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TPQ
#StopTheGame ✉ with an appeal to the Irish soccer squad and manager not to play against Israel.


We are the activists behind the #StopTheGame campaign. We are writing to you directly, and publicly, in advance of Ireland's technical home fixture against Israel in Serbia this Sunday. We are doing so because the Football Association of Ireland has demonstrated, repeatedly and conclusively, that it cannot be trusted to communicate honestly — either with you, or about you.

FAI President Paul Cooke has gone on public record to state that the FAI succeeded in their handling of this issue. We are asking you directly — each one of you, and your manager — do you believe you were placed in a position of success? Do you believe what has happened to you, to your squad, to your manager, and to Irish football over the past weeks represents success?

We are also asking you to consider this. When Paul Cooke was asked directly whether UEFA had threatened the FAI with sanctions if Ireland refused to play, he answered bluntly: no. No threat of sanctions was made. The entire justification built by the FAI for placing you in this position — the fear, the financial warnings, the talk of disqualification — was built on a foundation that their own president has now demolished with a single word.

For that reason, and because the FAI cannot be trusted to put the truth in front of you, we are writing directly.

Our Appeal

We are writing to appeal to each of you, individually and collectively, not to take part in Sunday's fixture against Israel in Serbia.

We want to begin by acknowledging Gavin Bazunu. His decision not to be available for these fixtures was an act of immense personal courage. It was a humanitarian stance, taken at professional risk, and it has received admiration around the world. He has honoured Irish football and he has honoured Ireland.

We know he is not alone. We know there are others among you who do not wish to play this fixture and who are doing so only because you have been pressured and misled by the FAI. We understand that. We do not hold it against you. But we are asking you to reconsider.

We also understand that there are those among you who do not share our view. We believe that position is wrong. But we appeal to you to stand with your colleagues, and with the Irish people. Every credible national poll on this issue has found that over 70% of the Irish public believe these matches should not take place. You are asked to represent Ireland. This is what Ireland thinks.

There Is No Other Side

We are aware that during your discussions on Saturday, you were subjected to an address purporting to present the other side of this issue.

There is no other side.

The position of the Irish Government and the Irish state is that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. Ireland is a co-litigant with South Africa before the International Court of Justice, prosecuting Israel for genocide. The position of Israel's own leading Holocaust historian, Amos Goldberg — himself Jewish — is that this is genocide. The United Nations Independent Commission of Inquiry published its findings in 2025 that Israel is committing genocide. The International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for Israeli leaders.

If we support international law, if we support the United Nations, if we support the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court, we are not only able but obligated to take a stance. While everyone should always listen, the narrative presented to you on Saturday is not only wrong — it is disconnected from every independent international legal and humanitarian authority that exists.

On Protests

We want to be clear about the protests that will take place around Thursday's Austria fixture and Sunday's game in Serbia.

The right to protest has never been more necessary. It is only through protest that these games were rightly moved out of Ireland in the first place. It is only through protest that the cause of the Palestinian people — under constant genocidal attack — has received the global coverage it has received this past week.

We protest because UEFA has failed to carry out its own rules. UEFA found Israel in breach of its statutes for establishing football clubs on illegally occupied Palestinian land — and chose to profit financially from that breach rather than act on it. We protest because we see that differently.

We protest because we are morally and legally obligated to do so. We protest because the FAI has failed in its duty. We believe the FAI has been working in concert with the Israeli FA for months to position Ireland's players and manager as instruments of sportswashing genocide. Long after these games are over, David Courell, Paul Cooke, and the FAI board who facilitated this disgrace will be held to account.

What Happened in Hungary

In Hungary on Sunday, you wore black armbands. You bowed your heads during the Israeli national anthem. You refused to shake hands. You refused to exchange pennants. Each of those acts said something. The world noticed.

And one of you — Adam Idah — was subjected to racist monkey chants from Israeli supporters, clearly audible to anyone watching. The referee refused to investigate because the word "racism" was not used when it was reported to him. That is what the FAI placed you in the middle of. That is their success.

Our Final Appeal

We are asking each of you to reflect on the reality of the Palestinian people. On the fact that over 560 of your fellow footballers have been murdered by Israel. On the fact that football itself is being used as a tool to perpetrate and launder genocide.

