Sandra Chapman: Maybe Suella Braverman could be chosen to tackle the shortcomings of the British government in Ulster

One daily newspaper had a headline `the public deserves better than infantile regression’. Now, I couldn’t have put it better myself.

I had rather liked the smarter-than-all-the-men-put-together Stella Braverman but I’m convinced the Tories don’t know how to deal with a smart woman in their midst so they move them aside as they did with Ms Braverman and go back to the past, in this case David Cameron who smiled and chatted a lot but achieved nothing substantial or memorable when he was in power.

Some of the headlines for this current historic disaster are choice. I wouldn’t have the nerve to put them into print lest I would be sued. But many of our national press commentators are priceless and get braver by the year.

Bravery is essential in this day and age. I’m married to a retired newspaper man who’s been through all the British elections including our own in recent decades and he has been left with no respect whatsoever for politicians. Not even Margaret Thatcher, whom I respected. As for our Ulster politicians – I made sure I never raised their shortcomings in his company.

The Rwanda issue – now stalled – when illegal migrants were to be sent to the place none of us has ever heard of but was a key pledge of the current Prime Minister Rishi Sunak – is now going nowhere. So is smiley Foreign Secretary David Cameron going to make a better job of it since it’s bound to part of his writ?

I suppose it’s enough to say that politics is a nasty business. Has the current lot in power in London improved our country in any way? Will the female politicians continue to be downgraded in favour of the men or will the smart Ms Braverman come back one day waving a big stick to put them in their place?

The sickening thing is that other Tories – well known ones amongst them – are now weighing in on her so-called short comings. So there you have it; our country is dripping with endless political shortcomings. Sometimes great ideas emerge and we cheer up. But then a falling-out happens, the cosy nest is shaken to its core, the boss won’t have any alternatives and the so-called trouble makers get the boot. The process has to start again and a new face is brought in to calm the rebel-rousers.

In this case it’s David Cameron who, in my book, did little or nothing for Northern Ireland when it needed British Government support. Who kows he might even achieve the top job of PM again, in which case many of us might think the best thing to do would be to leave the country.

There will be lots of old Tories- some of them former cabinet members - who will be gloating over the failure of Ms Braverman but if one was to sit down and work out what each has achieved one would find very little of any worth . And maybe that’s why our country is in the state it’s in. There is the suggestion that Braverman was after the PM’s job. If she feels like a change maybe we should invite her over here to see if she can knock some sense into certain people whom I’m convinced are holding our province back.

Co Antrim’s Hidden Village is a precious part of our history

Part of our beautiful Antrim coast road is a mess of mud and rubbish after the recent storm took two goes at whipping its beauty out of shape. Nature does that from time to time without even consulting us.

Methinks it goes back a long time ago to when the main road didn’t really exist, rather it was a well worn path created by the locals who lived up in the hills in little hovels.

Occasionally there was a market in the nearest town. Getting to it might have involved harnessing up the family donkey and setting a day aside to make the 12- mile journey to the nearest inhabited town.

I know of one such village – it’s called the Hidden Village –stretching several miles to the nearest town. It would have been a long rough walk to get there.

How people lived in it requires much imagination. These were tiny little hamlets which had to house a number of families and maybe also the donkey which was their only mode of transport. This hidden village is nature’s gift to us to show us how people had to live when there was no mode of transport other than the four legged variety. The natural landscape is stunning, cliffs stretching upwards, little drains which carried water down those hills and grassy areas where the vegetables and potatoes were grown.

Keeping fires going for cooking would have meant long treks into the hills for wood and its likely potatoes and other vegetables were grown. I first heard of the village when I moved to this area to live. Now the tourists flock to it and they too must wonder how civilisation back then thrived in this hidden landscape.

The Hidden Village as we know it is big tourist attraction. After our recent storm I’m wondering how those early settlers survived.