Stormont stalemate causing harm to the union, warns minister Steve Baker

Steve Baker urged DUP MPs to return to Stormont as the Commons gave its backing to a budget for Northern Ireland's public services. He implored them to "make the union work" and pursue the "best of available futures" for Northern Ireland by returning to the power-sharing executive, and restoring the assembly.

The budget is being set in Westminster due to the continued political stalemate in Stormont. The DUP refuses to enter a power-sharing devolved government over concerns that implementing the post-Brexit trade arrangements in the Windsor Framework would loosen Northern Ireland's ties to the rest of the Union.

The Windsor Framework, negotiated by Rishi Sunak earlier this year and approved by Parliament, proposes reduced checks in goods travelling directly to Northern Ireland from Great Britain to reduce trade barriers within the UK.

Goods travelling onto the Republic of Ireland would continue to be subject to checks required by EU law. Speaking during the third reading debate of the Northern Ireland Budget (No.2) Bill, DUP MP Sammy Wilson laid out his party's continued objections to the agreement.

He told MPs: "Quite honestly, no Government can expect unionist representatives who have fought to maintain the union, to go back into Stormont to implement policies which will drive a further wedge between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom, where they will be obliged to accept EU legislation which even the Windsor Framework indicated would be a cause of divergence between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom.

"So if the Government really does want politicians in Northern Ireland to play a role in deciding budgets and how budgets are spent and everything else, then they first of all have to accept that Unionists will not, and cannot, and should not be expected to participate in the demise of the union by having to sit in an assembly which would be forced to implement the very policies which they believe are detrimental to the union."

He later added: "We are not being truculent... we simply are making it quite clear that the ask which is being made either in terms of the political compromises on the union, and secondly the financial difficulties which this budget would cause, make it impossible for the assembly to be up and running again."

Northern Ireland minister Mr Baker responded: "On the point of the budget, the surest way now surely to harm the union is to allow Northern Ireland to fail, because people vote for change when the world isn't working for them.

"I have to say to him that when I look at the available futures for Northern Ireland the one that is going to work best and best preserve the union is to get on and get Northern Ireland working. "I know he is frustrated. I am frustrated too and I say to him I would have liked to have done better on the Windsor Framework but now we have to choose from the best of available futures."

Mr Baker went on: "This Government does believe in the union but we also respect the Belfast Good Friday Agreement in all its dimensions and that includes devolution and I just implore him to make the union work."

Elsewhere in the debate, shadow Northern Ireland secretary Hilary Benn urged ministers to work to "regain trust" of Northern Ireland's political parties.

The newly appointed Labour frontbencher added: "The Labour Party does not oppose this Bill as to do so would cause deeper instability but as I think everybody has contributed so far tonight has said, the best and the only way forward is the restoration of Stormont so that local representatives can get to grips with the budget and be accountable to the people who elected them, the people of Northern Ireland for the decisions that they make, and frankly that day cannot come soon enough."

Alliance MP Stephen Farry (North Down) said there is "no sign" of any return to devolution, adding: "The response from (Mr Wilson) to the minister of state I think illustrates the lack of realism that there is there in terms of the choices that face us in Northern Ireland collectively, and indeed the choices that face unionism in terms of ensuring Northern Ireland works for everybody."

The Bill will undergo further scrutiny in the House of Lords at a later date.