You showed the world in Hungary that you have a conscience. We are asking you to go further in Serbia. Build on what you did. Stand with the Irish people. Stand with Palestine.

Stop the game.

Signed by the following League of Ireland fans:

  • David Sherlock - Shamrock Rovers
  • Karen Dervan - Galway United
  • Lorcán Ó‘Duíne - Derry City
  • Manus Bree - Sligo Rovers ⁠
  • ⁠Lar O’ Tuama - Cork City
  • Bas O’ Curraoin - Bohemians
  • Brendan Ogle - Dundalk
  • Tommy Martin Snr - Finn Harps
  • Anthony McIntyre - Drogheda
  • Gerry Deane - Shelbourne
  • Ezin Rose Voight - Longford Town
  • Cian Darcy - St. Patrick’s Athletic
  • Paul Duggan - Waterford United
  • William Sainsbury - CK United
  • Jason Shanahan - Treaty United

An Open Letter To The Republic Of Ireland Football Squad and Manager Heimir Hallgrímsson

Dixie Elliot ✊Why did a British PM eventually slam the door shut on Sinn Féin's last hope, a referendum on Irish Unity?


From McGuinness to O'Neill, Sinn Féin have constantly stated that they were determined to make the institutions in Stormont work.
 
That's exactly what the British want to hear.
 
The institutions have never worked for the people who elected the politicians who sit in them, nor will they ever work for the people.
 
They were only meant to give the impression that those self-serving politicians had a semblance of power.
 
Only recently Michelle O'Neill attended the 'Council of Nations' hosted by the British King Charles Windsor. The intended aim of which is to 'bring the leaders of the four nations' together to promote unity across the UK.

Why would any British government feel pressurised by those who serve their interests and theirs alone without fail?


Thomas Dixie Elliot is a Derry artist and a former H Block Blanketman.
Follow Dixie Elliot on Twitter @IsMise_Dixie

Door Slammed

Lynx By Ten To The Power Of Two Thousand One Hundred And Eight

 


Religious Derangement Syndrome @ 18

 

A Morning Thought @ 3279

Gary Robertson ⚽As I’ve stated many times before I’m no fan of international matches so the prospect of watching Scotland line up against Slovenia on Saturday hardly filled me with joy.
 
According to UEFA Scotland are ranked 19th and Slovenia 26th so it looked, for those interested, a perfect opportunity for the Pocognoli era to hit the ground running.
 
Instead what we saw, yes I endured it, for research purposes you understand, was another display of mediocre football.
 
Simply put, both sides were rubbish. The highlight, yes highlight, was seeing Billy Gilmour back in a Scotland top. Otherwise it was same old, same old. Missed chances, poor defending and misplaced passes. Just when you thought maybe a game of football might break out the footballing Gods decided that was enough excitement and the game quickly descended back into the realms of that most descriptive of Scottish words “pish.”
 
The only consolation being at least we are spared another episode of east end soap opera Janefield Street.
 
Martin O’Neill, at time of writing, is still the main character but as time goes by he’s slowly morphing from loveable rebel into villainous defender of the cabal. He must be asking himself if the scripts he’s working with are worth the aggravation. There will be no Bobby Ewing moment for Martin, it wasn’t a dream dude. Celtic really are that bad.
 
So bad in fact, as therapy I’ve found myself watching highlights of matches from yesteryear online and trying to remain positive. Indeed it would be unfair of me not to mention the positive vibes I received in a comment from Steve R. Honestly the last person I expected to put a virtual arm around me and tell me it will get better. It’s amazing the difference a few kind words can make.
 
There was however some Scottish football at the weekend. The Scottish challenge cup - The KDM evolution trophy as it’s known this year.
 
A chance for Premier League “big boys” B teams to compete against established teams from the lower divisions. With names such as Galafairydean Rovers from Galashiels in the Scottish Borders and Clachnacuddin of Inverness it’s the perfect opportunity for fringe players from Rangers, Celtic etc to get some much needed game time. This was all too evident for Hearts who’s B team suffered a soul destroying 14-0 defeat at the hands of Ross County at the Global Energy Stadium. True it didn’t help that Hearts played much of the match with ten men due to Flockhart seeing red for the Jambos in the 34th minute. However, even by then Hearts looked miles off it and were already 4-0 down.
 
