Normally as a nationalist businessman I stand out from my colleagues in actually liking Jeffrey Donaldson – though I must admit to finding it difficult to agree with his views.
A month ago he said that we should not get hung up on having devolution and there are many business people looking at the speed and quality of decision making by direct rule ministers like Ian Pearson who may agree. But the reality is that Jeffrey likes devolution just as much as the DUP and the rest of his colleagues in the UUP – if not why did he fight so hard to be selected to stand for the Assembly?
Yet at the weekend he best demonstrated why maybe we as nationalists and business people should not get too hung up on devolution either.
Apparently he has got himself in a lather over the PSNI awarding a catering contract to a company from the Republic.
Leaving aside his political standpoint on the issue, he makes a ludicrous comment that this decision will cost jobs in the north within local firms who could have provided the same service.
When I heard this I thought: "Is the earth really flat and does planet Orange actually exist?"
If this is the logic and economic vision that local politicians bring to the table then they are destined to do for business what Robert Maxwell did for pensions.
In this column I very publicly challenged former economy minister Sir Reg Empey on the appropriateness of taking an over-hyped trade mission to the USA shortly after September 11 and in the middle of one of the worst economic downturns the USA has ever seen.
He disagreed by rebuking me through his press office. However, in the light of Jeffrey's contribution to the economic debate I now believe Sir Reg to be the most imaginative, bold and enterprising minister we ever had.
Just imagine if next time around at the Stormont 'rumble in the jungle' it is Jeffrey as enterprise minister at the Assembly (as he already is, wait for it, the UUP trade and industry spokesperson at Westminster).
The beating heart of the entire Northern Ireland business community will stop if and when Sir Reg accepts the poisoned chalice of leadership from Trimble and he leaves the economy in the hands of someone so opposed to the principle of free trade.
If taken to its logical conclusion where would this statelet be if the government of the Republic of Ireland, or its agencies and businesses, reciprocated with such nonsense? Would Grahams have built the motorways in the south?
Would Harland and Wolff have refurbished the Dublin landmark of the Halfpenny Bridge? Or would the Dublin financial community have invested so heavily in what's left of NI's listed stock or property market because they don't like the politics north of the border?
Not to be out done is this 'tangoed' economic logic, he was joined by Sammy Wilson (apparently an economics teacher) who wants the Policing Board to launch an inquiry into the awarding of the contract because it takes millions of pounds out of the Northern Ireland economy at a time when many people find themselves on the dole.
Apart from being so obviously politically schizophrenic on the wider issue of inquiries, this type of debate is really is tribal politics at its worst!
Not since Peter Robinson and his toytown raid at Clontibret, when after his incarceration he refused to eat any southern food, has anything so ridiculous hit the headlines. But more worryingly is the silence of the saner voices of Ulster Unionism who ran the economy in the assembly.
Where are the voices of those who worked on all-Ireland trade missions and worked to promote exports?
Where are the business leaders in the Institute of Directors or Chambers of Commerce who should be blasting this tripe for what it is? Where are the trade union leaders who should be condemning slurs on workers and irrational comments that may set workers up for sectarian attack?
August is the silly season and making news headlines is easy. But this type of comment from senior Unionist politicians passing unchallenged by business or media is not acceptable.
There is a danger in allowing politicians to make political capital out of serious issues that involves jobs and livelihoods.
We are supposed to have left the Troubles behind but some people don't seem able or indeed want to live outside the self-imposed sectarian cage that Northern Ireland has become over the past 30 years.
Have we reduced ourselves to a form of thinking that says Newry shoppers should be checking Portadown sausages for Cemtex?
Northern Ireland, or the north, is the size of Greater Manchester. It is not a country and it is provincial in the very real and limiting sense, as outlined by the poet Patrick Kavanagh.
Jeffrey has provided a very good case against devolution and it is the mindset of those who are seeking election.
He is not alone, as on both sides there are vast amounts of money being wasted on programmes which are nothing more than sweeteners to satisfy political agendas and that do not stack up economically. The future economic success of the north cannot depend on political leadership but it evidently does not exist.
Both Sammy and Jeffrey have a point that many people in Northern Ireland do find themselves on the dole at this moment and for most of them it is not of their own making.
Many of those who are unemployed are skilled people who have much to offer prospective employers.
The same cannot be said of those we entrusted with our hopes and aspirations in the shape of the assembly and the Good Friday Agreement.
They squandered our trust and their mandate, God only knows why they are in such a rush for us to renew it.
Those like Sammy and Jeffrey want have their cake and eat it too. Only in the Lilliput that is the north would they be allowed to have it!
