Hain snubbed after 'slur on economy'
The Rev Ian Paisley’s Democratic Unionists today snubbed Peter Hain by withdrawing an invitation to the Northern Ireland Secretary to address their councillors.
The party’s Fermanagh and South Tyrone Assembly member Arlene Foster said the move followed comments from Mr Hain last week in the United States advocating an all-Ireland economy.
The Northern Ireland Secretary was quoted in an Irish American newspaper saying Northern Ireland’s economy was not sustainable in the long run.
The cabinet minister was reported to have told the New York-based Irish Echo: “In future decades, it is going to be increasingly difficult to look at the economy of north and south except as a sort of island of Ireland economy.
“We are deepening north-south co-operation in a number of areas.
“The Northern Ireland economy, though it is doing better than ever in its history, is not sustainable in the long-term.
“I don’t want the Northern Ireland economy to be a dependent economy as it is now, with a sort of UK ‘big brother’ umbrella over it. It needs to be much more self-sufficient, so that’s what we’re trying to do.”
The comments have infuriated unionists, with DUP leader the Rev Ian Paisley demanding Mr Hain’s resignation and former Ulster Unionist devolved minister Michael McGimpsey accusing him of stabbing Northern Ireland in the back.
Sinn Féin and the nationalist SDLP, however, have welcomed the comments.
Arlene Foster, the vice chair of the DUP councillors’ association, accused Mr Hain of an unacceptable slur on Northern Ireland and its economy.
“In one comment he has done unquantifiable damage to the prospects of attracting inward investment to Northern Ireland, undermined the work of Invest Northern Ireland and insulted the efforts of the province’s (sic) business community,” the DUP Assembly member argued.
“What is worse is that the Secretary of State’s remarks were factually inaccurate.
“Northern Ireland is the fastest growing region within the United Kingdom, enjoys unemployment levels that are at an all time low and has attracted in excess of 15,000 jobs from American companies over the last decade.
“Things might be far from perfect with a decline in manufacturing and an over dependence upon the public sector, but neither are we some economic backwater.”
Mrs Foster said the remarks also defied logic.
She asked how two separate sovereign states could integrate their economies when they had two different currencies and two different tax systems.
“Maybe the Secretary of State is advocating ever greater European political integration and UK entry into the Euro?” the Fermanagh and South Tyrone MLA said.
“It also fails to make sense for an economy such as Northern Ireland’s to move closer to the Irish Republic with its market of just four million people instead of remaining with and developing further our links with the rest of the UK and its potential market of well over 50 million.”
Mrs Foster said the councillors’ association had in a bid to raise issues effecting them and their constituents asked the minister to address their association.
She confirmed: “That invitation has now been revoked and will remain as such so long as the Secretary of State sticks by his statement to the Irish Echo.
“Mr Hain has degraded Northern Ireland’s economy to an international audience and he cannot expect us to just accept his words as if they mean nothing.”
