[Stoat]

Northern Ireland Office -- About the NIO - Biographies - Peter Hain MP

PETER HAIN MP

Secretary of State for Northern Ireland

Peter Hain MP was appointed Secretary of State for Northern Ireland in May 2005. He retains his responsibilities as Secretary of State for Wales.

Peter Hain was first elected as Member of Parliament for the Neath constituency in April 1991. Since 1997 he has held the post of Minister in the Welsh Office, Minister for Africa in the Foreign Office, Minister for Energy at the DTI and Minister for Europe at the Foreign Office. He was promoted to the Cabinet in October 2002 when he became Secretary of State for Wales. He became Leader of the House of Commons in June 2003 while retaining his position as Secretary for Wales.

Mr Hain achieved international prominence as a result of his work in the anti-apartheid movement. He played a leading role in the campaign to secure a 'Yes' vote in the 1997 devolution referendum in Wales. He is a former head of research with the Union of Communication Workers and a former chairman of the Tribune newspaper. He was made a Labour Whip in 1995.

Born in Nairobi and brought up in South Africa, Mr Hain was educated at Pretoria Boys High School, University of London and Sussex University.

Hain, Peter Aristotle Guardian Unlimited Politics

Peter Hain
Member of Parliament for Neath
Party: Labour

Secretary of state for Northern Ireland and Wales

Peter Hain says: On his proudest achievement in parliament since 1997: "Playing a key campaigning role in winning the referendum for a Welsh assembly and achieving a huge 30% swing from the crushing "no" vote in 1979."

(in Labour Activist, June 1980): "The left is now dominant in the party in a way that we have never been before; we don't control the party - yet - but we have to try to run it."



Others say: Martin Kettle, the Guardian: "Hain has always been something of a lone ranger, and his fame and flair win him enemies even among his colleagues, even today"
 

[Stoat]

His apology came despite the fact that ports here were closed to slavery and citizens of Belfast blocked an attempt to establish a slaveship company in the city assembly's room in the 18th century.

(edit)

"....there was no association between Northern Ireland and the slave trade," said the DUP's Sammy Wilson."
 

It's one thing to apologize for something that you've done; it's quite another to apologize for something that you didn't do....particularly when you're apologizing on behalf of other people and when history indicates that they are innocent.

The Left thrives on guilt and emotionalism, and whether the guilt is valid or not appears to be irrelevant in so very many cases.

Mr Noble said "the modern-day slavery that is human trafficking" is more prevalent than the slavery experienced prior to the abolition of the shameful practice in 1807.

I knew that the level of modern slavery was very bad, but I hadn't heard it put into this perspective before. 

<<<Listening to the remarkable silence on this issue from American race-hustlers and slavery banner-wavers such as Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton

[Jedi Master Pikachu]

Aren't England, Scotland, and the Irish Republic as complicit as Northern Ireland and Wales? They were all run by the same government.

[Jedi Master Pikachu]

How come Wales and Northern Ireland have a single Secretary of State?

[Chode]

just exactly WHO was he apologizing too anyway... and who was there to accept it???

or is this just more political masturbation?

[Irish_Thatcherite]

Thanks for the ping, Stoat! :)

I'm convinced Peter Hain (still) smokes weed!

Any apology from him concerning the fact he turns a blind eye to the paramilitaries' ongoing enslavement of their respective ghettos in NI?

Ireland Ping!