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Speaking in the Assembly, Sam Gardiner MLA, the local Ulster Unionist Assemblyman called on a major rebate system to be speedily devised to help older householders on fixed incomes.

“In my Upper Bann constituency, there are many older people living on fixed incomes and pensions but whose houses have risen in value with the current house price boom. This has meant they have big increases in their rates bill. They have no way to pay these new bills without selling their homes. This is unacceptable.”

“The fact that their home is now worth a lot more, makes no material difference to them. They will never see that value unless they sell their homes and that, for many, is unthinkable. They may be asset rich but their income stream may be incapable of absorbing new rates bills and water charges.”

“These homes are not just houses. They are family homes where many of these older people have lived all their lives. It is where many of them have brought up their families. There is something deeply personal about a person’s home – especially as they get older. They are filled with memories and have a real sense of place for the people who live there.”

“That is why a generous rates rebate scheme must be put in place as soon as possible by Peter Robinson the Finance Minister. There must be no foot dragging on this. It is time this Executive got to work.”

Rev Dr Robert Coulter, the Ulster Unionist Party Assembly member for North Antrim and UUP Stormont Commissioner, said constituents would “greatly benefit” from any future decision to scrap health prescription charges.

Dr Coulter, the UUP Health Spokesman, was speaking after backing a recent Assembly motion urging the Health Minister to establish a cost and benefit review aimed at abolishing health prescription charges as had been carried out in Wales.

The North Antrim MLA noted that in 1979, the prescription charge was 20 pence, yet by this year, it had reached £6.85.

“That is more than five times what might have been expected due to normal inflationary pressures. That simple arithmetical exercise shows how inflated prescription charges have become.”

Dr Coulter branded prescription charges as “a health tax”. He said this was why the Welsh Assembly – which had fewer devolved powers than the Stormont Assembly – had abolished prescription charges from 1st April this year.

“The purpose of levying prescription charges is now unclear. The income from them is negligible in overall terms. We must get away from continuing and perpetuating activities simply because we have always done them.

“Levying prescription charges is one of those survivals from past practice that no longer makes sound business sense for government.

“It may be argued that we need to get back to the founding principles of the National Health Service in this matter. The NHS, introduced in 1947, was a comprehensive health service that was free of charge at the point of need.

“If patients are treated free of charge at the point of need, medicines should also be free,” emphasised Assemblyman Dr Coulter.

Rev Dr Robert Coulter, the Ulster Unionist Party Assembly member for North Antrim and UUP Stormont Commissioner, had the honour of proposing and speaking on the first motion of the new legislative parliament when MLAs supported his call to rejoin the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association.

Dr Coulter said: “It was a tremendous personal honour for me when I was told I would be proposing the first motion for debate in the new Assembly. In the past, I have also had the privilege of representing the Assembly at CPA conferences in Australia and Wales.

“The success of this motion is an important milestone for the Assembly. In rejoining the CPA, the Assembly is re-entering the largest association of free and democratic parliaments across the world.

“This is an important statement for the Assembly to make. It says Northern Ireland is back on a sound democratic track and, once again, is a distinct part of that great democratic worldwide community.”

Dr Coulter said the CPA was founded in 1911 and was originally known as the Empire Parliamentary Association. It became the CPA in 1949.

Active CPA branches existed in 169 national, state, provincial and territorial parliaments across the Commonwealth, with a total membership of around 16,000 parliamentarians, he added, making the CPA “one of the greatest democratic forums on earth”.

The North Antrim MLA recently attended the annual conference of the British islands and Mediterranean region in Belfast, which was hosted by the CPA’s United Kingdom branch.

He said CPA membership would bring “real and tangible benefits” to Assembly members. “It will put them in the mainstream of a worldwide association and embed the Assembly where it rightly belongs – alongside other democratic legislatures.

“The time has come for our Assembly to take its place once again among our parliamentary friends and among the great community of nations and free people that make up this truly international body, spanning all continents and income levels and bound by a common heritage of democracy, liberty, justice and freedom under the law,” said Assemblyman Dr Coulter.

