Ben Lowry - Saturday reading

It was a beautiful afternoon in Belfast on Wednesday, sunny and warm, 19 Celsius, ahead of outdoor events such as a Sting concert.

That was in some respects the peak of the year because it was a day before the summer solstice, on Thursday, On that longest evening I spoke to people in this story at 10pm in broad daylight outside Belfast City Hall.

Now we are at that slightly melancholic moment when the days are getting shorter ...

In politics today we run one of the few interviews there has been with the independent unionist candidate in North Down, Alex Easton.

He will be disappointed that a former MP in the constituency Bob McCartney has in this essay for us backed his rival candidate for Westminster, Colonel Tim Collins.

As has the ex Labour MP, Kate Hoey, in this letter to the News Letter, in which she also backs Carla Lockhart and Jim Allister - who yesterday launched his TUV manifesto. Meanwhile, the Ulster Unionist leader Doug Beattie writes his election platform for this newspaper here.

My column is on why it is fair to ask Pat Cullen her view on the IRA, given the way it was responsible for 90% of killings in the area she wants to represent.

This week the former policeman Jon Burrows wrote on a second essay on the scandal of how the Ormeau Road policemen were treated. And the former headmaster JN Morton wrote in to challenge Dr William Kitchen's assault on progressive educational approaches.

Enjoy your Saturday and your reading,

Ben