Tommy Greene

My two cents on where things stand at Lough Neagh, after a rare interview the media-wary Earl of Shaftesbury gave to the Irish News (published last Saturday).

Who decides the lough's future and who *really* holds the power in this equation?

Some analysis here 👇

The podcast where I tried to explain the fallacy of market-led climate action via the use of Whale Shit.
Full interview here: www.patreon.com/posts/patron...
Apologies to @tommygreene.bsky.social

Hill Dickinson is a Liverpool institution. Long before sponsoring Everton's stadium, the law firm advised the White Star Line after the Titanic's sinking. However, one of the city's enduring success stories is now involved in a protracted legal battle that threatens its reputation.🧵

Did the booming firm remove whistleblowing protections in law from 54,000 NHS medics and from 865,000 agency workers across other sectors? How? And what has this got to do with contracts that landed in my inbox all the way back in 2019?

I try to tell this story today in @liverpoolpost.bsky.social

A doctor takes on the NHS – and its Liverpool law firm Hill Dickinson, Everton’s stadium sponsor, is accused of withholding critical information

How did the sponsors of Everton FC's new stadium - prestigious law firm Hill Dickinson, whose name is now recognisable to millions - find themselves an accused party within a high-profile NHS whistleblowing case sparked by intensive care deaths and understaffing? 👇

www.livpost.co.uk/a-doctor-tak...

Article refers to a 'closed-door process' that's largely been shaped by the Earl and a series of unaccountable intermediaries with no ties to LN.

Where is all that leading?

I reported on one recent approach here, made by a 'friend of Nick's', which may hold some clues 👇

bsky.app/profile/thed...

Succession: who should own Lough Neagh? The Earl of Shaftesbury says he’ll give Lough Neagh away for free.

A clear-eyed and accessible piece, following Earl of Shaftesbury's interview with the Irish News.

The aristocrat's choreographed and spin-heavy statements, it points out, bring more questions than answers (similar to his last media intervention in 2024):

rebekahmccabe.substack.com/p/succession...

PSNI admits illegally keeping journalist data and family names In September MI5 conceded it had breached Vincent Kearney's source protection and privacy rights by accessing his communications data.

It’s not just Labour together who were snooping on journalists.

Really feels like we need a proper investigation into how journalists have been surveilled and smeared

www.bbc.com/news/article...

Garda Powers Bill has puzzling treatment of journalistic privilege Surely the minister for justice wants the best protections for the rights of journalists in fulfilling their essential democratic role, writes Cian Ó Concubhair

.@irishexaminer.bsky.social has published 2nd of 2 pieces on Garda Powers Bill

It looks at journalistic privilege & how Gardaí will get search warrants against journalists

In short: there's a risk risk the Bill breaches the European Convention on Human Rights

www.irishexaminer.com/opinion/comm...

Episode 1: The Ireland Left Behind

A very interesting oral history project looking at questions of evolving identity and ties to (home)place. Stories of Irish women emigrating to London between the 1960s and 1990s told through a series of interviews/conversations between the various generations:

open.spotify.com/episode/09pJ...

Israel used weapons in Gaza that made thousands of Palestinians evaporate US-made thermal weapons burning at 3,500C caused 2,842 people to "evaporate" in Gaza, Al Jazeera investigation finds.

US-supplied internationally prohibited thermal & thermobaric munitions burning at 3,500C have left no trace of nearly 3,000 Palestinians, @aljazeera.com reveals. “We found nothing of Saad. Not even a body to bury. That was the hardest part,” says one mother. www.aljazeera.com/features/202...

PSNI curbs migrant victims’ data sharing with Home Office after ‘institutional racism’ concerns

The PSNI will stop sharing data on migrant victims of crime with UK immigration enforcement in all but “very specific and exceptional circumstances”, after admitting that its previous approach “could be perceived as constituting institutional racism”.

✍️ @lukejbutterly.bsky.social

Wind farms and carbon credits: ‘advanced’ plans over Lough Neagh’s future Lough Neagh provides half of Belfast’s drinking water and more than 40% of Northern Ireland’s overall supply

British investors have presented ‘advanced’ plans for Lough Neagh’s future.