A score line like that can rip the fighting spirit out of any player and I hope these lads realise that strange things happen in football and not to become too disheartened. Sure it’s not good but it’s part of a learning experience and you can take the lesson and work on what needs to improve.
 
Other B teams fared slightly better.
 
Celtic drawing 3-3 with the aforementioned Clachnacuddin, Rangers going down 4-2 to Queen of the South at Palmerston Park in Dumfries, Dundee United losing out narrowly to Forfar 2-1, Bonnyrigg Rose, a Midlothian team based 8 miles outside Edinburgh to the south east managed to put 3 past Motherwell with no reply, Hibernian falling to a 2-1 defeat at Galabank the home of Annan, Hamilton overcoming Kilmarnock's B team 3-0, Dundee losing out 1-0 in a Friday night showdown with Spartans.
 
Indeed the only Premiership second side that managed a win this weekend were St Mirren who overcame Cumbernauld Colts 4-2. So it’s hats off to them for a fine performance.
 
Friday also saw four Scottish Championship matches with the highlight being Stenhousemuir who overcame Ayr United to extend their lead at the top of the table to eight points after second placed Raith Rovers were defeated 2-0 by third placed Livingston. It’s early in the season but building a lead in the league can be crucial even at this stage, and Stenny are going about their business with professionalism.
 
Sunday saw the first women’s Glasgow Derby of the season, with both teams on fifteen points this looked on paper at least a tasty fixture.
 
For both sets of fans it’s showed however the pendulum of power is slowing swinging in the direction of Rangers.
 
After the men’s team having disappointed us for weeks it was a chance for the fans to find something to smile about. However it was not to be and a 5-2 rout by a rampant Rangers side reminded us that things aren’t ribbons and roses at Paradise and the disease that has swept through the men’s team- loseritus has infiltrated the ladies squad too.
 
Winning is a good habit to have, losing can also be habit forming and I hope for Celtic women this is just a blip and winning ways will be restored soon.
 
As for the men’s team I still maintain surgery is needed and fast. But that’s a story for another day.
So there you have it, another weekend in the wonderful world of Scottish football.
 
I enjoy writing these pieces as it’s nice just to switch off for a while from what’s going on in the world around us. When Anthony McIntyre asked me if I’d be interested in writing for the blog I’ll admit I was excited, humbled and rather nervous all at the same time. I mean I couldn’t say no, opportunities like this don’t come around every day. And a chance to bring fans closer to their respective teams and what’s happening both on and off the park is both a privilege and excellent therapy. I try to keep the swearing to a minimum, otherwise some weeks you might end up with a string of expletives followed by “Celtic” but I write as I think, and yes sometimes the odd one will creep into conversation. It happens, it’s football it’s one of those things.
 
Anyway whatever you’re doing do it well, stay safe and be happy.

🐼 Gary Robertson is the TPQ Scottish football correspondent.

Soap Operas

Seamus Kearney 🎤 I met my old comrade Breandán Mac Cionnaith, on the Garvaghy Road in Portadown last night.


He welcomed me with open arms and we reminisced briefly about our time in the H Blocks in the Autumn of 1982.

His determination for justice then, matched his determination for justice now, which I found absolutely admirable and awe inspiring.

I have never been driven by bland politics and squabbling over the crumbs from a colonial table, but have always been ignited and inspired by raw passion and grit determination. That is why the four years on the Blanket Protest in the H Blocks has always been the bedrock of my strength and my guideline into the future and all it holds.

Standing shoulder to shoulder with men and women who still possess the Republican fighting spirit and an unquenchable desire for justice is heartening and still leaves me humble in their presence.

Despite standing on the Garvaghy Road all night and being soaked to the skin, the dawn finally appeared and the pangs of hunger appeared with it. A solitary sausage roll was presented to me and I shared it with the man next to me, the sense of comradeship emerging again as it was many years ago when we shared meagre food rations during the Blanket Protest.


