Everything Ulster - Election 2005

WILL the average Joe be able to tell the difference in post-election Northern Ireland, whether the DUP/UU top the Unionist vote, whether Sinn Fein beat the SDLP in the nationalist one, or who wins overall?

My prediciton is no. For all the money and effort spent electioneering, the parties seem to largely ignore the big issues that actually affect people on the ground. What of Belfast and Northern Ireland's ever growing waste problem? What of punishment beatings, as news broke yesterday that the IRA have appointed someone in North Belfast to deal out their own brand of justice to 'anti-social elements' there? What of the fact that the police and the ARA seem petrified of organised crime - only moving in to act once the perpetrators have been ousted from their gang? All these stories were reported in the local press over the weekend.

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