Opinion

Newton Emerson: The DUP's claims over the Brexit border deal simply did not add up

Newton Emerson

Newton Emerson

Newton Emerson writes a twice-weekly column for The Irish News and is a regular commentator on current affairs on radio and television.

Newton Emerson
Newton Emerson Newton Emerson

Something does not add up about the DUP’s cold feet over Monday’s Brexit deal.

The party claims it had been asking to see the text for five weeks to no avail, yet last week said it was in close contact with the government on its contents. That followed a Times report that the Department of Exiting the EU was “closely consulting” the DUP. June's DUP-Tory deal set up a joint committee to look at confidence and supply issues as they arise, with Brexit specifically cited.

On Tuesday, Nigel Dodds confirmed the DUP has no objection to all-Ireland regulatory alignment - the Brexit deal’s central principle - as the party already supported it for agriculture and energy. So while there may have been a crossed wire over exact wording, the fuss the DUP kicked up since was out of all proportion to any possible misunderstanding. Either the party was managing unionist expectations, exploiting the misunderstanding for further gains - or both.

One conspiracy theory at least can be debunked. The British government cannot have had any willing hand in Monday’s humiliation of the prime minister and trashing of London’s credibility ahead of trade talks.

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The DUP’s tactical objective in blaming its Brexit problems on Dublin was exposed in all its electoral cynicism, after Nigel Dodds accused independent unionist Lady Sylvia Hermon of “siding with the Irish government.”

Hermon’s supposed crime was seeking a Westminster motion to protect the Good Friday Agreement in any final Brexit bill. Her actual crime, of course, is occupying a North Down seat the DUP now thinks it can win.

There were reportedly “groans” in the Commons as Dodds, usually heard with some respect, issued his attack - and members lavishly praised Hermon for her speech.

Cynical tactics are hardly confined to the DUP, however. It is only a fortnight since the Commons groaned at Hermon after she mixed up basic human rights law while defending the agreement. Hermon’s pro-EU stance suddenly makes her useful in a much bigger game to soften Brexit across the UK, on the pretext of softening the border.

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The taoiseach is not taking the DUP’s blame game lying down, pointing out that the unionist party does not speak alone for Northern Ireland on Brexit or anything else. The same objection has been raised in Britain, while nationalists here have ridiculed Arlene Foster for continuing to act as if she is first minister - a title still emblazoned across her party’s website. Yet strictly speaking, Foster is correct. The law enacting the Good Friday Agreement states that following an assembly election: “the First Minister and the deputy First Minister shall hold office until immediately before those offices are next filled.” As those offices have not been refilled and the deputy first minister is deceased, Foster remains in post and the DUP speaks alone for Northern Ireland by default.

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London’s media has been treated to a classic Stormont-style press conference, with almost all DUP MPs lining up outside Westminster behind Nigel Dodds. Only Northern Ireland parties practice this playground psych-op, which for completeness really ought to include someone holding the ringleader’s blazer.

Alas, an eccentrically dressed anti-Brexit protester then marched into shot behind them all, waving enormous UK and EU flags. Judging by their backward glances, the MPs were furious - Stormont security would not permit such things at home. But how could the DUP have asked for a Union flag to be removed?

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John Finucane, Sinn Féin’s star signing in June’s Westminster election, has resurfaced to promote a week of anti-Brexit protests, during which he attended a white line picket and unveiled a mural. Readers of the republican tea leaves might wonder if Sinn Féin thinks another Westminster election is on the cards or if it foresees co-opting him into Stormont in the near future.

Some of the discipline problems the party has experienced in the Republic are due to southern resentment at novice northerners being parachuted in - but the party has parachuted them in regardless, so that career path remains open.

Protest politics can hardly be the height of Finucane’s ambition, or of Sinn Féin’s ambition for him.

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Every week, indirect rule becomes more mysterious. Civil service chief David Sterling has the power to sign off public sector pay rises funded last month in the secretary of state’s irregular budget, the BBC has claimed. However, the civil service insists this power can only be used in line with public pay policy, which a minister first has to devise.

Even more mysterious is Sterling’s burgeoning foreign policy - this week he has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Chinese government and briefed Stormont’s diplomatic bureau in Washington, in what the bureau described as “his first official visit”. The civil service claims all this is in line with extant executive plans so no line has been crossed. But clearly we are approaching the point where Sterling has as much claim to being first minister as Arlene Foster.

newton@irishnews.com