Category Archives: Democratic Unionist Party

NI elections: with Sinn Fein ascendant, what next for the DUP?

The results of the Northern Ireland local elections are in – and Sinn Fein has made clear gains.

After that party’s victory in the Stormont assembly elections last year, it gained 39 council seats to make itself the largest party in local government as well.

And turnout was up, from 52.7 per cent to 54.7 per cent. That suggests that people deliberately turned out to help Sinn Fein gain more seats.

What does this mean for the Democratic Unionist Party, the next-largest in both Stormont and the councils?

I’d say that, as Sinn Fein’s Michelle O’Neil has said, it means the public want the DUP to resume its power-sharing arrangement in Stormont – or they’ll punish that party again.

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As the DUP digs in its heels, is Northern Ireland facing hard times?

Stormont: still locked as the DUP’s representatives dig in their heels over post-Brexit trade.

Rishi Sunak has managed to avoid humiliation in the vote on the ‘Stormont Brake’ aspect of his ‘Windsor Framework’ deal with the EU over trade in Northern Ireland. Instead the shame was hung on the Democratic Unionists and Tories in the European Research Group faction.

MPs voted by 515 to 29 to support the deal agreed by Rishi Sunak.

But the defeat means the DUP has vowed to continue its boycott of the Northern Ireland Assembly at Stormont – with possibly serious consequences for the province.

Spokespeople for the other Northern Irish political parties have begged the DUP to come back, according to the BBC:

Sinn Féin vice-president Michelle O’Neill said the DUP had to “stop their boycott” of Stormont so that executive ministers could take control of the budget.

Ministers had to be in post to make the case to the Treasury for extra funding for Northern Ireland, Ms O’Neill added.

“This budget is about to cause catastrophic damage to public services,” she said.

“So the DUP need to get around the table with the rest of us, make politics work.”

Alliance Party MP Stephen Farry said Northern Ireland was “bleeding at present”, with problems piling up and public services in real crisis.

He said his party had asked the UK government to consider providing a financial package and it appeared “the door is open to that”.

“This will require the parties in Northern Ireland to work together and to make a very persuasive case… to the Treasury,” he said.

“So it reinforces the impetus on the DUP to join the rest of us in ensuring we have proper governance here.”

Ulster Unionist assembly member Robbie Butler said the level of budget cuts “on that cliff edge at the moment actually is quite alarming”.

He urged the DUP to accept the “difficulties” with the Windsor Framework and “put the people of Northern Ireland first”.

Social Democratic and Labour Party leader Colum Eastwood said the DUP had to accept that it could not get everything it wanted from the new Brexit deal.

“We have a huge opportunity with this [deal] to trade into both [UK and EU] markets unencumbered,” said the Foyle MP.

“People in Britain would give their right arm to have that opportunity.”

But DUP leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson said the ‘Windsor Framework’ would not deliver the long-term stability and prosperity that Northern Ireland needs.

Adding insult to injury, he adopted the rhetoric of Labour’s Keir Starmer, saying there was “an element of the sticking plaster” about Rishi Sunak’s new deal with the European Union, and it would not work.

He went on to say he is “not a quitter” and will continue trying to get the deal changed – a tall order, considering the joint UK-EU body that is overseeing Brexit will meet o ratify the legal changes brought about by the Windsor Framework – tomorrow (Friday, March 24, 2023).

Northern Ireland Secretary Chris Heaton-Harris has met the five main Stormont parties at Hillsborough to discuss the new Brexit deal as well as Northern Ireland’s public finances, which he said were not in a good state.

He said he would have to set Northern Ireland’s budget for the coming year within the next few weeks if the executive was not up and running soon – and there would be some “tough decisions” if that happened.

It seems a very thinly-veiled threat, not just to the DUP but to all of the Northern Irish politicians: “get back to normal or suffer”.

But nobody in NI will be in any doubt about where responsibility will lie if the Tories in Westminster penalise them with Budget restrictions, and there may be knock-on consequences at the ballot box.

Is the DUP really willing to court electoral wipeout for the sake of what many see as not just a lost cause, but also a pointless one?

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Democratic Unionists will vote against Rishi Sunak’s new Northern Ireland deal. Why?

No entry: are the Democratic Unionists opoposing Rishi Sunak’s new Northern Ireland deal because they don’t want to return to the Stormont Assembly as only the second-largest party?

