Carla Lockhart says she quit DUP board over principle - rejecting Sammy Wilson's 'token gesture' comment

Carla Lockhart has repeated a call for the First Minister to be removed from office – and has pointed out that her party can do that by resigning Emma Little-Pengelly from the joint position.

However, she says she wants to be “honest about the limits of what we can achieve” – and that other Sinn Féin ministers cannot be removed from post.

Sinn Féin says Michelle O’Neill is going nowhere, and the DUP won’t decide who Northern Ireland’s first minister is.

The Upper Bann MP said she made her decision to quit as a DUP party officer on a point of principle, and not an attempt to satisfy hardliners. That came in response to comments from her Westminster colleague Sammy Wilson MP.

He had told the News Letter that he did not envisage Ms Lockhart quitting the DUP – and that he didn’t understand how collapsing Stormont would help “the Drumcree cause or the country”.

Mr Wilson said her resignation as a party officer was “probably the lowest level protest without any real consequences for her”.

“It's a way of making a token gesture as to her dissatisfaction that we weren't prepared to bring the assembly down”, the East Antrim MP said.

Ms Lockhart did not respond to questions from the News Letter about her DUP colleague’s comments, but addressed some of the matters he raised in a statement posted on social media at the weekend.

Ms Lockhart said her decision was not made for the purposes of “satisfying hardliners”.

“The stand I have taken is about principle,” she said.

“My only ambition is to continue serving the people of Upper Bann. It is not about personal differences with party colleagues. I feel strongly that an issue this serious cannot be resolved through symbolic or token gestures. Nor am I interested in myself making any such gestures.

“Any belief the steps I have taken are for that purpose is deeply misguided and completely misreads both my strength of feeling, and that of those I represent. Suggestions that I am simply ‘satisfying hardliners’ miss the point. I am standing up for what I believe is right, even when that means taking difficult decisions.”

Ms Lockhart said she wants to be clear about what she is calling for. She called for Michelle O’Neill to be removed from office, adding that deputy First Minister Emma Little-Pengelly’s resignation would also bring that about.

“I wish we could, but we cannot simply remove every Sinn Féin Minister who is under investigation for law breaking on the Garvaghy Road, and I want to be honest about the limits of what we can achieve,” she said.

“I have never seen unionism so united or felt such anger across our community. That unity should give us encouragement and courage. These concerns are not confined to so-called ‘hardliners’. They are shared across all shades of unionism by people who want fairness, respect for the rule of law and meaningful accountability. Unionists who want flagrant law-breaking dealt with but want the institutions to continue.”

Ms O’Neill attended a police station in Belfast on Wednesday for an arranged interview with officers investigating an unnotified protest, which was staged as part of efforts to stop an Orange Order parade proceeding down the predominantly nationalist Garvaghy Road.

Sinn Féin leaders Mary Lou McDonald and Ms O’Neill were both interviewed at Musgrave PSNI station on Wednesday over their participation in the Portadown protest.

The senior republicans were among several Sinn Féin politicians to receive letters from the PSNI asking them to attend for interview. Politicians from other parties also received such letters.

Sinn Féin MLA Paul Boggs said: “It’s not for Jamie Bryson, the DUP or the Orange Order to decide who the First Minister is. The people across the north decided Michelle O’Neill should be their First Minister. Michelle is going nowhere. There is no going back to the days of ‘no nationalist need apply’”.