Newry and Armagh Young Unionists Representative and UUP Officer Kenny Donaldson has described as “insulting and anti-democratic” the contents of a leaked memo emanating from the new Sinn Fein DRD Minister Conor Murphy in which he is said to have banned his staff from calling the Province Northern Ireland.

At the behest of Mr Murphy, DRD staff must now refer to Northern Ireland as “here” or “the north”, while the Republic of Ireland is to be called “all Ireland” or “across the island of Ireland” and “Derry” must be used instead of “Londonderry”.

In a statement, Kenny said: “It’s absolutely intolerable that any Minister of the Northern Ireland Executive should seek to eradicate terminology specific to the very Region for which they are at service to. Conor Murphy along with his colleagues within the Republican Movement accepted Northern Ireland as a ‘legitimate territory of the United Kingdom’ when signing up for the Belfast Agreement, the consequent Saint Andrew’s Accord, and when taking the oath to serve as a Minister within the Northern Ireland Executive.

“Mr Murphy is guilty of political revisionism. He, along with his colleagues, are clearly embarrassed at the fact that they have sold out on their founding ‘so-called Republican principles.’ Northern Ireland is here and it is here to stay and any Minister of our Executive who should so blatantly seek to undermine this territory by giving it erroneous names should be hauled into line.”

He added: “Come on DUP, where are your much-vaunted accountability mechanisms? Do you care that your OFM/DFM partners are so intent upon undermining the very Region for which you claim to care so dearly for?”

UUP MEP Jim Nicholson has said that the EU must pass new laws on reducing mobile phone roaming charges before the summer holidays so that people from Northern Ireland can benefit from reduced tariffs when they are abroad.

Last night EU Member States and MEPs reached a preliminary deal on cutting mobile phone roaming charges, which would see the cost of calling home from another EU state set at a maximum of 49 euro cents (£0.34) and 24 cents (£0.16) to receive a call. These caps would drop a little in 2008, and more in 2009.

A vote is expected next Wednesday in the European Parliament, while EU telecommunication Ministers are due to consider the package on 7 June.

Speaking from Brussels Mr Nicholson said,

“It was important for the EU to get a grip on the spiralling cost of using your mobile phone abroad. I am sure that many people from Northern Ireland, whether they have been on holiday or on business, have been stung by huge mobile phone bills on their return.

“I hope that my fellow MEPs and European telecommunication Ministers formally back the compromise deal that was struck yesterday so that the new prices can come into force before the summer otherwise consumers will have to wait until the autumn.

“For far too long now mobile phone companies have been making excessive profits, at the consumer’s expense, on roaming charges. Such a vast difference in cost between domestic and international calls is unjustifiable and unacceptable in a single market. People already pay enough for their summer holidays and shouldn’t be hit with more high charges for using their mobile abroad.”

East Belfast Ulster Unionist and former Serviceman Michael Copeland today appealed to the media and those feeding the current frenzy surrounding the decision by the Ministry of Defence not to send HRH Prince Harry to Iraq to stop.

In a statement Mr Copeland said,

In my view this decision has been taken, not because of the danger posed to the Prince himself but to the danger posed to those around him by his presence.

I well recall during our own recent troubles being required to surrender my own ‘White Pips’ (insignia of rank) and light coloured puttees as they identified those of commissioned rank. Prince Harry is a young man, and like any young soldier will be extremely disappointed that he has not been permitted to accompany his men to this theatre of operations.

He is above all else a soldier and has received an order made by his superior officers which he must accept. The matter has not been helped by repeated media intervention and some of the comments from those that never served have not been helpful.”

UUP Victims Spokesman Derek Hussey today branded the creators of an internet based paramilitary game set in Northern Ireland as tasteless and insensitive.

The game, in which the objective is to become top dog among paramilitaries has provoked a strong response from victims and groups representing victims.

In a statement Mr Hussey said,

“This game really is in poor taste and those who have created it and who presumably are profiting from it are insensitive.

There is nothing glamourous or playful about paramilitarism in Northern Ireland. At a time when many victims are coming to terms with the new dispensation and politicians are trying to draw a line under the past, this type of nonsense does not help. I would urge the creators of the game to think again and remove it from the internet.”