Do we believe the Democratic Unionists when they say they won’t support Rishi Sunak’s ‘Windsor Framework’ trade deal for Northern Ireland and the European Union because they have “ongoing concerns”?

Party leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson said the party would continue to assess the deal, but that “we don’t believe that this represents the significant progress that we need to see in order to have the institutions restored at this point”:

“There remain for us concerns, for example, and the Stormont Brake deals with the application of EU law in Northern Ireland, but it doesn’t address how are we dealing with change to UK law, which could impact on NI’s ability to trade within the United Kingdom itself.”

He said he wanted to ensure “what the prime minister is claiming is translated into law”.

“Our seven tests have not yet been met. Sufficient progress has not yet been made. I am determined to continue engaging with the government and to get this right,” he added.

Some have doubts…

… and I am among them. The comment triggered an interesting (if short) discussion:

What do you think?

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The DUP may have solved its ‘Windsor Framework’ dilemma – by passing the buck

The Democratic Unionist Party in Northern Ireland found itself facing a thorny problem after Rishi Sunak announced his new ‘Windsor Framework’ deal for trade between Northern Ireland, Great Britain and the European Union.

That party had been using the lack of a hard-Brexit-supporting agreement on trade as an excuse not to take its seats in the Northern Ireland Assembly at Stormont, after elections that made Sinn Fein the largest party group there.

But Sunak’s deal has been welcomed almost universally, leaving the DUP with very little wiggle-room.

It left party leaders scrabbling for time in which to find a face-saving way forward.

Now it seems they have found it: pass the buck onto a specially-created committee, act according to its recommendations and – if anything goes wrong – use it as a scapegoat.

Here’s Maximilien Robespierre with the details:

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Praise for Tory MP who put the DUP in its place over lack of energy price cap in NI

How surprising, actually to be able to praise a Conservative member of Parliament for pointing out the facts of life to other politicians who have harmed the people!

Energy is a devolved responsibility in Northern Ireland, and the reason people there don’t have the safety of a cap on the price of energy per unit is because the devolved assembly in Stormont has not been able to meet since the cost of energy started skyrocketing.

The reason it hasn’t met is that the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) is blocking the formation of an executive led by Sinn Fein.

So when DUP MP Carla Lockhart complained that people in England, Scotland and Wales had received £400 to help pay bills but nobody in NI did, Tory energy minister Graham Stuart put her right in her place.

Here’s what happened:

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Will the DUP’s election gamble backfire as Northern Ireland heads for another poll?

Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party has forced the province into another election after the Assembly there failed to elect a Speaker, or First or Second Ministers.

The DUP has refused to participate in the power-sharing arrangement at the Stormont Assembly since elections in May, when Sinn Fein became the largest party there for the first time.

Its members say this is because of the Northern Ireland Protocol of the Brexit Agreement, which keeps Northern Ireland aligned with some EU trade rules to ensure goods can move freely across the Irish land border.

If you want evidence of this, here’s Sky News:

This is very odd behaviour, though – because the Protocol puts Northern Ireland in a better position than the rest of the UK. NI businesses are much better-positioned to profit from the current situation because they can still trade with the European Union relatively frictionlessly.

And think of the practicalities. Suppose you are a trader in goods that perish relatively quickly. Wouldn’t you want to pass them on to another trader just across the Irish land border than go through the rigmarole of having to send them across the sea to Scotland, by which time they may well have gone off?

One is led to question whether this is just sour grapes from the party that used to have the largest number of members in the Assembly.

And the simple fact is that the NI Protocol isn’t going to change – for the foreseeable future at least. It would take a considerable amount of negotiation between the UK and EU, and changes to the policy positions of both that would most likely be acceptable to neither, in the current political climate.

Irish voters know that. They’re not like voters in England who allow the right-wing press to lead them by the nose. They can see that the DUP is on a hiding to nothing. And I wonder what they will do about it in an election that will most likely take place on December 15.

My bet is that the DUP will lose more seats, and another party replace it as the second most well-represented in Northern Ireland – one that might be able to meet agreement with Sinn Fein and restore the Stormont Assembly to full working order.

It wouldn’t be politics. It would simply be good business.

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Did King Charles just troll the leader of the DUP – in front of his face?

