Tag Archives: Edwin Poots

Devolution returns to Northern Ireland

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Two years after the Democratic Unionist Party put the institutions of the 1998 Belfast/Good Friday Agreement into suspension by withdrawing from them, those institutions returned, and devolved government exists in Northern Ireland again, headed by a Sinn Féin First Minister. Negotiations between the UK government and DUP led to a deal, embodied in a white paper. Alan Whysall looks at the paper, and the prospects for the Agreement settlement.

How we got here

The history of the dispute has been set out on this blog and a recent Constitution Unit podcast. Briefly, a Protocol to the EU Withdrawal Agreement left Northern Ireland effectively within the EU single market for goods and customs arrangements. This avoided the necessity for a border within the island of Ireland, which would be acutely difficult in both political and practical terms; it gave Northern Ireland rights to trade freely in the EU as well as Great Britain. But potentially it inhibited trade with GB, the symbolism of which antagonised some unionists. Hardline pressure grew. The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) responded by withdrawing from the institutions in February 2022, thereby shutting them down.

The Windsor Framework, agreed between the UK and EU in 2023, was intended to respond to the DUP’s demands – but it stayed out. Negotiations went on, in private, between the DUP and London, reportedly involving Julian Smith, who more or less uniquely among recent secretaries of state is widely respected in Northern Ireland. There was also a brief interparty discussion in December in which the government made an offer of relief for Northern Ireland’s desperate public finances. But deadlines came and went.

Finally, a week or so ago, DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson presented the proposals emanating from the negotiations to various party groupings; and securing majorities, albeit not it appears large ones, announced acceptance.

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The political foundations of Northern Ireland are at risk of crumbling

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Not for the first time in recent memory, Northern Irish politics is in flux, the UK government’s Brexit deal is causing ructions and the power-sharing institutions are on the brink of collapse. Alan Whysall assesses the current crisis and argues that the foundations of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement are at serious risk of crumbling.

Northern Ireland appears headed for further political turbulence, and it is not clear that devolved government will survive. Two steps within 24 hours by the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), currently the largest party in the Assembly, have triggered this.

On Wednesday night, the DUP Agriculture Minister, Edwin Poots, announced that his staff would no longer carry out checks required at Northern Ireland ports under the Northern Ireland Protocol.

On Thursday afternoon, the DUP First Minister (FM) of Northern Ireland, Paul Givan, announced that he would resign his office on Friday morning over the Protocol, although his resignation letter was short on specifics.

A couple of years ago, the DUP leadership was suggesting that, notwithstanding additional border checks in the Irish Sea, Northern Ireland should make the best of the Protocol, which gives it free access for goods to the single markets of both the EU and the UK. But the party was losing support in polling both to the hardline Traditional Unionist Voice, and to the more moderate Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) – which continues. Arlene Foster was ousted as leader and First Minister last year, and Edwin Poots became leader, lasting three weeks before he himself was removed, to be replaced by Jeffrey Donaldson. The party has become increasingly strident in its demands for the replacement of the Protocol in its present form, and since last summer Donaldson has been threatening to collapse the institutions over the issue.

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