DUP will not bow to pressure from presidents and prime ministers, MLA insists

Emma Little-Pengelly speaking at Queen's. Picture: Press Eye.

The powersharing impasse in Northern Ireland will not be solved by demeaning the concerns of unionists, a DUP MLA has said.

Emma Little-Pengelly told the Queen’s University Belfast conference commemorating the Good Friday Agreement that hers was a party of devolution and it wanted to get back into government at Stormont.

But she said that could only happen when there was a sustainable basis for governance and a return to the principles behind the landmark 1998 deal of unionist and nationalist aspirations both being respected.

Ms Little-Pengelly was taking part in a debate with the leaders of the four other main Stormont parties. 

DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson did not participate in the discussion panel.

The DUP is currently blocking devolution in protest at post-Brexit trading arrangements that the party believes have undermined Northern Ireland’s place within the UK.

It has made clear it needs further legal guarantees from the UK Government on sovereignty before it countenances a return to devolution.

At times, audience members at Queen’s made clear their opposition to the DUP’s stance, loudly clapping points made by other party representatives when they criticised the Stormont boycott.

Ms Little-Pengelly insisted unionist grievances were not manufactured and said the conference audience was not representative of the electorate.

"The reality is that we need to have a fair deal," she said.

"We need to address the issues of unionism, anybody in this hall who thinks it’s easy to say ‘no, we need to get this right’ in the face of presidents and prime ministers and pressure and the scoffing and mocking of the DUP, I would say this, in terms of this room, this room doesn’t represent the voters that are out there.

"The voters that are out there speak to us on the doors all the time, they’re articulating their concerns. 

I am not here to bow to presidents and prime ministers. I am here to speak for the people and their genuine concerns and to try to get that resolved."

Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald said the concerns of the DUP had been listened to and were reflected in the changes to post-Brexit trade brought about by the UK and EU’s Windsor Framework deal.

Ms McDonald said no one had “any right whatsoever to disregard the views, the fears, the anxieties of the other”.

Directing her comments to Ms Little-Pengelly, Ms McDonald said the DUP’s concerns had been heard “so loudly” and taken so seriously that there have been “years of a sustained negotiation”.

"So the question now has to be, particularly for the DUP, you now arrive at a crossroads, and a moment of decision,” she said.

And I sincerely say to you, I really pray that that decision is the right decision, because it seems to be unconscionable that we stay in this limbo and that we drift.

“For me, the most frightening prospect is drift. We agreed that we have to work together. We all live here. That’s not going to change. That will never change. We have different views. That’s not going to change either.

"What has to change now is that we have the institutions, as imperfect as they are, functioning for everybody."