New Green Party deputy leader Lesley Veronica tells how IRA murder of her father led to interest in politics

Lesley Veronica said while the party had a disappointing Assembly election earlier this year, losing both their MLAs – former leader Clare Bailey and Rachels Woods – it relit the political fire in her belly to help them grow.

The party is now left with seven councillors across the region.

Ms Veronica emphasised she did not believe the results reflected a rejection of the Green Party, revealing they received a surge of new members after the election.

She described working well with leader Mal O’Hara, and wanting to help the party communicate that it is about more issues than the environment alone.

Her father David Bingham was shot dead by the IRA in January 1973 when she was just four.

“For me that has definitely led to my interest in history and politics, that took a swing to the academic side because I teach politics, but it always stimulated my attraction to politics,” she told the PA news agency.

She served on the Victims and Survivors Forum, which she described as a “humbling experience”.

“I was in a room with some people who had had multiple traumatic events, yet we were able to come to a consensus, we were able to be respectful to each other,” she said.

While she opposes the UK government’s controversial proposed legacy bill which would see perpetrators offered an effective amnesty in exchange for co-operation with an information retrieval body, she is not pursuing justice nearly 50 years on.

“I understand it matters a lot to other people, what one person needs or wants, it’s quite legitimate for somebody else to need or want something else,” she said.

“For me, what I want to see is a real commitment that we never return there. I would honour the loss of my father and the impact it had on us – and it had an tremendously bad impact – but I would honour that more by trying to work for peace.

“I would love to see more work on a regional trauma network because we do have a massive problem with mental health which is undoubtedly related to the conflict and the post-conflict society.”

Ms Veronica stood unsuccessfully for election for Belfast City Council in 2019, and for the Northern Ireland Assembly in South Antrim in 2022.

Her husband Paul is also involved in the party, and ran for Antrim and Newtownabbey council in the last local government election.

In the days after the Assembly election result, she described sitting down to identify the work needed to grow again.

“Our vote went down by a very small margin, but nonetheless we went into the election thinking we were going to significantly increase our vote,” she said.

“It does give us work to do.

“Mal and I are a really good fit, we have worked on numerous campaigns together, we share the same vision for the party and we both have the passion and energy which is what I’m is what we need to get everyone focused on what we want to do.

“From a party point of view, we want to see more elected reps in the Assembly and at council, at the end of the day, we’re in a political party to get policies enacted or have an impact on policy – and I think we have shown at council and Assembly level that we do it.”

With speculation that fresh Assembly elections could be called this winter while the DUP continues to refuse to participate in devolved government until the UK takes action against the Northern Ireland Protocol, Ms Veronica blasted the situation as “ludicrous”.

“We would really prefer not to (fight a second Assembly election this year), apart from anything else, it is a colossal waste of public money,” she said.

“It’s really ludicrous at this stage that the executive has not been formed, it actually defies belief to me that you could see a population facing such a huge economic problems and still hold out in this way… it’s a dereliction of duty.”