Ben Lowry: It seemed barely possible for the appeasement of Sinn Fein to get even worse, but somehow it did

Weak unionism and a weak Conservative and Unionist government giving special treatment to Sinn Fein.

We thought this because the culture of appeasement was already such an enduring feature of NI politics. The determination to keep republicans in Stormont has been a constant since 1998.

Such as in 2001 when Tony Blair could not get through an amnesty for the IRA via paragraph 20 of the Weston Park talks document of that year, and so moved his plans moved behind the scenes (in what became the On The Runs scheme).

This determination to help IRA members who engaged in multiple calculated acts of terrorism came 20 years before elderly soldiers were charged over single killings which lacked pre-meditation.

Or the appeasement when republicans dragged their feet on decommissioning, spied at Stormont and broke into Castlereagh PSNI, resulting in power-sharing being suspended for everyone.

Or when the IRA murdered Robert McCartney and pulled off a heist at the Northern Bank, and the only sanction against Sinn Fein was that they were not invited to the White House weeks later, on St Patick’s day 2005. But all NI parties were dis-invited to ensure SF was not embarrassed — and at the very time that a US politician as influential as Senator John McCain was singling out Sinn Fein for criticism.

The determination to keep republicans in office was still unwavering, and barely 18 months later, in the autumn of 2006, the DUP had signed up to power sharing too.

Then there were sporadic crises: over the devolution of policing and justice; over the exposure of On the Run plan; over SF refusal to implement welfare; the Kevin McGuigan murder and the 2015 paramilitary report of ongoing IRA influence; the scandal of RHI was turned into a demand over Irish language.

And look where we are now in terms of feeble scrutiny of IRA: the Independent Reporting Commission in recent reports has not probed the status of IRA, to update us all after the 2015 findings, and instead has issued warnings such on topics like Brexit.

So it seemed the society-wide soft pedalling around republicans could not get worse, particularly not after the almost comical inability to find anyone accountable for the Bobby Storey funeral.

Yet this week it did get worse.

Edwin Poots has been deservedly ousted for his conduct, which has done almost irreparable damage to devolution. But the list of culprits for this disaster is much larger.

It includes a succession of Tory secretaries of state who have been sent here with no prior knowledge of the place, and are beholden to a Northern Ireland Office, which defers to Ireland’s republican inclined Department of Foreign Affairs.

I have often heard rumours from London that it will do something to change the neutral culture in the NIO but it never does. On its handling of legacy alone the department should have been disbanded, and replaced with a unit that uses the whole apparatus of the UK state to defend Northern Ireland’s place as an integral part of the nation.

Instead of such action, Boris Johnson’s government showed its neglect of the crisis facing the Union in Northern Ireland by installing Julian Smith as secretary of state in 2019, before realising within months it needed to sack him.

Not in time though to stop him delighting Sinn Fein by letting Simon Coveney of all people — one of the most interfering, pro nationalist Dublin ministers in decades — jointly author a deal to reward the republican Irish language blackmail that kept Stormont down for three years.

Unionist politicians actually paid tribute to Mr Smith on his dismissal. In case any of them have still not clicked as to why nationalists rhapsodised about Mr Smith, this week he was tweeting his support for Westminster imposing the Irish language act if unionists did not commit to the Sinn Fein demand to prioritise its implementation.

You might have thought that after the Boris Johnson Irish Sea border, imposed after almost four years of warnings of republican terrorist violence if so much as CCTV was installed at the land border, that London might for once have made things tricky for republicans.

You might think that after all the setbacks and humiliations and betrayals of unionists (including the spectacle of Sinn Fein being so sure of the 2014 mooted legacy structures are good for republicans that it has repeatedly demanded their introduction) a DUP leader would have insisted on such a firm line from London against the Westminster appeasement solution. But no.

I am already hearing people connected to the Tories blaming Mr Poots for this saga, by implying that he encouraged Brandon Lewis in such a course rather than vice versa. But even if this had been the sole idea of a unionist leader, we ought to have UK minsters informed and strong enough to refuse such a Sinn Fein abuse of the process of first and deputy first minister nominations to secure political gain.

It would be bad enough to reward via Westminster a party that boycotts parliament, and yet has special dispensation to receive expenses despite the boycott. But it is unpardonable when the party wants Northern Ireland to fail and at times shows that goal in political vandalism.