Ulster Unionist Mid-Ulster MLA Billy Armstrong has said recent NHS changes in District Nursing Care are having a negative effect on patient care.

Mr Armstrong commented after inviting Dr Smith and Mrs Moira Doyle (Nurse) from Cookstown Heath Centre to Parliament Buildings yesterday for a meeting with Health Minister Michael McGimpsey.

In a statement Mr Armstrong said,

“I was approached by senior representatives at the Health Centre in Cookstown who are concerned at the effect that recent changes by the NHS on District Nursing Care are having on patient care.

Increased demands on administration and bureaucratic procedures are making it harder for patients to receive care because so much time is spent form filling. As a result the quality of service has reduced.

In palliative and terminal care the changes have led to a lack of continuity of care and a confusion of responsibilities. For terminal care in particular this is completely unacceptable when those dying need a sensitive and caring approach, not one driven by NHS Diktat.

In Cookstown other problems include a reduction in Treatment Room Care and out of hours services. It is alarming when health care professionals are so incensed and fed up with the changes foisted upon them that they feel they need political support. I am only too pleased to offer this support and I know from meeting with the Minister that he too is eager to listen to their concerns and act upon them.”

Ulster Unionist Member of the European Parliament Jim Nicholson MEP has said today that the new Northern Ireland Executive at Stormont must speak with one voice and demand that the Government at Westminster provide a secure future for the hundreds of rural post offices across Northern Ireland.

Mr Nicholson has written to the Northern Ireland Executive today urging them to make representations to the Government at Westminster about the issue.

The UUP MEP was speaking as the trade and industry secretary Alistair Darling is set to confirm today that about 2,500 post offices are to close by 2009.

Speaking from the Balmoral Show Mr Nicholson said,

“Make no mistake post office closures are going to hit Northern Ireland and its rural communities very hard. It will deliver a body blow to the economic and social sustainability of rural communities across the Province.

“This issue is of vital importance and one that the Executive at Stormont must deal with immediately. It is essential that the Executive speak with one voice to ensure a secure future for the hundreds of rural post offices across the Province threatened with closure.

“I would urge the Executive to consider working together with the devolved administrations in Scotland and Wales because after all rural communities across the UK will suffer under the expected closures. This is definitely an issue where the regions of the UK are all stronger working together than we are working apart.

“Post offices in isolated rural areas benefit the community. They are a central area where people can meet and in many cases if you take the Post Office out of the community, the community dies.

“For many people, particularly the elderly, the sick, parents with young families and those without immediate access to transport, the potential closure of so many post offices would have a major negative impact upon them and their everyday lives.”

Ulster Unionist Councillor Stephen Nicholl has condemned the Rev Ian Paisley for his Republican outburst against Her Majesty’s Ministers.

Speaking today Councillor Nicholl stated,

“Now that the hype of last week has died down we can take time to reflect on the many messages given but perhaps the most startling was the Rev Paisley’s outburst in which he stated

“Many of the problems are not of our making but are the making of squatters (Northern Ireland Office ministers), as I call them, from outside our country who flew in and flew out of here.”

Paisley’s adoption of such openly Republican language suggests that while his relationship with Martin appears very jovial and light hearted some of Martins Republican traits are rubbing off on Ian.

The term ‘squatters’ suggests illegal occupation; of course a key Republican position over the years has been that Government Ministers were illegally in Ireland. As to them coming from ‘outside our country’ unionists would view the United Kingdom as a national territory. While accepting that integration may be the purer form of unionism but that devolution provides more accountable government for the regions it is clear that we can never view Her Majesty’s representatives as ‘squatters’ within the United Kingdom ruled by her.

Since the joint tenants of the OFMDM both now believe, apparently, that the British Government held office here illegally what now is the future for the union. >From Paisley’s comments it would appear that we could well drift into a Home Rule scenario where his bitterness is focussed on Her Majesty’s Government while he looks for succour south of the border.

For Real Unionists the political struggle for the Union is only just beginning.”