Alliance blocks 365-day flying of Union flag on war memorials as unionist critics call party 'anti-democratic'

The issue has been several years in the making. The News Letter spoke to a number of councillors, and the account that emerged was this.

As a legacy of the region's defunct pre-2014 councils having different policies, some war memorials in today's North Down and Ards borough already fly the Union flag 365 days a year.

But others only fly the flag on designated days or for up to a fortnight around Remembrance Day.

Unionists want all of them to fly the flag all year round, and a vote was taken on the issue at a full council meeting some five months ago.

A clear majority approved the idea at the time, with all unionist councillors voting in favour.

But days later the Alliance Party (along with the sole SDLP councillor) performed a "call-in" of the decision, meaning a new vote would be taken.

The second time, 80% of councillors had to approve the proposal for it to stick.

That vote happened on Wednesday night and, since Alliance did not approve it, the 80% threshold wasn't reached and the proposal was scuppered.

The council make-up is as follows:

DUP, 13; Alliance Party, 12; UUP, 8; Independent, 3; SDLP, 1; Green, 1.

Two of the independents are unionists, meaning that unionist councillors hold 23 seats and nationalist/other councillors hold 15.

A number of councillors have now decried Alliance for taking an "anti-democratic" stance, and wondered why such a flag proposal would be considered controversial.

DUP group leader Stephen McIlveen told the News Letter Alliance "didn't seem to care how the unionist population feel".

He added that the vote five months ago to fly flags 365 days had been "a democratic decision", and the Alliance call-in was "hypocrisy".

"They complain about the petition-of-concern in the Assembly being anti-democratic, yet they're willing to use an essentially similar lever in local government to get what they want," he said.

"We can't overturn it. It's open to us or anybody else to bring the proposal back again. But this is a statutory lever that's built into the local government legislation so there's very little we can do about that - other than hope the next election brings a change of occupants."

UUP councillor Peter Wray echoed the comment about "hypocrisy" over the call-in, adding: "We've got to remember this is not an offensive thing – they're at war memorials.

"I don't want flags on every lamppost and every street. That doesn't make me any less of a unionist.

"But what is important to me is that we remember our war dead and the people that made that ultimate sacrifice for us.

"And that's not something that happens just on Remembrance Day, it's something that should be able to happen every day in a way that's respectful and certainly isn't a poke in the eye to anybody.

"So I'm very disappointed and to be honest I think a lot of Alliance voters are going to be disappointed."

He said the issue of flags on war memorials is “a bit of a red line for unionism – it should happen”.

It was put to Martin McRandal, Alliance group leader for the council, that unionists would see the decision as a snub.

He did not wish to comment because a press release was being prepared on the matter by Alliance HQ.

At time of writing, it had yet to arrive.