Opinion

Alex Kane: DUP and Sinn Féin are now on shifting, unsafe ground

Alex Kane

Alex Kane

Alex Kane is an Irish News columnist and political commentator and a former director of communications for the Ulster Unionist Party.

The chasm between First Minister Arlene Foster (left) and Deputy First Minister Michelle O'Neill is getting wider.
The chasm between First Minister Arlene Foster (left) and Deputy First Minister Michelle O'Neill is getting wider. The chasm between First Minister Arlene Foster (left) and Deputy First Minister Michelle O'Neill is getting wider.

On Monday we discovered Michelle O'Neill and Arlene Foster can't even agree on the appointment of a new head of the civil service and seem to be heading down the route of appointing a joint head: the sort of one-for-me-and-one-for-you solution beloved by two parties which - and let's avoid the usual nuanced pussyfooting - can't stand each other.

Really. They can't stand each other. They never will be able to stand each other. They sit at the heart of the executive with their own 'ourselves apart' arrangement waiting, as Arlene Foster noted yesterday, for something that will see their 'relationship damaged yet again'.

They didn't have to wait long. When the Public Prosecution Service issued its report on Tuesday the DUP responded with a demand for the chief constable's resignation, a hint they might withdraw from the Policing Board, criticism of the Director of Public Prosecution and a call for Michelle O'Neill's resignation from former junior minister Gordon Lyons (who also said the DUP weren't planning to collapse the executive). The other three executive parties clambered on board in support of an SDLP motion of censure condemning 'the deputy First Minister and the Finance Minister for their actions which have caused immense hurt and undermined the Executive's public health message.'

The motion was destined to go nowhere. How could it? The PPS report argues that prosecutions of anyone interviewed by the PSNI after the funeral were unlikely to succeed because: a) there was a 'lack of clarity and coherence' about regulations they might have breached; and b) there had been 'prior engagement with the organisers and policing approach on the day.'

So, the members of Sinn Féin interviewed by the PSNI can't be prosecuted because, apparently, there's no clarity or coherence on the regulations that Sinn Féin itself agreed to in the executive and then, through Michelle O'Neill at a press conference, urged the rest of us to follow. Meanwhile, the other four executive parties, who also agreed to the regulations, supported a motion which condemns Michelle O'Neill and Conor Murphy for breaching regulations described as unclear and incoherent! It's getting very close to something that could be described as Schrodinger's Covid Cat's Catch-22 territory. And no, I don't really understand it either.

Meanwhile, it strikes me as odd that in the engagement which took place between Sinn Féin and the PSNI neither side seemed to pay all that much attention to the precise interpretation of the regulations. The lack of clarity referred to by the PPS report obviously suited Sinn Féin, since most of the elected members who were questioned cited 'confusion' as their defence.

Were the stewards who marshalled events on the day confused? Was the leadership of Sinn Féin confused? Is it residual confusion which prevents Michelle O'Neill from acknowledging that a clear breach of the spirit and intent of the executive's public message on limiting the spread of Covid is, to all intents and purposes, just as bad as a specific breach of the law? When two executive ministers attend a funeral where alleged breaches of regulations can't be prosecuted because of the incoherence of the regulations (whilst the vast majority of other funerals did comply with a spirit of the law interpretation of the rules), am I being unreasonable to suggest the two ministers should even 'consider' their positions?

Anyway, back to my opening point: another day and another widening of the chasm between the DUP and Sinn Féin. It's not going to get better. Those who don't like the PPS report called for an independent review (which was announced on Wednesday); but even if a review reversed the PPS conclusions it would also reverse the DUP/SF positions of supporting or rejecting the findings.

I know most of you will be aware of my cynicism and pessimism when it comes to the possibility of genuine rapprochement between the DUP and Sinn Féin (and I've never bought into the belief that the Paisley/McGuinness, Robinson/McGuinness arrangements were really much better than the Foster/O'Neill relationship), but where we are now is entirely new ground, even for them. Shifting, unsafe, dangerously debilitating ground.

Can it get better? Will it get better? Only if there is a surge of middle ground willing-to-work-together parties in the election due in May 2022. My gut instinct is that the bitter, hard-blowing winds of polarisation sweeping through our politics now will favour the DUP and Sinn Féin. Which maybe explains why they keep on doing what they've always done.