Ben Lowry: It was as if on Saturday unionist opposition to the Irish Sea border and to Stormont no longer exists - and never did

There was much laughter in the chamber, there were many political compliments traded, there was a buzz among the media in the packed Great Hall. Politicians praised their opponents, or their predecessors and in some almost embarrassingly gushing moments paid tributes to their truly wonderful colleagues.

In broadcasts the historic moment of the day was emphasised as though unionists were hesitant about a Sinn Fein first minister because she was female and Catholic, and not because the party lauds past IRA terrorism.

But one thing was missing from the story almost entirely: unionist concern not only over about the Irish Sea border but about the very institution of Stormont itself.

It was almost missing, but not. Jim Allister, the TUV MLA, was the sole dissenting voice in the proceedings, which lasted the better part of three hours.

An hour or so into the meeting, Mr Allister was called by the newly installed speaker Edwin Poots to speak. Mr Allister briefly did so, beginning his words to say that as a member of the house he was respectful of the position of speaker. “Accordingly, as you now fill it I wish you well in that regard,” he said.

Mr Allister then said that he was still present in Stormont “to the disappointment of the protocol implementers and I will be here as a thorn in their side”.

He said to Mr Poots that he should “just remember that it was 1,000 TUV transfers that elected you to this house on the fifth count in South Belfast” in the Stormont election of 2022.

There was then an extraordinary attack on Mr Allister that is worth reproducing at length because it was the only significant personal attack of the afternoon, apart from Mr Allister’s own attack on Michelle O’Neill.

Paul Givan, the DUP MLA and new education minister who had spoken in glowing terms about having been for many years a friend and colleague of Mr Poots, whom he first met aged 16, rose first to say that he wanted to “formally congratulate” Mr Poots on his new position.

“I trust you will give all members of this house the same latitude that you always wished the speaker would have gave [sic] to you whenever you were a member of this house,” he said to Mr Poots.

Then almost the rest of his two-and-a-half minute address was directed at Jim Allister.

“I do think it is worth putting on the record my disappointment at the very personal bitter contribution from Mr Allister,” he said. "Mr Speaker he is an angry man, I can understand why, because he has achieved absolutely nothing, nothing in order to have these institutions restored and in his own contribution he again was incapable of responding to the challenge of my party leader to provide any evidence of what he has achieved because it is nothing because his political career has been one marked with failure – even within the DUP a poor substitute for the late Dr Paisley, he cost us votes when he was our candidate for Europe.”

Mr Givan described Mr Allister as a “dead end unionist”. As he spoke several DUP MLAs around Mr Givan smiled, as is visible in the Assembly video feed online. Others, including Diane Dodds MLA did not smile, nor Tom Buchanan who faced a notable challenge from the TUV in West Tyrone in 2022.

From my vantage point in the gallery I could see the NIO ministers Steve Baker, Lord Caine and Chris Heaton-Harris smiling at length on one side of the gallery and, on the other, Sir Jeffrey Donaldson smiling, beside Gavin Robinson who was poker-faced.

Then Mr Allister like all the party leaders was given a longer opportunity to speak about the new government and he mentioned how Northern Ireland now had “a first minister who wallows in the glorification of terrorism”.

She was someone, Mr Allister said, who had said there was “no alternative” to the IRA: “No alternative to La Mon, no alternative to Enniskillen, no alternative to Teebane, no alternative to Kingsmill or to Markethill [Emma Little Pengelly in her remarks had mentioned an IRA bomb in that town].”

Mr Allister then mentioned a Ballymena woman from his constituency Yvonne Dunlop burned alive in 1976, “whose vile murderer McElweee Ms O’Neill celebrates every year”.

During part of this speech, Mr Givan spoke to Gordon Lyons, who is also now a DUP minister, and while he might not have been ignoring Mr Allister it was much more than just a few words, and could have seemed to be a snub.

Mr Lyons in his response to various speeches, including from Mr Allister and independent MLAs, said he wanted to thank Mr Allister “for the reminder we have had from him today … why he is the sole TUV member on that bench”.

I recount all this at length because, as I say, only Mr Allister’s attack on Ms O’Neill was as withering as that by Mr Givan on Jim Allister.

In both the chamber and in the gallery were some hardened veterans of the republican movement. And on a day when Sinn Fein was being reported around the world as the lead party in Northern Ireland and there was no shortage of people to hail the moment, it was a unionist critic of Stormont who was the target of devastating criticism from the DUP.

Mr Allister himself responded forcefully. He said that eight DUP MLAs had been elected on transfers from his party.

In that 2022 election, the TUV got almost 8% of the vote – more than the Alliance Party has achieved in most Stormont elections since 1998. It is a share of the vote approaching the level that Sinn Fein got in some Northern Ireland elections in the 1980s.

There has never indeed been a group that got such a percentage share of the vote and only ended up with one seat – as the TUV did when it fell short in a number of constituencies, and lost out because its vote was spread widely across NI.

It is plausible to argue that the TUV vote would have been notably higher if not for the fear of Sinn Fein topping the assembly contest.

Some opinion polls have suggested that more than 70% of DUP supporters endorsed their strategy of staying out of Stormont over the Irish Sea border. Therefore it is not unreasonable to speculate that more than 20% of all voters – let’s say half of the 42% who voted for unionist parties in 2022 – would endorse a position akin to that of Jim Allister or the more sceptical politicians of the DUP.

That, in an accurate proportionate representation of such views, would have meant around 20 Stormont MLAs who were unhappy at its return, or uneasy.

There was on Saturday just one reflecting this view. And he was the main person to be attacked – and in full view of the media glare and a triumphant Sinn Fein contingent of MLAs.

Ben Lowry (@BenLowry2) is News Letter editor