Trimble seeks to have rebels removed

DAVID TRIMBLE launched moves last night to have his Ulster Unionist Party president, the Rev Martin Smyth, removed from the post after he joined two other hardline MPs in resigning the party whip in parliament.

He is also seeking to have Jeffrey Donaldson removed from his position as one of the party vice-presidents.

Mr Trimble’s announcement came after consultation with lawyers following the resignation of the whip by Mr Smyth, Mr Donaldson and David Burnside in opposition to his peace process policy. They made their move earlier yesterday after their failure a week ago to get the ruling Ulster Unionist Council to back their demand for a total rejection of the British-Irish Government Joint Declaration on the way forward for restoring devolution at Stormont.

Mr Trimble last night accused the three renegades of making it clear “they will not accept party democracy.” He said the reasons they gave for their action were “disingenuous in the extreme.”

He added: “After such a direct repudiation of the Ulster Unionist Council’s decision, the positions of its president and one of its vice presidents are wholly untenable.”

Resignation would clearly be the “principled course of action” he said, adding that, in any party elsewhere in Britain, their actions would be regarded as a resignation from the party.

Mr Trimble said he could only assume they “recognise and intend this outcome, but merely wish to place on the rest of the party the task of tidying up the situation.

“So be it. I have therefore asked the party chairman to convene a special meeting of party officers later this week.”

Mr Trimble said it was “a defining moment not just for the Ulster Unionist Party but for unionism as a whole”. Making clear he was not going to lie down in face of the hardline anti-Good Friday Agreement opposition from within his ranks he said it was also a key moment for society in the North.

“At stake is all the progress that has been made in recent years.”

The party was working to deliver a peaceful, democratic Northern Ireland at ease with itself and its neighbours, said Mr Trimble. The Ulster Unionist Council challenge by the hardliners was the latest in a series of failed attempts to change Mr Trimble’s stance.

Of the latest move he said: “This is the latest, and I hope the last, effort to turn the clock back. It may also free the party to enable it to complete successfully this historic endeavour.”

Mr Trimble is left with just Lady Sylvia Hermon (North Down) and Roy Beggs (East Antrim) faithfully at his side in the House of Commons.