The catastrophic decision made by the Parades Commission and further exacerbated by the PSNI, has not been lost on those of us who linked arms as the dawn broke through on a precarious political landscape, but the strategic initiative and moral argument had now gone to those of us who persevered throughout the night. We were off our knees and were not going back down on them again. The simple question still resounded as the morning rain persisted: Why march down a road where you're not welcome?

However the bigger question was now starring us all in the face: Where do we go from standing on this crossroads?

Despite the growing realisation that we had somehow crossed another Rubicon, the lesson I have taken away from Garvaghy Road is that a people together can never be torn apart, especially with a vision for a future that can never be reversed.

As my comrade Bobby Sands said ' Never Give Up, Never Despair, Never Lose Hope'.

Onwards to the Republic.

Seamus Kearney is a former Blanketman and author of  
No Greater Love - The Memoirs of Seamus Kearney.

No Going Back

Barry Gilheany ✍In what to many in the field regard as an overdue development, the UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham announced last week the creation of a new-disinformation agency. 

In his words the National Centre for Information Defence is to counteract:

… an insidious campaign that reaches into people’s homes and twists what they feel about their own country and community – creating a narrative of decline, stoking division and sowing despair.[1] 

Although the sowing of disinformation and the telling of tall gates has long been the MO of espionage agencies of all states be they the CIA or KGB, particularly during the Cold War and in the course of counter-insurgency campaigns with Col Frank Kitson’s Low Intensity Operations - a standard operating manual during the Mau Mau era in Kenya and later transferred to Northern Ireland in the early 1970s, there is a widespread consensus that the terrain and nature of today’s information conflicts are totally different from the analogue eras. 

In this age of super-connectivity and instant messaging, tech savvy bad actors be they hostile, aggrandising states like Russia, China or Iran or networks of conspiracists be they far-right ethno-nationalist influencers; anti-vaccination activists or climate denialists are ahead of the game and are having a corrosive effect on the democratic process and institutions across the Western world. Shocks to liberal democracy such as the vote for Brexit and the first election of Donald Trump as US President have been attributed to the losing side in both to multiple disruptions to the electoral processes by Russian origin “bots” and the nefarious data harvesting operation of the research firm Cambridge Analytica; the rapid spread of false narratives around alleged Muslim of immigrant culpability in events such as the Stockport Taylor Swift child massacre generated Britain’s worst race riots in generation and the lies spread by antivaxxers about the safety of vaccines during the Covid-19 pandemic and their narratives around lockdown and other virus suppression measures being part of a globalist, Great Reset agenda which had unquantifiable impacts on death and infection rates provide an indisputable rationale to tackle such floods at their source at an institutional level.

Experts in decrying the futility in chasing in a needle in a haystack manner isolated examples of disinformation, identify the “infrastructure” and the “sophisticated ecosystem which exists to exacerbate provokable users for one reason or another” in the words of Sophie Williams-Dunning, cyber analyst at the Royal United Services (Rusi) thinktank” have welcomed going after the networks as a step in the right direction. For Williams-Dunning, this ecosphere encompasses not just the ubiquitous Russian bot but far-right influencers who immediately exploit such social flashpoints as the Stockport and Belfast riots and the protests outside migrants’ accommodation as well as grifters looking to monetise on such conflictual situations by producing captivating content riffing on disruption (sometimes the same person as with Steven Yaxley-Lennon aka Tommy Robinson). Accompanying Burnham’s measure will be, rightfully so, a debate about free speech and the appropriate levels of governmental intervention. Williams-Dunning forecasts that malign networks will amplify these free-speech concerns, no matter how cynical the methods.

