They're coming from all sides today.

O'Neill's ever-watchful eye has picked up that Wales's GVA per head is only 77% of the UK average, (down from 79% when the Assembly was set up in 1999 and 84% back in 1991) despite receiving more than £1bn of EU aid to boost economic activity, placing them firmly at the bottom of the UK league table. Never mind, as long as the Bank of England, the Olympic Delivery Authority and the Carbon Trust have to "deliver services" in Welsh, what does wealth matter?

Meanwhile, in Northern Ireland where the GVA is 81% of the UK average (that figure is unchanged since 1997 and currently sees us tying with north-east England for second-last spot), devolution seems to be having similar levels of success. According to a MORI poll conducted last month (spotted by Chekov in a report in the Belfast Telegraph):

• 21% of people polled think the Executive has done a good job in the last year since it was reinstated while 28% rated their collective performance as poor.
• 72% of people asked thought devolution had failed to make any difference on their lives.
• 46% thought devolution had had no impact on Ulster's economy and 10% thought it had made it worse.
• The Health Service fared even worse: 67% thought devolution had had no impact, while 16% thought devolution had improved it and another 16% thought it had made it worse.

The BBC's Mark Devenport claims the "most obvious achievement of the current executive is that it is still in existence" and our own First Minister yesterday extolled the current setup as "not perfect and not wholly democratic, but the best [he] could get for the people of Northern Ireland" - not exactly glowing recommendations, are they?

Perhaps now would be a good time to reflect on the bill for devolution.

A few successes at the US:NI investment conference yesterday, despite the worrying economic outlook in the United States.

US company CyberSource have announced they will be creating 20 new jobs (rising to 60 in three years) in a new research centre to be based in Northern Ireland. Belfast-based financial services company Wombat, recently purchased by the New York Stock Exchange, will also be creating 77 new jobs. Bombardier Aerospace are investing £70m to underpin 1000 jobs at Belfast engineering firm Shorts, mostly to work on parts of the new CRJ1000 lower-emissions short-haul aircraft (although £10m of that is coming from from Invest NI).

The numbers may be small but I'd hazard a guess that, long-term, 100-150 well paid graduate jobs will prove much more significant than employing 800 battery hens in the north-west (although I suppose anything is better than the Derry Disability Living Allowance).

So, are Invest NI setting their sights too low by opening an office in Mumbai to attract more Indian firms to create call centre jobs here? Or are they just aiming for what's achievable?

I got really pissed off with Queen's University in my last year or two, specifically with the School of Computer Science (as was), despite the university being short-listed for Sunday Times University of the Year in my graduation year, and it really made me regret not setting my sights higher on my UCAS forms. If Northern Ireland's supposed top university is that bad it makes one wonder what the competition is like. Now we know.

The UU's Magee campus is so shite the university feels the need to bribe students with £3,000 grants to take their Computer Science courses at the campus. The question is: is it the university itself that prospective students are turning their noses up at, or is it simply the idea of living in Londonderry just that repellent?

It wouldn't be the first time I've been accused of taking a short term or simplistic view of a situation, but I can't help but think there might be a silver lining to today's reports that the co-ownership scheme, which helps first-time buyers get on the property ladder by allowing them to buy part of their home and rent the rest, is to stop taking applications after committing to help 500 people next year, and thereby using up their budget.

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Everyone likes some good news once in a while so here it is. On the day when the Grosvenor road junction on the Westlink opened, regional development minister Conor Murphy said the Westlink upgrade might be completed up six months ahead of schedule, which is excellent news for those of us who use the busy road on a regular basis.

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Some time ago I gave a few examples of practical, everyday benefits of being a part of the United Kingdom as distinct from the Republic of Ireland. I've stumbled across further examples on a semi-regular basis since then, but I couldn't believe that the iPhone hadn't been released (officially) in "Ireland" [sic] yet.

Apparently there are a few complaints that the price of the iPhone in the rip-off Republic is going to be even higher than the price in the United Kingdom (of rip-off Britain and rip-off Northern Ireland) when it is finally launched down south (where it also looks like being an O2 exclusive), just 4 months after UK consumers got their mits on the device.

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A review of Northern Ireland's MLA's pay is expected to recommend a 16% pay-rise, taking the MLA's basic salary to £52,000. MLAs will themselves then vote on whether or not to accept the recommendation.

That's clearly not going to do much to help reduce the cost of Stormont, and is completely unjustifiable in the current economic conditions and comes at a time when the Prime Minister is urging MPs to show restraint on their own pay.

