Number in DUP knew about claim over Jeffrey Donaldson's behaviour to woman – Poots

Insisting that he would never have “done anything to protect” Donaldson, Mr Poots said the former DUP leader had attempted to “extinguish” his career.

Mr Poots has faced pressure from several Stormont parties over his role in an incident where a woman raised concern about behaviour by Donaldson.

Sinn Fein Chief Whip Sinead Ennis told MLAs that the incident raised “serious questions” over his role as Speaker.

Donaldson was last week convicted of 18 sex offences, including one count of rape, relating to abuse of two women when they were children.

Subsequent media reports have raised questions about how much was known within the DUP about Donaldson’s wider conduct in the period prior to his 2024 arrest.

BBC Spotlight has reported that some senior DUP figures were aware of another woman, who was not involved in the recent court case, who had raised concerns about Donaldson’s behaviour.

In the programme, former North Antrim MP Ian Paisley said the woman did not want to make a formal complaint but he said he told Mr Poots, who was then party leader and is now Stormont Speaker, about her concerns.

Questions have also been raised around whether there was an awareness that Donaldson was allegedly engaged in behaviour in his private life that, although legal, was at odds with positions he adopted publicly.

The DUP is commissioning an independent review into issues raised since Donaldson was convicted.

In an interview with UTV, Mr Poots said: “On a personal level, Jeffrey Donaldson sought to drive me out of politics, he sought to extinguish my career, he sought to destroy me as a person in politics.

“My experience of Jeffrey Donaldson was hugely negative, particularly in the last five years.

“The notion that I would ever have done anything to protect Jeffrey Donaldson is something for the birds, it just wouldn’t be done.

“The notion that I would not do something to protect victims, if that was the case, was also for the birds.”

Mr Poots said that he had been told by Mr Paisley the woman had been receiving texts from Jeffrey Donaldson that “she didn’t want”.

He said there was nothing suggested to him that the claim involved anything of a safeguarding or criminal nature and that the woman did not want to take it any further.

He said: “There’s quite a number of people within the DUP knew about this. Some of them told me, other than Ian Paisley.

“There are other people who knew about this.”

Asked about calls for him to stand aside from his position as Stormont speaker, Mr Poots said: “There is not one smidgeon of evidence of wrongdoing on my part.

“Nobody has provided any evidence.”

In the Northern Ireland Assembly on Tuesday, SDLP opposition leader Matthew O’Toole asked about standing orders for recall of MLAs over the summer recess to ask further questions about the fallout from the Donaldson conviction and to express confidence or otherwise in the speaker or others.

Mr Poots responded that anyone who believed he had protected the disgraced former leader is “living in some other world or other planet”.