A PLAN by opponents of Basil McCrea within his own constituency association to table a vote of no confidence in their MLA has failed to get off the ground.
The plan, revealed in Monday’s News Letter, was to table a motion of no confidence in the UUP’s sole Lagan Valley MLA at a scheduled meeting of the constituency association’s Lisburn branch on Monday night.
However, the meeting, which was not attended by Mr McCrea, ended in a statement, which was approved by the UUP press office, which said: “The branch fully supports the statement issued by the party executive on Saturday.
“No motion of no confidence was raised or discussed in respect of our MLA.”
One of those who had planned to make the move against Mr McCrea over his support for Alliance’s policy of only flying the Union Flag on designated days from Belfast City Hall said that flag protests in Lisburn meant that some party members had been unable to attend the meeting and that only about seven turned up.
Mr McCrea said that he was “happy” that there had been no motion at Monday’s meeting.
And the former leadership contender said that it was “not the right time” for the Assembly Commission to be discussing flying the Union Flag on extra days from Parliament Buildings at Stormont.
Mr McCrea told the News Letter that the issue should instead be looked at as part of a “proper” community relations strategy, the Cohesion, Sharing and Integration (CSI) strategy.
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