The mission of this centre is thus to mobilise “trusted voices across civil society” to confront the messy reality of how people consume news: fragmented feeds, algorithmic bundles and emergent deepfakes. Deleting and disrupting hostile state activity does sit uneasily at the frontier between national security and freedom of expression; between the democratic imperatives of the state and the often changing and the security necessities, not just in the area of national defence but also food, health and environmental security in an era of science hostile narratives spread by bad actors such as climate change deniers and antivaccination activists who then seek to monetise their lies and misinformation in the manner of the Dirty Dozen wellness woo snake entrepreneurs such as Dr Mercola who the Centre for Countering Digital Hate identified as being responsible for up to 85% of disinformation content at the height of the Covid pandemic in 2021. So a successful centre must thread that needle; aggressively countering malign influences with protecting civil liberties.[2]

The UK government has not yet published a launch date, budget, location, or complete governance structure. Initial reporting suggests that the centre will bring together intelligence agencies, law enforcement bodies and technology companies including social media platforms to coordinate responses to foreign information attacks. Its proposed remit will include identifying the state or proxy responsible for initiating campaigns using manipulated narratives and then disrupting the digital infrastructures used to spread them.[3]

The initiative followed the National Security (State Threats) Act, 2026 which strengthened the Government’s ability to degrade and disrupt organisations involved in hostile activities on behalf of foreign powers. Official guidance defines state threats as harmful overt or covert actions by foreign governments which fall short of direct armed conflict but beyond peaceful diplomacy. The Government lists espionage, sabotage, disinformation, cyber operations, and political interference, especially in the electoral process. In this context, Andy Burnham did reference alleged Russian interference in the 2019 UK General Election.[4]

The legislation introduced proscription style powers against state linked organisations and offences concerning support for designated bodies. The new centre is intended to address the information and coordination side of the threat rather than replacing those criminal powers. Further government announcements will be needed to establish which department will be acceptable for the centre; how intelligence will be shared with technology companies and what independent oversight will apply.[5]

For now the PM has set the objectives and has tasked security chiefs to develop the organisation. He has stated his desire for Britain to use its presidency of the G20 in 2027 to pursue common international principles and standards for advanced AI unlike the dangerously laissez-fair approach of Donald Trump with whom Britain will nevertheless deepen their practical defence and AI partnership proving that the two governments can cooperate on military technology (for now maybe) while disagreeing about wider international regulation.[6]

The Right to Truth and the NCID

As has already been alluded to, the design and implementation of this new body has to balance national security needs and the integrity of democratic processes with safeguarding an overarching principle of liberal democracies, freedom of expression and from arbitrary acts of censorship. The NCID must be undergirded by a “right to truth” which should supersede what has traditionally been the unquestioned liberal norm – free speech. In formulating his right to truth principles, Geoff Mulgan starts out by critiquing how the liberal tradition of freedom of expression or speech has prioritised that value over the right to truth. He starts out by pointing out how this approach to speech assumes that free and fair competition in the “marketplace of ideas” will ensure that truth triumphs over lies. However just as other liberal nostrums over the neutrality of markets have been shown to have feet of clay due to the emergence of aggrandising monopolies and oligopolies, so Gresham’s Law which says that bad money drives out good money out of circulation (crypto currency may well be a contemporary example), so “flooding the zone with shit” as propounded by Alt-Right guru Steve Bannon makes it harder to distinguish fact from falsehood and so perverting the entire raison d’etre of free speech.[7]

The 17th century French mathematician Blaize Pascal wrote “Truth is so obscure in these times, and falsehood so established that unless we love the truth, we cannot know it.” Fast forward to the first two decades of the 21st century, and we find the very idea of the universality of truth hollowed out by tech behemoths such as Meta and X; the long reach of falsehood factories such as Russia’ s Internet Research Agency; the “anything goes” literary dogmas of postmodernism and poststructuralism and the amplification of conspiracy theories through cyberspace which would have been laughed out of court in the analogue age. For truth is dependent on a never- ending process of discovery bolstered by laws and institutions. All other civil liberties implicitly rely on some right to truth. Mulgan cites the example the right to a fair trial by jury having little meaning unless judges ensure that juries have the best possible information.[8]

Historically the right to truth is expressed in human rights discourse as the right of victims of war crimes or state repressions and other gross violations of human rights to the truth of how loved ones died and to appropriate recompense. Mulgan reframes this right not to be lied to or knowingly misled by powerful and influential organisations. He advocates that the right should be added as a protocol to the European Convention on Human Rights and should balance the US Constitution’s guarantee of free speech. He stresses that there must be a high bar for invoking this right, to account for differences of opinion and should be enforced by courts, not governments or “Ministries of Truth” (which certain media outlets like the Daily Mail are styling the NCID as).[9]