Sinn Fein’s evident joy in the early hours of Thursday, after Mr Lewis gave it its Westminster wish, was telling. So too was the graceless and cruel way that Michelle O’Neill in her Stormont acceptance speech to kick the DUP when it was down, scolding them for denying rights and being untrustworthy.

Republicans and others including the former Alliance MLA Trevor Lunn used social media to mock my appearances on BBC Radio Ulster Talkback on Wednesday and on BBC One The View on Thursday night, when I was scathing about this context of Sinn Fein conduct and its long appeasement.

I stand by every word of what I said, and said it because so few others do. I have heard more than one panel discussion in recent weeks full of criticism of the DUP (much of it deserved) but not a word about Sinn Fein, not even from ‘unionist’ voices.

Perhaps the incoming DUP leader will think that it will be enough to complain about the Westminster threat but do nothing about it.

There has been little sign so far that they will be under pressure from the Ulster Unionist Party to take radical action.

I understand the UUP disinclination to help a party that tried to destroy it, or to look extreme when the Greens and Alliance have not stood against the fast tracking of the Irish language above all else including health.

But every party with the word unionist in its name should be refusing to operate as normal amid this outrageous abuse of an abnormal system of mandatory power-sharing, that depends above all on trust that is not currently forthcoming from an increasingly confident Sinn Fein.

• Ben Lowry (@BenLowry2) is News Letter deputy editor

Other articles by Ben Lowry below, and beneath that information on how to subscribe to the News Letter:

• Ben Lowry June 12: Now above all, when unionists are winning the argument on the Protocol, is time to stand firm against it

• Ben Lowry June 5: It is clear that Edwin Poots is not taking the DUP in a remotely hardline direction

• Ben Lowry May 29: There is much confusion in unionism, so here are some suggested core pro Union principles

• Ben Lowry May 22: Instead of ‘moving on’ from IRA funeral, we still need proper answers

• Ben Lowry May 22: If Joel Keys, 19, wants to help unionism he should get a law degree

• Ben Lowry May 15: Edwin Poots and Doug Beattie will offer two distinct shades of unionism

• Ben Lowry May 8: Formal UK ideas for an amnesty are almost exactly 20 years old

• Ben Lowry May 8: Let us hope that the brilliant Eoghan Harris keeps on writing

• Ben Lowry May 1: Unionism can’t just be about managing long-term defeat

• Ben Lowry May 1: Arlene Foster was given huge opportunity by DUP after her exit helped ruin UUP

• Ben Lowry April 24: NI seems to rely increasingly on just one pollster for data on attitudes to a border poll

• Ben Lowry April 17: DUP still has to choose between managing this disaster or total rejection of it

• Ben Lowry April 10: His enduring marriage to the Queen was key to our understanding of Prince Philip

• Ben Lowry April 3: Radio grilling of UUP leader exposed folly of unionists blaming Simon Byrne for funeral

• Ben Lowry Mar 27: There should not be an Irish language act, but it is too late — the DUP has agreed one

• Ben Lowry Mar 20: We have made it through the worst of the dark, dreaded winter lockdown

• Ben Lowry Mar 20: MLAs lost control of abortion by rejecting modest law reform

• Ben Lowry Mar 13: Whatever future Boris Johnson adopts for Northern Ireland seems set to lead to a crisis

• Ben Lowry Mar 13: Scotland tunnel isn’t fantasy, but something kids of today might see

• Ben Lowry Mar 6: The cost of victims’ pension has ballooned without explanation as to why 


• Ben Lowry Feb 27: Unionists have fully turned against Irish Sea border because they’ve seen the scale of disaster

• Ben Lowry Feb 20: We still lack answers as to why IRA funeral got special treatment at Roselawn

• Ben Lowry Feb 13: Peter Robinson has long experience of what is and is not politically feasible

• Ben Lowry Feb 6: There is barely any unionist support for violence, despite justified anger at sea border

• Ben Lowry Jan 30: At last, clear reason for UK and unionists to stop being weak towards Ireland/EU

• Ben Lowry Jan 23: Lockdown sceptics have been undermined by crazy theories, but sensible criticisms haven’t gone away

• Ben Lowry Jan 16: The Irish Sea border was imposed because UK knew unionists would take it

• Ben Lowry in 2020: Last night unionists celebrated a move towards Irish unity

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