Divergence proposal a win says Poots - as DUP 'dealmaker' raises prospects for a deal

“It would be one element of progress that in itself wouldn’t carry anything,” said Mr Poots.

“There is a course of work that has been done thus far and that’s a course of work that is ongoing and we are determined to bring that to a conclusion.”

Mr Poots also said no internal party meeting was planned for “the next couple of days” but said there are a whole series of regular meetings over the course of the next week.

He also criticised some other unionists who have accused the DUP of being “traitors”.

“Why would we have done what we’ve done for the last two years and go back with nothing, and people should reflect on that,” he said.

In a spat with the TUV’s Samuel Morrison yesterday on X, formerly Twitter, Mr Poots reiterated the party’s seven tests.

“We produced the seven tests, and our negotiations are about delivering on them”, he said.

The TUV press officer had accused Mr Poots of implementing checks on the Irish Sea border when he was a Stormont minister.

He said the former DUP leader “stopped implementing the protocol in the lead up to the last Assembly poll” and that a court case proved “beyond doubt that you cannot hold office in NI executive without being a protocol implementer”.

Edwin Poots said he “used every opportunity in post to frustrate its implementation” and added “repeating something doesn't make it a fact. What is a fact I never give an instruction to build any port infrastructure to implement the protocol, that was just a lie repeated by the TUV”.

There has been increasing tensions between the parties in recent weeks as a deal to restore Stormont inches closer.

TUV leader Jim Allister has warned of an “inevitable attempt to hoodwink” voters that the Irish Sea border has been removed.

He asked unionists to judge what they are being told "not by the spin but by the reality that the iniquitous Protocol remains unaltered”.

Mr Allister said that having less divergence with Great Britain wouldn’t “undo any of the law and structures which created the partitioning sea border in the first place. Unless and until sovereignty is reclaimed from the EU over our trade and border, nothing of constitutional substance will change”.

The Tory European Research Group – which is opposed to the divergence plan because it would hamper so-called Brexit freedoms in GB – called the proposals a fig leaf.

The group’s director Christopher Howarth told the News Letter that rather than change or even tweak the Windsor Framework the government is “now trying to pretend the whole UK will be dragged into the Windsor Framework.".

He said: “But they can't tell pro Brexit voters in GB that the UK can still make it's own laws and tell Northern Irish politicians they will solve the sea border by stopping divergence in GB.

"If you say different things to different people about the same fig leaf of a proposal you will get caught out and upset everyone.

"The only solution is to treat the UK as an indivisible whole and scrap the Windsor Framework”.

Prominent Tory backbencher David Jones – a member of the ERG – said “the ability to diverge from EU regulations was one of the most important reasons for Brexit and is potentially one of its most important benefits.

“Northern Ireland is an integral part of the United Kingdom and it is essential that it should be treated in exactly the same way as the rest of the country.

“The episode further highlights the need to revisit and amend the Windsor Framework”.

But many in the DUP have long since given up on a hard Brexit and are appalled at the approach their former Tory allies in the referendum campaign have taken to Northern Ireland.

Few in the party will be concerned about limiting Brexit in Great Britain.

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