The right to truth should be grounded on the perennial precept of treating others as one would like to be treated by them. Mulgan identifies four areas of public life which should be guided by it. The first is the law, consumer protection laws which prohibit misleading and false claims in advertising and marketing should be extended to political communications. The industrial scale of Donald Trump’s lies and the egregiously false claims peddled by the Brexit camp during the EU referendum such as the weekly £350m sum allegedly paid to Brussels to be then used to fund the NHS; the claim that 75 million Turks would be able to come to the UK in the event of an impossible Turkish accession to the EU and Nigel Farage’s Breaking Point anti-refugee poster would be punished under this remit.[10]

Second, media non-profit news outlets and public service broadcasting providers which full the role of commitment to truth must be strengthened. Thirdly, regulation could force powerful information providers to become purveyors of truth. As examples of good practice, in June 2024, the European Commission released a preliminary finding that Elon Musk’s X platform deceives users by letting anyone pay for a verified account and was therefore in breach of the Digital Services Act. As a result, X could face fines of up to 6% of global revenue. Germany’s Network Enforcement Act of 2017 requires platforms with more than two million users to remove “clearly illegal” content.

Fourth, independent electoral commissions need powers to fact-check and correct false claims and block the most damaging misinformation and deepfakes in the run-up to elections when the vulnerability of truth to the risk of interference is at its most acute and the stakes for democracy are at their highest. Lastly, tech pioneers such as Factiverse and Fullfact in the UK are developing new tools combining artificial and collective intelligence to spot and access misinformation.[11]

Although, the proposal for an NICD is in its infancy, there can be doubt about the “epistemological crisis” facing Western democracies that Barack Obama warned of in November 2020 and which has heightened since then.[12] A possible vision for Burnham’s proposed information resilience department would be a multi-agency integration of the elements sketched out above by Geoff Mulgan into a stand-alone body with specified executive functions. First in its crosshairs should be the power and influence of Elon Musk who as the world’s richest person and owner of X has been the greatest superspreader of hate speech relating to immigration, multiculturalism and open support for far-right parties like Restore UK and the German AfD; the latter designated by German intelligence services as a threat to democracy and national security. For it is the truth that sets one free and protects one’s freedom.

References

[1] Dan Milmo and Robert Booth. Attacks on information PM’s plan to stem tide of falsehoods. The Guardian. 24 September 2026 p10.

[2] Defending Democracy. Britain’s National Centre for Information Defence against AI-driven Disinformation. 23 September 2026.

[3] Charlotte Mercer. Burnham announces new UK centre to combat hostile state disinformation. Ayes to the Right. 23 September 2026

[4] Ibid

[5] Ibid

[6] Ibid

[7] Geoff Mulgan. Right to Truth Project Syndicate. 14 August 2024

[8] Ibid

[9] Ibid

[10] Ibid

[11] Ibid

[12] Russian disinformation. A strategy of resilience has to recognise the complicity of domestic extremists. The Guardian Editorial 24 September 2026

⏩Barry Gilheany is a freelance writer, qualified counsellor and aspirant artist resident in Colchester where he took his PhD at the University of Essex. He is also a lifelong Leeds United supporter.

Burnham Declares War On Disinformation

Kate Yo ✍Tuesday 28/9/26: listening to the news the Garvaghy Rd spokesman that he had met with the Secretary of State and that it was constructive and friendly. Later that evening at after 10.5 the Spokesperson took to the megaphone to update the people on Garvaghy. This is the gist of what he said taken from the video made by the 1916 Societies.

The mediator was to be someone from outside Britain and Ireland someone with experience, perhaps the one used before from South Africa. An independent mediator. The British came back and wanted to bring ourselves the Orange Order and the British together to decide on the mediator. We responded this evening to say that's not how mediation works. Those involved in a dispute don't appoint a mediator. Look at it this way, the British pick one, the Orange Order pick one, and we pick one. That's not the way to do it. The British government should go out and recruit a mediator without the help of ourselves, or the Orange Order. Someone with no connection to here, outside Britain and Ireland and therefore completely independent, and independent in any decision they reach.

