Ben Habib: The DUP has made a huge mistake by claiming the Irish Sea border no longer exists, while choosing to implement it

I refer to Sammy Wilson’s comments (‘Election row over TUV deepens,’ March 23).

Reform UK and I do not accuse anyone in the DUP of not being unionist. I count their members and representatives as political and personal friends.

I like and respect Sir Jeffrey Donaldson. I have frequently expressed sympathy for the position in which the DUP and he have found themselves because of a negligent and self-harming government in Westminster. Unionists should be able to take the Union for granted. They cannot because the Conservative and Unionist Party cares not for it. The protocol was its invention. It fell to political unionism to defend Northern Ireland’s place in the United Kingdom. That was an intolerable position in which to put the leaders of unionism.

We are on the same side of the debate. But, and it is a big but, the DUP as a political entity has made a huge mistake by claiming the Irish Sea border no longer exists, while choosing to implement it.

You might reasonably argue the border is now inevitable and so who cares whether the DUP turns a blind eye to it? It is going to happen whatever the DUP makes of it. Such thinking is fundamentally flawed.

By claiming it does not exist, the DUP was/ is asking the electorate to move on from the issue; it is saying the problem of the border has gone. It thus undermines resistance to the partitioning of the UK.

By turning a blind eye, it has also made it more difficult to advocate for measures which would counteract the adverse economic impacts of the border and the diversion of trade to the Republic. If there is no border, such measures would not be required?

So, there has been enormous damage done to the fabric of our country and Northern Ireland by misrepresenting the border as having gone. For goodness’s sake, even the UUP recognises there is a border in the Irish Sea. That is how far the DUP has fallen.

Reform UK had repeatedly said it would only stand in Great Britain. We had no desire or political advantage in standing against our friends in Northern Ireland. Our gripe was (is) with the Labour and Conservative parties – which together have delivered the United Kingdom to the precipice of an existential threat at multiple levels: economically, socially, culturally and constitutionally (including with the border down the Irish Sea).

The last thing I wanted was getting stuck into Northern Irish party politics. I had deliberately supported the DUP and TUV in equal measure, including financially. But the DUP’s Orwellian position on the border forced us into the fray.

It is not helpful that Sammy Wilson and others in the DUP personally disagree with their party’s line on the border. By remaining in the party, no matter what they might think and say, they are endorsing its actions and the Irish Sea border. Indeed, their being in the party gives false hope they may be able to get the DUP to correct course. Some will be duped into voting for them on that basis.

The DUP must be judged by what it does; not by what some of its rebellious members say.

If Sammy and his fellow rebels felt strongly about the border, they would leave the party.

The electorate has a genuine choice between the DUP and UUP on one side (both reconciled to the protocol and border) and TUV/ Reform UK on the other.

Let the people decide.

Ben Habib, Deputy leader, Reform UK