The royal and the republican: King Charles III meets Sinn Fein leader Michell O’Neill. The comments about the largest party in Stormont took place seconds later.

Here’s some good – if well-used – advice for DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson from the owner of the Maximilien Robespierre YouTube channel: “Never meet your heroes; you’ll be disappointed.”

He was referring to the moment when King Charles III met the leaders of the two largest political parties in the Northern Ireland Assembly and mentioned to Sinn Fein leader Michelle O’Neill that he was aware that her republican party now has more members there than any other.

It was a direct snub for Donaldson and the unionist DUP, which had been the largest party from the Stormont Assembly’s inception until its most recent elections, and which is now delaying the resumption of devolved democracy there with a row over the Brexit-related Northern Ireland Protocol.

The Monarch’s words may have been unintentionally harsh – or they may have been a hint that democracy should be respected, the power-sharing agreement should be resumed, with Sinn Fein as (nominal) leader rather than the DUP, and they should sort out their differences by other means.

Or we may all be reading far too much into them.

Here’s the Maximilien Robespierre clip…

What do you think?

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The elephant in the room: why are the Tories trying to sideline Northern Ireland?

Northern Ireland: most people here aren’t bothered about the protocol that puts a trade border between the Province and the rest of the UK. Are the Tories entertaining the DUP’s block to the restoration of the Stormont assembly because it aligns with their own differences with the European Union?

Isn’t it strange that the Queen’s Speech made no mention of the Northern Ireland Protocol that is currently the greatest threat to peace in the United Kingdom?

Prince Charles, standing in for Her Majesty, announced no fewer than 38 planned new laws – and not one of them explained how Boris Johnson’s government plans to tackle the constitutional crisis that has flared up in the Province.

I think it’s because Johnson doesn’t know what to do. He has painted himself into this corner with his silly rushed Brexit and now he can’t get out of it.

For those who don’t know: the Northern Ireland Protocol of the Brexit agreement keeps open the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland by creating a hard trade border between the Province and the rest of the United Kingdom.

Last week’s local elections returned a majority of members to the Stormont assembly who approve of that agreement – but Stormont is run on a power-sharing basis, and the second-largest party, the Democratic Unionist Party, is refusing to nominate any of its members to the new administration until a deal is struck that dismantles the border with the rest of the UK.

Michelle O’Neill of Sinn Fein, who is set to be the new First Minister, has said it is the responsibility of Boris Johnson and his government to resolve the problems over the protocol – by negotiation with the European Union. This has created something of a domino effect.

The EU itself has acknowledged that the Protocol has created difficulties – and offered proposals last October to ease the burden of checks and paperwork.

The EU said it would mean inspections of food products would be reduced far below what is usually required at single-market borders, but the plan came with caveats and the UK said the EU needed to do more.

Now, Universities Minister Michelle Donelan has said the UK may decide to scrap the protocol altogether – and a source close to Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said she was considering legislation to scrap parts of the Brexit treaty unilaterally – without seeking agreement from the EU.

In turn, the EU’s chief negotiator, Maroš Šefčovič, has said that the EU had already “shown a lot of flexibility by proposing impactful, durable solutions and we stand ready to continue discussions. We need the UK government to dial down the rhetoric, be honest about the deal they signed and agree to find solutions within its framework”.

This has been interpreted as a threat of a possible trade war if Truss goes ahead and trashes the protocol.

It’s a big mess – of Boris Johnson’s making. But some have suggested that the only people with whom the UK government should be negotiating are the DUP.

The majority of people in Northern Ireland support the protocol as it stands – or at least, they have voted a majority of representatives into Stormont who support it – and some say this means the DUP should accept it as it is, and not use it to disrupt the power-sharing agreement that helps to maintain the fragile peace the Province has enjoyed since 1998.

It seems only six per cent of the NI electorate see the protocol as a major issue, which suggests that the problem lies only with the DUP.

This Site has previously mentioned rumours that the DUP is only using the protocol as a means of ensuring that the unionist party will not take a position subordinate to nationalists – even though the titles of First Minister and Deputy First Minister are practically meaningless; power is shared between the two major parties.

The possible consequences for Northern Ireland could be catastrophic. But surely, nobody wants a return to the situation before the Good Friday Agreement, do they?