I reckon what the British are trying to do is line this up that we are going to be seen as the unreasonable ones, because I'm sure there's been more discussion between the British and the Orange Order than there has been with us. So over the next couple of days there'll be more exchanges between us and the government. But I bet that the British government already has its game plan in place. It's to make us be the unreasonable ones and to make the Orange Order look good. And it goes beyond Garvaghy Road because the Brit's know that the political process is already in crisis and that they need to be seen to give something to Unionism. For the DUP, UU, and TUV, and are using the process to make us the sacrificial lamb.

They are also doing this so that anything that happens on Sunday will be seen to be our fault. Now the British might think they are being smart but us telling youse the night will ensure that the move that the Brits are trying to make, at least youse will see it and understand it. It will not come as a shock. So the next couple of days we are going to have to try everything to try and avoid the Brits and their latest ploy. But I think that they have already decided on their game plan, just like Mo Mowlam did away back in the 90's. They've got their game plan and they are working out how to deliver that game plan and it's looking like Orange feet on Garvaghy Road. It's not the end of it because Orange feet on this road is not acceptable to this community. It will also not be acceptable to nationalist communities right across the north.

If the British government want to go down that road of wrecking the peace process let it be on their head. Because they already know what the result of a march on Garvaghy Road will be: people in Derry, Belfast, South Armagh and Dungiven. What they are trying to do is that the blame falls on us. I also believe that no announcement will be made until Saturday. And there is a reason for that, because you know yourself that there's damn all on TV except sport. The news programmes as you know are five minutes of news and a half hour of sport. Newspapers that are printed for Sunday go to print on Saturday afternoon. So once they make their decision and release it publicly the newspapers will have already been printed and the TVv will not be able to carry much about it. They have the whole thing timed out to a T.

Our defence here will be the support and the reaction of the six counties and probably beyond. As long as we stand united, as long as people are prepared to make this stand the Brits still have a big problem. One thing they will not be able to do is prevent what before here because this time round we know what to expect. We know there will be a battle, and the British know this time we learned lessons from the past, from almost 30 years ago. We are determined that this injustice will not go unopposed. So there's still a couple of days left to convince them.

This afternoon I was also speaking to two people from the Irish government and was telling them about our fears. All the nationalist political parties are behind us in this. As I say there's major repercussions for the British government if they go ahead with what appears to be their strategy. I am hoping that the Dublin government and the nationalist political parties here will make it known to the British government and the Secretary of State. that either this is a proper process or that there'll be major repercussions. Because nationalist parties will pull out of Stormont. But I'm not advocating any of that. That's up to them, to do it because there'll be major repercussions than the British realise.

I know it's not a good note, it doesn't sound good but believe me over the next number of days we are going to convince the British government that this is not about politics but this is about justice for this community and we have no intention of going back.

⏩Kate Yo is a Belfast book lover.

Mediation Policy Exposed 🪶No Going Back

Lynx By Ten To The Power Of Two Thousand One Hundred And Seven

 

A Morning Thought @ 3278

Packy Carty ✒ Whenever the mathematical reality of the Northern States demographic momentum and material inversion is laid bare, establishment commentators retreat to a single, comforting sanctuary: 

the growth of the Alliance Party. "People are moving beyond tribalism," the refrain goes. "The middle ground is taking over."

It is a convenient fiction, but a fiction nonetheless. The rise of the "neither" designation is not the birth of a new, post-constitutional identity. The party currently occupying that ground is Alliance, but what actually sits underneath it is a class alliance, not a resolved one — sections of the middle classes and the urban petite bourgeoisie on both sides of the sectarian divide, holding together for as long as their shared interests in stability, property, and professional advancement outweigh the pull of their separate national loyalties. It is not a homogeneous bloc waiting to be wooed wholesale by either side.

