30th Jun 2008
Irish Times joins the free web and NI parties look to Europe
The Irish Times today goes free to view on the World Wide Web and not a day too soon. I posted previously about the irony that a decade ago the Guardian website and Ireland.com competed for roughly the same market share. That all changed with GuardianUnlimited went free stealing the march on the other major independently owned, progressive broadsheets in Britain and Ireland.
I have no doubt the Irish Times online readership will increase and increase exponentially from today and that Ireland’s share of voice in the digital and social media space will also increase as Irishtimes.com stories become available to share. To get the ball rolling on O’Conall Street, there is a story today about the IDA warning the southern government of the potential threat to foreign direct investment from the North which is well worth a read.
One of the first significant opportunities for the Irish Times to increase its profile in global terms will come when the government takes the inevitable decision to rerun the Lisbon Treaty referendum.
Meantime and much closer to home the ‘big four’ political parties north of the border are now turning their attention to the selection of candidates for the European elections next June. I can see no reason why Bairbre de Bruin will not be on the Sinn Fein ticket and Jim Nicholson should be safe as the UUP standard bearer. As for the DUP and the SDLP, things are still very much in the air.
The SDLP is under real pressure of identify a candidate capable of a credible run. The party may also want to take the opportunity to test possible future more permanent arrangements with other partes on this island. The nomination process was reopened last month and members have until the end of August to nominate with a selection convention / special conference rescheduled September 20th in Belfast. It will be interesting to follow the debate over the summer. Will the only pro Europe party in the North opt for a seasoned stalwart or is their an outsider waiting in the wings? Either way the succesful nominee will face a long uphill marathon run to put him or herslf in the final shakeup.
Peter Robinson will not be looking forward to this particular election. Jim Allister will vigoroulsy defend his seat from the dissident DUP corner. There has been some talk that Edwin Poots might be the DUP nominee. On the other hand a William McCrea, Lord Morrow or even Ian Paisley Junior could make formidable challengers for the Belfast barrister.
With a more fragmented unionist field then ever before and Sinn Fein on the back foot on issues like education this may be the most open European Parliament Election since 1979.
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