A personal letter from News Letter Editor Ben Lowry
View email online | | | | | | Dec 18, 2021 | | | | | | Dear reader, It is now the darkest time of the year but from Tuesday, the winter solstice, the daylight will be returning. No wonder at a latitude as far north as Ulster we have been celebrating this point in the calendar since long before the birth of Christ. I write a brief piece about the joy of the solstice in this week's bumper weekend edition of the News Letter and Farming Life, and also a longer column about the hope that (I believe) is provided by the booster programme. https://www.newsletter.co.uk/news/opinion/columnists/ben-lowry-i-jumped-at-the-chance-to-get-my-booster-jab-this-week-3499753 Until they brought forward the dates, I would not have been eligible for a third jab until February. The vaccine programme is, like Furlough, a thing the UK has got right about Covid. But much about the pandemic response is contentious. On our front page today a veteran of the pubs trade in Northern Ireland says it is the worst time in the industry he remembers in decades. https://www.newsletter.co.uk/business/a-yuletide-lockdown-will-spell-bankruptcy-for-many-ulster-pubs-3499693 The talks over the Northern Ireland Protocol are off now until the new year but the DUP fears that London is softening its line against the Irish Sea border https://www.newsletter.co.uk/news/politics/dup-boris-johnson-is-weakening-and-backing-down-from-triggering-article-16-3499684 This week the Supreme Court ruled on the so-called hooded men case. One of our regular opinion writers, Dr WB Smith saw it as yet another propaganda victory for the IRA https://www.newsletter.co.uk/news/opinion/letters/the-uks-highest-court-hands-yet-another-propaganda-victory-to-irish-republicans-3498900 And the former IRA man Shane Paul O'Doherty contrasted the treatment of the hooded men with brutal republican use of torture https://www.newsletter.co.uk/news/politics/ex-provo-contrasts-hooded-men-case-with-ira-brutality-3497919 However, the hooded men did not win their case on all points and we will be examining the ruling in coming weeks, and the view that it was not too bad for the UK state. This weekend we serialise our latest extract from 'The Idea for the Union' in which Dr Graham Gudgin says nationalists have comprehensively and unfairly won the late 1960s propaganda battle over discrimination https://www.newsletter.co.uk/news/opinion/book-extract-claims-of-past-bias-against-catholics-are-greatly-exaggerated-yet-even-unionists-are-not-challenging-them-3499775 In other news, the Broughshane man Brian Gault, who was born with no arms after his mother took two Thalidomide tablets to treat morning sickness, picked up an MBE at Windsor Castle ... with his toes https://www.newsletter.co.uk/health/northern-ireland-man-brian-gault-is-star-of-show-at-honours-investiture-3492819 Our our sports back page today, we report on the first major football domestic final to be played in Northern Ireland on a Sunday next year: https://www.newsletter.co.uk/sport/football/northern-ireland/gerard-lawlor-wants-crowds-boost-in-biggest-ever-league-cup-final-3498809 In motorcycling, Peter Hickman and Brian McCormack will spearhead BMW Motorrad’s official roads challenge as the FHO Racing team gears up for North West 200 and Isle of Man TT in 2022. https://www.newsletter.co.uk/sport/motorcycling/peter-hickman-and-brian-mccormack-to-spearhead-fho-racings-isle-of-man-tt-debut-in-2022-3491867 Where sport meets politics, there is ongoing interest in the Northern Ireland football team anthem debate. This letter critical of Rory Best's comments on the affair is getting a lot of readers online: https://www.newsletter.co.uk/news/opinion/letters/rory-bests-comment-on-dropping-the-national-anthem-from-northern-ireland-football-matches-is-ill-timed-3498795 Farming Life stories include a report on guinea pigs that were left to die in an NI ditch - discarded in a bag for life https://www.farminglife.com/country-and-farming/guinea-pigs-left-to-die-in-ni-ditch-discarded-in-a-bag-for-life-3499011 And how the UFU says farmers have been thrown under the bus as UK agrees to trade deal quotas https://www.farminglife.com/country-and-farming/farmers-have-been-thrown-under-the-bus-as-uk-agrees-to-trade-deal-quotas-3499186 And there is, as always, so much more. The News Letter is printed daily this week except Christmas Day itself, Saturday, but the website will still be updated on December 25. Thank you for your continued interest in the world's oldest English daily newspaper. If you are not already signed up, there's huge value in a subscription to The News Letter, through which you can secure unfettered access to our news, sport, opinion and lifestyle journalism, all produced for you here by our team across Northern Ireland. You also get access to the content we are moving into a premium section, such as Henry McDonald's column today warning loyalists against false prophets https://www.newsletter.co.uk/news/opinion/columnists/henry-mcdonald-young-loyalists-should-beware-of-false-prophets-3499756 We hope you have a good week in the run-up to Christmas. Best wishes, Ben Lowry Editor, The News Letter | |
| | | | | | | | | | ‘A yuletide lockdown will spell bankruptcy for many Ulster pubs’ | | | | | | | | | | | | A veteran of Ulster’s pub trade says that right now is the most fearful moment he has known in over 30 years, with any renewed lockdown threatening to be the death knell of many of the Province’s pubs. | | | | | | Read more + | |
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