Editorial: There is still time for London-based unionists to show they care about threats to the Union

​The Northern Ireland Affairs Committee has recommended a shake up of Stormont governing structures.

One proposal is to change the name of first and deputy first ministers into them both being dubbed first minister. This is logical in that the two positions are the same. It might also save unionist blushes symbolically by not having to serve ‘under’ SF.

NI will still have no ‘prime’ minister, meaning stalemate in a policy split. And the plan doesn’t address problems such as a party that does not want Northern Ireland to exist always being in power.

The committee wants speakers and first ministers elected by a two-thirds majority. Advocates of such action say that by making non unionist and non nationalist parties eligible for the top posts it will disadvantage unionists no more than Sinn Fein. But they must know they are removing minority protection as soon as unionists are in the minority.

The NI Affairs Committee is chaired by a Tory MP, Sir Robert Buckland. He is unlikely to be perceived as anti unionist as unionists considered his predecessor Simon Hoare to be, but even so, the Conservative and Unionist Party shows little concern over where Northern Ireland is being allowed to go.

Set aside the constitutional abomination of the Irish Sea border for a moment, other problems should concern London-based unionists: SF knowing it can take or leave Stormont because in its absence Dublin gets increased say (perhaps via SF ministers); use of judicial review in NI to undermine policy making and our place in the UK; subtle all-island push in matters such as educational academic research; demonisation of the security forces, which will continue regardless of amnesty; lenient criminal justice approach to dissident terror. And so on.

Nationalists sneer that London doesn't care about NI. This government still has a year, and coming talks proposals, to prove them wrong.