A Sinn Fein MLA has already said her party will oppose the pay-rise as out-of-line with both inflation and the pay-awards other public-sector workers are being asked and/or forced to accept. Well done them. Let's see if anyone else follows suit (all the parties' websites seem silent on the issue).

A heart-warming act of friendship in Ballymena today as Northern Ireland's First Minister Ian Paisley and the prime minister of the Republic Bertie Ahern got all cozy and loved-up during a visit by the latter to the former's constituency.

Paisley described it as a "Good day for the whole of Ireland" as the two men met at the Galgorm Hotel to discuss the promotion of tourism, an area on which there is a large degree of North-South co-operation.

Former DUP man Roy Gillespie (yes, that Roy Gillespie) wasn't so pleased. He unfurled a Union Jack outside (err.. why?) and sent his wife in apparently to confront Paisley's wife, Eileen.

I'm disappointed in Jim Allister. The man seems to be a useful politician in terms of finding things out and getting things done (or maybe he's just a good opposition politician, he did learn from the best after all). Allister claimed that "spectacle at Galgorm is yet another manifestation of the dramatic intensification in north/southery which is occurring under devolution."

The problem is that the only "spectacle" is the one Roy Gillespie made of himself and, by extension, unionism generally by acting the maggot today. Sometimes co-opertation with the Republic is going to be advantageous. Tourism has the potential (I don't think co-operation here is working at present) to be one area in which this is the case. Simply decrying North-South co-operation in and of itself doesn't help distinguish where it's good and where it's bad, it only serves to allow its proponents to dismiss your criticism even when it's valid.

It also hides the real question raised by today's visit. If Paisley's right to host a visit from the Republic's premier today, why was it appropriate for Paisley to throw snowballs at Sean Lemass's car when then Prime Minister Terence O'Neill invited Lemass to Stormont forty years ago??

Just stumbled across this: apparently house prices in Northern Ireland have fallen by 10% recently and there are thought to be nearly 50,000 Ulster dwellings lying empty.

Plans are now being made to charge rates on empty dwellings (long overdue if you ask me) which will hopefully have a significant impact on the number of developers holding on to empty properties in the hope they increase in value, at the same time artificially limiting supply and inflating prices.

It does make you wonder if all that headline-grabbing extra money for "social housing" wasn't a bit premature, but as someone who's hopefully going to be buying in the next couple of years I'll not complain too much. What'll have more of an impact, I wonder: 5,000 'affordable' (state-subsidised) homes or the owners of 50,000 properties facing the threat of rates?

It's been over a year since my original look at the Northern Ireland Delivery Rip-Off so, given the popularity of that post, I thought it was past time I looked at the whole matter again. The scenario is simple - I want a small computer peripheral or component delivered to my Northern Ireland address. The problem is most of the companies with the best prices (even accounting for mainland UK delivery costs which are the only ones included in price comparison sites), often have the largest penalties or "surcharges" if you want your items delivered to Northern Ireland. The result is it's difficult to tell who is best for getting individual smaller items delivered to Northern Ireland, so I've done a little investigating.

This time I've added a few extra retailers bringing the total to 13. I've used the same wireless card as last time for the test product (although I don't recommend it, the WG311 is awful; if you need a wireless card try a Linksys WMP54G).

Anyway, here's how the results looked.

Pos.	Retailer	Item Price	Std. Delivery	NI Delivery	Total	Change
* Mplex and Overclock did not stock the Netgear WG311 so similar alternatives are used as the example product. indicates Northern Ireland delivery charge has been reduced since September 2006. indicates Northern Ireland delivery charge has increased since September 2006. NEW indicates the company was not included in the 2006 results.
1	Amazon	£18.99	£0.00	£0.00	£18.99	-
2	Overclock.co.uk *	£18.68	£4.70	£4.70	£23.38	£0.24
3	Mplex *	£15.00	£10.00	£5.00	£20.00	NEW
4	Komplett	£18.51	£6.75	£6.75	£25.26	-
5	Aria	£20.74	£4.69	£4.69	£25.43	NEW
6	Dabs	£19.01	£3.81	£8.51	£27.52	£7.75
7	ebuyer	£18.99	£2.57	£10.27	£29.26	£11.63
8	OCUK	£25.84	£3.51	£3.51	£29.35	£5.95
9	Play.com	£29.99	£0.00	£0.00	£29.99	NEW
10	Misco	£22.31	£4.69	£11.74	£34.05	£5.89
11	Novatech	£19.40	£2.93	£17.03	£36.43	-
12	Scan	£19.92	£7.17	£18.74	£38.66	£0.24
13	Saverstore	£20.15	£3.51	£27.00	£47.15	£9.97

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