Category: Northern Ireland life

Drugs, Health, HIV, Northern Ireland life, politics1 Comment

time to call a halt on the war on drugs

Michael McFarland Campbell

For many politicians there are many policies to which they refer as “Wars on X”. In recent years, most notably we have the “War on Terror”, and the “War on Drugs”. When the former was used by President George W. Bush,

to denote a global military, political, legal and ideological struggle against organizations designated as terrorist and regimes that were accused of having a connection to them or providing them with support or were perceived, or presented as posing a threat to the US and its allies in general. It was typically used with a particular focus on militant Islamists and al-Qaeda” militant Islamists and al-Qaeda.

(from War on Terror (my emphases in bold)) Continue reading “time to call a halt on the war on drugs”

Belfast, news, Northern Ireland life, Regional Development, TransportLeave a comment

well they do say things come in threes…

Michael McFarland Campbell
The failure of ticketing machines hopefully will be sorted in the weeks to come.

Yesterday I had to make several different journeys using Translink services. I travelled from the Mater Hospital into Belfast city centre, then up to near Queen’s University and back, back home, and finally by train to Ballymena.

Fortunately, I could telephone the Translink callcentre to get the information that I would normally have obtained from the website – as it was the first of the failures. Continue reading “well they do say things come in threes…”

news, NIO, Northern Ireland lifeLeave a comment

Guide Dog to be trained in N. Ireland thanks to HMP Maghaberry’s donation of £5,000

Michael McFarland Campbell

Amidst the wrangling over the devolution of Policing and Justice to the Northern Ireland Assembly this week the news that HM Prison Maghaberry has made a charity donation of £5,000 to the Guide Dogs charity will probably have been so far under the radar that most of Northern Ireland won’t have seen it. Let’s hope that the good that comes from the deal reached at Hillsborough Castle, will be just as beneficial to the community as the Guide Dog that will come from this donation. The Guide Dogs charity have said that this donation will make it possible for a … Continue reading Guide Dog to be trained in N. Ireland thanks to HMP Maghaberry’s donation of £5,000

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Belfast, Gaeilge, news, Northern Ireland lifeLeave a comment

Assembly committee wants townland names in official addresses!

Michael McFarland Campbell

Townlands in our addresses

It seems that the Culture, arts and leisure committee at Stormont is managing to tackle real issues. Today there is a call from the Committee to use townland names in postal addresses. They are saying that the address for the Northern Ireland Assembly would now be:

Continue reading “Assembly committee wants townland names in official addresses!”

Northern Ireland lifeLeave a comment

Common courtesy missing at Ballymena Station!

Michael McFarland Campbell

It is clear that on occasion people in this part of the world can be just downright rude. Take today, I was getting off the 3.14 train from Béal Feirste/Belfast to Doire/Londonderry in An Baile Meánach/Ballymena and there were about thirty people on the platform waiting to board the train. Unfortunately, at the door where I was trying to get off, they just hurded themselves into a group and stood opposite the door, right close to the train and there was nowhere for me to stand had I been able to get onto the platform. It’s probably time that Translink … Continue reading Common courtesy missing at Ballymena Station!

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