Start with the party's own voters. The University of Liverpool's 2024 general election survey found 68.1% of people who actually vote Alliance want to remain in the UK, against 31.2% who back Irish unity — on the electorate's face, a party that leans towards the status quo. But look past the voters to the people who've actually joined the party, and the picture changes completely. Research commissioned for the book The Alliance Party of Northern Ireland – Beyond Unionism and Nationalism found 38.1% of Alliance members support Irish unity, 27.6% want to remain in the UK, and 30.1% are undecided. Two surveys of the same party, pointing in different directions, is not evidence of a coherent political philosophy. It's evidence of a coalition of convenience — voters parking a decision they haven't made behind a party that isn't asking them to make it, and a membership already split three ways underneath. This piece isn't claiming that bloc will swing to a united Ireland on polling day. It's pointing out there is no "it" to swing at all — only a community raised, like every other, inside the sectarian structures of the northern state, whose eventual choice will follow the same two forces already at work everywhere else on this island: the community it was reared in, and which outcome actually serves it's material interests better.

Its growth has been built on a coalition of convenience, drawing middle-class professionals and younger voters who have temporarily parked the border question to focus on everyday governance. But when a border poll is triggered, the nature of material self-interest changes instantly. The question ceases to be "who fixes the potholes today?" and becomes "which state guarantees your healthcare, your real wages, your pension, and your children's access to the world's largest single market?" As established, the material balance of that calculation has already inverted toward the South.

The Alliance leadership knows this balance cannot hold. Naomi Long's shift toward suggesting the party might "step back" from a border poll campaign and treat it as a matter of individual conscience, with representatives free to vote as they wish, is a real retreat from her own 2022 position that Alliance would "undoubtedly" take a side eventually — an admission of structural vulnerability, not confident neutrality. Former Alliance leader John Alderdice put it more bluntly still: sitting on the fence is "not politically realistic," he argued, pointing to what he called an "almost inexorable trajectory towards a united Ireland." A party with genuinely no guidance to give on the single largest constitutional question in its country's history isn't rising above the divide. It's postponing the moment it has to pick a side of it.

The structural fault lines are already visible, and they run in both directions at once. When Carole Howard defected to the UUP, the word she reached for was "now" — she said she could "now openly and comfortably express" pro-Union views she evidently hadn't felt free to voice inside Alliance, a defection the party itself called "an act of bad faith." Months earlier, former councillor David Rossiter had walked the other way, resigning from the party in October 2024 because he could "no longer support a party that has not embraced the possibility of a new Ireland." Rossiter didn't just leave quietly. He pointed directly at the same membership poll cited above and accused his own former leadership of sitting on it deliberately, telling the Irish News he assumed the party "took a strategic decision not to engage further in order to protect their unionist leaning voter base" — happy, in his words, to take nationalist votes in swing seats without ever reciprocating by acknowledging what a third of its own members actually wanted. One defector leaving because the party wouldn't let her say she was pro-Union. Another leaving because it wouldn't act on how pro-unity a third of its own membership actually was. That's not a coherent centre. That's a fault line with people falling off both sides of it.

Perhaps the most tragic exposure of this internal contradiction was the experience of Anna Lo. From an Alliance perspective a progressive, pro-European, anti-sectarian figure who ought to have represented their permanent future of "civic" politics in the North, Lo was hounded out of political life by loyalist intimidation after daring to describe a united Ireland as economically logical. Her exit was the canary in the coal mine: it proved that when the constitutional pressure ratchets up, the polite veneer of "neither" vanishes, and the underlying state mechanics reassert themselves.

When the border poll is eventually called, that class alliance comes apart. Alliance will not navigate the referendum as a neutral mediator, nor will it successfully convince its own divided membership to look the other way. The party will splinter along the same fault line running through the rest of the North — its pro-Union wing drifting back to the UUP or DUP to defend the status quo, its progressive and younger cohorts moving toward the material logic already laid out in my second article.

The "middle ground" is not a new political tribe destined to anchor the 1921 settlement forever. It is a cross-sectarian arrangement of convenience among people who share a class position but not a nation, raised the same way as everyone else in this artificial statelet and watching the same clock. Anna Lo's departure was their warning. The actuarial and material numbers already established are what's still ticking. The only remaining question is whether Alliance breaks apart before the referendum begins or during the count.

⏩ Packy Carty is an East Tyrone Socialist Republican. 

The Non-Aligned Of Brigadoon

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