We were right to pursue deal with SF: ex-SDLP MLA

Ex-North Belfast MLA Alban Maginness had last week warned that his party leader should be “very, very careful” about setting up a proposed anti-Brexit pact with the SDLP and Sinn Fein at its core.

But following the collapse of those talks he insisted it was “right to exhaust the process and see if an anti-Brexit arrangement could in fact be achieved”.

When it was put to him that IRA victim Ann Travers said she could no longer back the SDLP in the event of such a deal with Sinn Fein, he said: “I understand her position on that, and I’d have expected her – along with other people – to express that opinion.”

He was asked if he himself would have found it unpalatable for the SDLP to link up with Sinn Fein, given its past.

“The point I’d make to you is if it was going to be a genuine anti-Brexit pact it would’ve included parties other than Sinn Fein and the SDLP, and that would’ve been, I think, seen as a reasonable way of proceeding,” he said.

Asked again about Sinn Fein’s past, he said: “I think the important thing in that context was to elect anti-Brexit people; people would be campaigning on the basis of sending a very strong message to Westminster in relation to a hard Brexit.”

The SDLP had held out hope that some kind of deal could be salvaged, involving offering support to non-party-linked anti-Brexit candidates in the June 8 general election.

But on Wednesday Sinn Fein’s John O’Dowd scorned the idea, telling Radio Ulster that whilst “conversations should continue”, what was being suggested was “not a credible offer and won’t gain support within Sinn Fein”.