Northern Ireland: DUP ends government boycott
For almost two years, the pro-London Democrat Unionist Party in Northern Ireland refused to form a power-sharing government, as stipulated in the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, with the Irish republican party Sinn Féin, which won a clear victory in Northern Ireland's local elections. On Tuesday night, DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson announced that his party was endorsing a deal which paves the way for restored power sharing. Adjustments to the Northern Ireland Protocol with the EU are said to have facilitated the deal. Is this the long-awaited breakthrough?
Make the most of this unique opportunity!
The deal could trigger a boom in Northern Ireland, The Times hopes:
“It's not just that a revival of the power-sharing agreement means that normal government could resume: the province could also benefit from a unique status ... If the new agreement holds, Stormont will get an extra £3.3 billion from Westminster as a prize for good behaviour. That should help to improve public services, while the private sector could enjoy a considerable boom from companies keen to take advantage of a deal giving Northern Ireland barely restricted access to both the UK and EU. That will happen only if the province's politicians work together.”
Too early to celebrate
The Irish Times doubts that the announced deal will hold:
“Just because we seem to have a deal that should restore the Assembly and Executive fairly quickly, it certainly doesn't follow that we'll have a form of governance - let alone one underpinned by genuine trust and co-operation. Institutional stability is not a given, either. ... Nothing is set in stone yet. We don't know if the DUP will be hit by significant defections from its MLA, MP or officer teams. We don't know if Donaldson will be hounded and broken. ... We don't know if his internal and external opponents will expand and formalise their opposition to him.”
Brexiteers' U-turn comes too late
The U-turn by the DUP, whose boycott was linked to their protest against the Windsor Framework, won't divert attention from the negative impact of Brexit, says the Irish Examiner:
“Future historians may find it difficult to explain the chaos of this recent period, other than to point to the self-inflicted wound of Brexit. Even as recent opinion polls in Britain point to growing public awareness of the terrible mistake of Brexit, those living in the North have had to deal with the fallout from that electoral decision every day of the last two years. Those future historians are unlikely to be kind when judging those who championed Brexit but could not implement it.”