of centre, and the aim to create an inclusive public conversation which will draw on writers from across Britain, India, Bangladesh and Pakistan...

- In a break from Irish Election's coverage of Lisbon, P O'Neill remembers that glorious moment after the Rome EU summit of 1990 which lead to the inglorious fall of a British PM in Paris, just weeks later...

- John Barry writing at Tasc's blog ahead of a conference (PDF) in Dublin tomorrow week, notes that some neo classical economists did not get the memo on remoralising the market...

- Dog bites man former President of France... From which is almost all you need to know is:
Mrs Chirac noted the dog had never turned against her...

- And Gore Vidal continuing his life long war on stupidity, mostly that of his fellow countrymen:
“Americans? The worst-educated people in the First World. They don’t have any thoughts, they have emotional responses, which advertisers know how to provoke."

18 June 2009

The Breen Judgement...

Whilst Slugger is down (I know, I know... we're moving serves in the next few days)... The Judge makes it clear there are protections for journalists, but these are qualified protections...

Although the Recorder concludes

[33] I have therefore at this point reached conclusions as follows:

(a) That the concept of confidentiality for journalists protecting their sources is recognised in law, and specifically under the 2000 Act and Article 10 of the Convention;

He also notes that:

[21] The legislature clearly addressed the question of journalistic material in relation to Article 10 in various ways, but for the purposes of this application I have addressed it by the inclusion in the 2000 Act of a special procedure whereby such material can only be produced on an application to the court. However, and this mirrors the position under the Convention, such a right is not an absolute right. It is a qualified right following the wording of Article 10(2) namely that the freedom is “subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society”. The paragraph in short introduces the balance between the public interest specifically referred to of the prevention of disorder or crime, with the interest of the freedom of expression including the preventing of the disclosure of information received in confidence.

[22] While the court clearly must both respect, as it does, the personal view of any journalist who appears before it in relation to information in his or her possession, and the obligation imposed on themselves by themselves reflecting any professional obligation such as contained in the Code of Practice, nevertheless the court has its obligations to carry out the balancing exercise which on occasion may well demand that the duty which the journalist believes he or she is under must give way to a public interest such as the detection and successful prosecution of a member of such a ruthless organisation prepared to carry out this and other attacks.

08 June 2009

The NI European Count Live Blog

06 June 2009

Slugger live blog: Republic's local elections...

Right, we are going to be following the southern count today, with a live blog of our own. If you want the genuine southern article, Suzy and co have already moved in... It starts about 9, but we don't expect the action to start until 11am... Follow Sean O'Rourke and Rachel English on RTE radio from 11am until 4pm. Catch the TV coverage from 1-2 and 4-6 in the pm at RTE Live...

It fell off the back of a lorry....honest

(Mark here - think my blogger account gives a different display name)

Some limited and not particularly good raw polling data I got my hands on, 10ish boxes per area that probably benefit the UUP/Greens/Alliance.

Massive pinch of salt time but here you go, make of it what you will:

North Down

UUP - mid 20%
DUP/TUV/APNI - all around 20%
Greens - mid teens
SDLP - 4%ish
SF - 2%ish

South Down

SDLP/SF - high teens (very close)
TUV/UUP - mid teens
Green - 10%ish
DUP - 6% (wtf!)
Alliance - 5%


Newry and Armagh

SF - 50%
SDLP - 30%
TUV/UUP - 8%
Greens/DUP - 5%

05 June 2009

Gamechanging moments: Sinn Fein will top the poll by an Irish mile...

They've kept their counsel on the likely result the whole way through campaign, but it looks like McGuinness's post Massereene statement on dissident Republican paramilitaries bought him a huge chunk of the Nationalist electorate... Nationalist gamechanging moment number 1.

The SDLP on the other hand are back on a familiar knife edge: if the numbers from verification move slightly in their favour (DUP down 2, them up 1 is possible given the provisional nature of these early tallies), they could get the break their activists have been working day and night for; or they will get nothing, and must ask themselves how when Nationalism is at it's height, they get just under half of the political equity. That would be 1999 all over again. After 8 years, Mark Durkan will have questions to answer. That could be Nationalist gamechanging moment number 2.

The party bust a gut this election and in places like South Belfast they were well organised and had some inspirational leadership in the constituency from a hard working MP and good organisation. Other areas like Foyle may prove to add that extra point or two that gives Alban his bus ride home. But that gaping void between themselves and Sinn Fein must prompt the biggest question they need to ask themselves. What, in this post agreement days, is the SDLP for?

As for Sinn Fein, this Tweet from Gerry Adams in Dublin says it all:

Eating nuts and raisins in the car. Makes it harder to loudhail, but... Me predicts a good turnout. Gerry Adams


Today's news may have fortify him against more unwelcome news on Monday in Dublin (Mary Lou is in a fight to the death with FF's Eoin Ryan, amongst others) and North and West... The good news in the south though will certainly come in South with a good performance from Toireasa Ferris and the chance will soon present itself to blood the capable and personable Senator Pearse Doherty in the by election for Pat the Cope's seat, if as seems likely, he takes the MEP's for FF...

Election rumours, odds and sods..

In case Slugger goes belly up, here's a facsimile of the gossip thread intro:

This is a kind of open thread… I’d advise people to take what passes below as rumour until proven… but it’s a opportunity to share whispers gossip and general chat about how things are going inside in the verification process… I’ll start with one that should be taken with some salt… Allister is said to be polling well in Lagan Valley… with one unsubstantiated rumour that he’s pushed the DUP into third in one box… I’ve no idea which box, or where, but I’d probably guess Finis/Dromara direction… Just remember that extrapolation from rumour is dangerous!!

04 June 2009

Northern Ireland's polling day turnout

Starter for one:

South Belfast: 176 at Donegall Road in a ward of 2,500 registered voters.

Allister postering until 10 in Holywood last night...

The big question is how well will Jim Allister do... Well enough in the heartland, but he's up against big machines... Hardly surprising Holywood was a last resort for votes, but a few posters about the place may just get him another small margin...

03 June 2009

This is the emergency site for Slugger O'Toole...

We're expecting a big surge of traffic on the count day of the European election... On that day we'll be double posting all information to this place and Slugger main..