John Hunter's column: Auld habits die hard in Ulster's play for power

AS JOHN Reid eases himself gently into the Ulster hot-seat, I'm modestly congratulating myself for predicting way back last summer that he would succeed Mandelson.

An inspired guess, certainly, but it was no secret that as Edinburgh's Assembly firmly got into its stride, Reid was finding his Scottish Secretary position increasingly redundant.

At which point, he very obviously started putting his neb into Ulster affairs at Westminster.

Who better to give the Stormont parliament a reviving kick in the posterior than a man with one Assembly up and running?

Quite clearly, Reid has been in Tony Blair's mind for some time as a likely Belfast contender, although the Prime Minister probably intended the swap-over to take place following a late February London recall for Mandy to direct May General Election strategy.

Also in the frame were Welsh Secretary Paul Murphy and, of course, Adam Ingram.

Murphy was also transferred to Belfast under the Mowlam regime, then subsequently promoted to the Wales job.

Unmarried, a strong anti-abortionist, the fact that Paul Murphy is also a Papal Knight of St Gregory may have been seen as a trifle too colourful for Belfast's top job in current delicate times.

Dr Reid is also a Catholic, and moreover a strong Celtic fan, but possibly in Blair's view he is seen as the ideal balance for Adam Ingram, a former Scottish Orangeman and Glasgow Rangers follower.

In a patronising New Labour way, the doughty duo may be intended as a useful lesson in co-existence to the warring natives.

I wonder if they'll have to travel on separate Larne-Stranraer ferries to Celtic-Rangers matches as local fans are obliged to?

Reid, who also happens to be very much a Unionist in the Scottish sense and a strong Army supporter, has yet to receive either blessing or condemnation from Rev Paisley.

But who can forget Paisley's protest when he heard that Mo had invited Elton John to perform at Hillsborough.

"Now she's bringing in the Sodomites," he grunted. Within weeks, Mandelson arrived.

Mind you, Mandy, now broken on the basis of a porkie, had a curious tolerance of other sinners on the same issue.

He declared in the Commons last May that IRA statements "have a sort of rugged honesty about them".

Ironic, also, that as the SoS departed on a passport-row, Belfast gay Nigel McCollum lost a court case to allow his Brazilian boyfriend to live in the U.K.

I'm sure Peter's partner, Brazilian Reinaldo Avila da Silva, has a perfectly valid British visa, and so too does Ms Karene Adler, John Reid's colourful Brazilian girlfriend.

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