PETER Robinson has spelled out what he reckons is a stark choice for the DUP leadership. His advice to his successor Arlene Foster, whose party last week set out its five-point plan to undermine the protocol, is that half measures don't work. You can huff and puff but unless you, figuratively, blow the house down then your campaign will fail. It's telling that one of the most eager welcomes for the former first minister's frank assessment was from TUV leader Jim Allister
On one level Mr Robinson makes a valid point but also what is arguably a dangerous one. When the DUP announced its action plan it was within 24 hours of an opinion poll showing that it was haemorrhaging votes and that its handling of Brexit and the protocol were to blame. It came after a month in which the DUP leadership moved from begrudging acceptance of the Irish Sea border to seeking its banishment.
The party's focus now is primarily on constitutional concerns because the erroneous tales of no show Amazon deliveries and disruption to the lucrative trade in potted plants and dirty diggers have been debunked. Ironically, the DUP is arguing that the protocol breaches the Good Friday Agreement, the same accord that led to Arlene Foster and Jeffrey Donaldson's departure from the Ulster Unionists because at the time they found it unpalatable.
But it can be argued reasonably convincingly that the five-point plan was never designed to bring down the protocol and was merely a tactical measure – with more than a nod to Peter Robinson – that would enable the DUP to buy time and pretend it was actually doing something rather than being all at sea, so to speak. It's little more than gesture politics designed to disguise the realisation that the protocol remains the only show in town – though in need of urgent tweaks. It's also a bit rich of Mr Robinson, author of the short-lived Unionist Forum and and even shorter-lived graduated response, to criticise his successor for using what looks like a short-term ploy.
One danger in his observation is that he's effectively saying that the normal avenues for rectifying problems with the protocol to unionists' satisfaction are closed and that it's time for protest politics. But he of all people should know how that hasn't played out well in the past, from Clontibret to the flag protests.
Rather than escalating matters, what's actually required is some honesty and an acknowledgement from the DUP that hitching its wagon to Brexit was a cataclysmic misstep which it cannot reverse. By collapsing the institutions, the DUP would only be digging itself deeper into a hole and making the prospects for rescuing its fortunes even more bleak. It would also lead to greater societal instability and provide justification for those with violent intent – and crucially, at the end of it all, there'd still be the protocol.
