Neighbours: The Real Story
Forget all the talk about Neighbours moving to Channel Five, after the BBC refused to pay £300M for a new series. The real story is the knock on effect of the loss of Neighbours, which is sending the soap opera you all follow off to BBC2. That's right if you want to get your fix of Committee walk outs, ministers battling ministers and rhetoric without compare, then tune in to Stormont Live at its new time of 2.15 on BBC2.
Inside Politics, meanwhile, has a debate between basil McCrea and Alec Maskey which covers the potential 16% pay rise, the employment of family members and, given both politicians sit on the Policing Board, the latest intelligence on dissident republicans.
On the topic of the 16% rise, the Assembly says a draft report from the Senior Salaries Review Body is not due until July, which is later than I understood when I broke the story last night. Apart from the pay of MLAs in comparison to their counterparts, it will be interesting to see if the SSRB thinks any consideration of new Assembly allowances is within its remit.
In their discussion on the SSRB pay review back in December, the Assembly Commission, according to its minutes, "asked for consideration to be given to an allowance for Whips and Chairs of Standing Committees and sought further information in relation to the pension benefits for Members who retire through ill health. Members also asked for consideration to be given to the inclusion of an allowance to cover visits to EU Institutions and Westminster."
I'm 