Documents seen by The Detail show proposals that would reshape ownership and management of parts of Ireland’s largest inland waterbody.

✍️ @tommygreene.bsky.social

George Mitchell's name removed from scholarship over Epstein links George Mitchell chaired the talks which led to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998.

Queen's University Belfast cuts ties with George Mitchell, after Friday's Epstein files release

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

I’ve written this lengthy FT analysis overnight about the multiple multi-thousand pound Epstein payments to Mandelson’s husband

these particular paragraphs are worth reading slowly

www.ft.com/content/608a...

27th January marks the feast day of freshwater mermaid Lí Ban (who later became St Muirgen, Ireland's mermaid saint) - one of Lough Neagh's most captivating mythological figures:

It is publication today for Late Heaney I am told, although I imagine it’ll be a while before I see it between ice storms and the broad Atlantic. I thought I’d share a few thoughts about it, as it’s a different kind of book for me in form and style.

global.oup.com/academic/pro...

Engaging and urgent discussion around growing health inequalities and creeping privatisation at the launch of @viewdigital.bsky.social issue - on safeguarding public healthcare in the North.

Powerful contributions from Patricia McKeown (UNISON NI), Sara Boyce (@ppr-org.bsky.social) and others

Our Friends in the North 30 years on from the first episode of this groundbreaking drama, we take a closer look into the programme’s archive to reveal a time capsule of a turbulent era.

Our Friends in the North was first broadcast 30 years ago this week...

www.bbc.co.uk/historyofthe...

HMRC deemed risk ‘remote’ before wrongly cutting child benefit for thousands This was despite evidence from a pilot of the scheme showing travel data was wrong in 46% of cases

HMRC deemed risk ‘remote’ and 'tolerable' before wrongly cutting child benefit for thousands

This was despite evidence from a pilot of the scheme showing travel data was wrong in 46% of cases thedetail.tv/articles/hmr...

File claiming Gerry Kelly was key IRA figure in 1990s ‘removed from Dublin archives at request of Irish government’ A once-classified file which included a secret garda briefing note that claimed Sinn Fein’s Gerry Kelly was a key figure in the IRA in the mid-1990s has been recalled after being publicly released by ...

Declassified file claiming Gerry Kelly was key IRA figure in 1990s removed from Dublin archives at request of Irish government

m.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/norther...

If it's not regime change, and it's certainly not "law enforcement," let's just call it a nuclear-armed oil heist.

Venezuelan president Maduro captured and flown out of country following ‘large scale’ US attack, Trump says – live US president says ‘the United States of America has successfully carried out a large scale strike against Venezuela’

The world's biggest rogue state strikes again...

www.theguardian.com/world/live/2...

Former Wessex Water boss received £170,000 bonus despite ban on performance pay Company owners say bonus was unrelated to water business and complied with ban after pollution conviction

Private water company bosses in England still pocketing lucrative bonuses - £170,000 for a former Wessex Water chief, here - after criminal pollution failures on their watch.

This is in spite of Labour government's ban on performance-related pay...

www.theguardian.com/business/202...

Disappearing eels and the fight for a centuries-old livelihood Fishermen on the waters of Northern Ireland's Lough Neagh battle for their catch's future and a traditional way of life.

The case is being brought by a Dungannon law firm whose founder played a pivotal role in the creation of the Lough Neagh Fishermen's Co-Op during the 1960s and 1970s.

For more background to the Co-Op's story and to fishing at Lough Neagh 👇

www.aljazeera.com/features/202...

Lough Neagh fisherman taking Stormont department to court over response to pollution crisis A Lough Neagh fisherman is taking a Stormont department to court over its faltering response to the pollution crisis at Ireland’s largest inland water body.

Lough Neagh fisherman takes Stormont department to court over faltering response to pollution crisis at UK and Ireland's largest inland water body

m.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/environ...

NI Water’s pollution performance far below official figures, documents reveal