So perhaps NI Secretary Brandon Lewis simply needs to take a robust stance and present it to the DUP. Or are the Tories entertaining the DUP’s rebellion because it suits them to?

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Foster quits as DUP boss over Brexit. Can we get similar leverage against Boris Johnson?

Gurning, gurning, gone: Arlene Foster, whose support of Theresa May in 2017 deprived the UK of a Labour government led by Jeremy Corbyn, has been forced out of politics after a vote of “no confidence” by her party, the DUP. Why couldn’t it have happened sooner?

The leader of Ulster’s Democratic Unionist Party who propped up Theresa May’s minority Tory government to help push through a disastrous, unpopular exit from the EU is being forced to quit politics.

Arlene Foster, announced that she was resigning as DUP leader on Wednesday, after losing a vote of “no confidence” among party members.

About 80 per cent of the DUP’s Stormont and Westminster ranks signed a letter of no confidence in her leadership.

Brexit has been hugely divisive in Northern Ireland, with the imposition of an artificial trade border in the middle of the Irish Sea considered by many to be a breach of the Good Friday Agreement that ended the so-called ‘Troubles’, 23 years ago.

As a result, violence has flared up in many parts of the province.

Ms Foster supported the UK Conservative governments of Theresa May and Boris Johnson that have brought this division down upon Northern Ireland and it seems she is being made to take responsibility for the result.

She has now announced her intention to quit the DUP altogether, saying it is no longer the party she joined. Sour grapes?

Her future seems assured. Loyalty to the Tories tends to reap rewards for individuals, and it has been suggested that Foster will find her way into the House of Lords, with its £300-per-day salary, just for turning up.

Her fate raises an important question: when will Boris Johnson suffer a similar humiliation?

Johnson was the poster boy for Brexit. He campaigned hard for it in 2015-16, and was noted for his ridiculous red bus with a grotesque lie painted on the side, that money paid to the EU could be spent on the NHS if the UK left.

Trade deals he promised have failed to materialise. The UK’s banking power has been decimated. Exports have fallen dramatically. And the nation’s international influence is waning.

Johnson himself stands accused of serial dishonesty, and of wishing death on thousands of his fellow UK citizens in the midst of the Covid-19 crisis he has mishandled so atrociously.

And yet he remains perversely popular. For how much longer?

Arlene Foster believes the DUP is no longer the party she joined, say sources close to her.

Source: Arlene Foster to quit DUP after leaving leadership roles – BBC News

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As Stormont politicians meet, Northern Ireland violence escalates

Northern Ireland has now endured more than a week of violence related to Boris Johnson’s duff Brexit deal.

Johnson himself has said the violence in West Belfast “deeply concerned” him. He was right – it did, and it should; he is directly responsible for it.

He was told his decision to put a customs border in the middle of the Irish Sea would tear up the Good Friday Agreement, triggering an end to the NI peace process and a return to violence – and he did it anyway.

Northern Ireland doesn’t have a single Conservative member of Parliament; nobody in the province voted to be governed by Johnson (or at least, nobody worth mentioning).

The province’s pro-Brexit Democratic Unionist Party propped up former prime minister Theresa May, and could therefore be said to have paved the way for him. It holds power in the Stormont assembly so This Writer wonders what its representatives have to say for themselves.

Last night alone, police officers were attacked, petrol bombs were thrown and a bus was burnt.

Here’s how it looked:

Police believe paramilitary groups were involved in incidents such as one in which several hundred people on each side were throwing petrol bombs in both directions in the loyalist Shankill Road and the nationalist Springfield Road.

The Shankill Road and Springfield Road in west Belfast are now added to the list that includes Newtownabbey, Carrickfergus, Ballymena and the Waterside area of Londonderry.

The BBC’s report editorialised:

The longer it goes on, the harder it will be to stop.

While it is a comment that should not have been made by a news reporter, This Writer tends to agree with whoever wrote it.

Sadly, with Boris Johnson running the country, he will undoubtedly dither, delay, take a holiday, and probably even hide in a fridge before taking any decisions – and by the time he does, it will probably be too late.

And, as This Site stated yesterday, this is what he wanted. He had been warned repeatedly that it would happen but he did nothing. We have to draw the obvious conclusion from that.

Source: Belfast: Emergency Stormont meeting after night of violence – BBC News

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