WHEN the South of Ireland joined the EU in 1972, was there blackmail involved? I ask because between 1973 and 2018, the South of Ireland received €40 billion from the EU.  Was that blackmail? “Join us and we’ll give you billions of Euro – don’t join us and you won’t get  a cent.”?

I‘d  venture to guess not a single person living in the South would interpret their joining as response to blackmail, any more than if an Irish farmer said to a neighbour, “If you give me that fine heifer in the field there, I’ll give you 530 cent per kilo for it. If you choose not to sell the heifer, of course, you will get nothing from me." Would the neighbour see the approach as being blackmail?  Hardly. It’s called deal-making.

So can we please hear no more rib-tickling remarks from hardline unionist politicians about the North being blackmailed, with the North missing out on £1 billion in levelling-up funds because we have no Executive to receive it. Sammy Wilson says that’s outrageous, they should give us the money anyway. Claire Hanna’s response to Sammy is one many of us can agree with: “It's laughable to hear the DUP talking about economic blackmail when they have been holding the people of Northern Ireland to ransom for the past year-and-a-half.”  The DUPers, Ms Hanna says, are providing “the perfect cover [for the British government] to leave our services and infrastructure to rot.”  

So will Jeffrey and his DUPers do a deal before Christmas that will bring them back to form an Executive? Not a chance. The British government, Jeffrey says, must produce “much more” than a piddling £2.5 billion, which by Tuesday had turned into £3.3 billion. So all that guff about the abomination of a sea border, the sacred integrity of the UK, not to mention Jeffrey’s seven tests – all that’s dropped out of the conversation. A matter of principle looks like it’s now turning into a matter of pounds. 

The DUP will postpone the evil day for as long as it can, but eventually, if not before Christmas then not too long after, we’ll see Sir Jeff leading his troops back in, heads down, shame-faced, trying not to hear the shouts of “What the hell kept you?”

But glass half empty, glass half full. While the return of the DUPers won’t wash away all our problems in education, in health, in infrastructure, at least the Assembly members will be tackling the job for which they were elected. And we will have access to the EU single market as well as to the UK market, something which should make NEI an attractive business location.

So over Christmas and the following weeks, expect the DUP to beg the Brits to pile more millions, maybe billions, into their begging bowl as the price of their return. It’s a bit like the story told by George Bernard Shaw about a man who offers a woman a huge sum if she will, um, spend the night with him. The woman’s eyes register dollar signs and she agrees. The man then suggests a drastically lower sum for the night and the woman is indignant: "What kind of woman do you think I am?” she asks.

“We’ve already established that,” the man tells her, “now we’re just haggling over the price."

Biodh Nollaig maith agaibh go leir. Happy Christmas, everyone.