TUV Conference: Timothy Gaston says change is coming at Stormont - and his party is the alternative to failure
The TUV’s sole MLA at Stormont says the party is going into the next Stormont election with a clear message to the electorate – “vote for a party that you can trust”.
Timothy Gaston says that “change is coming” and told the party’s annual conference that “there is an alternative” to Stormont failure and “change is coming”.
The North Antrim MLA hit out at political rivals in Cookstown on Saturday, claiming that Northern Ireland “is not in good place” because of failings by the governing parties.
On MLA pay, he accused the Executive of being “out of kilter” with the people – citing the recent 27% pay rise for Stormont politicians.
He said that now the main five parties which sit on the Assembly Commission had got that issue out of the way, “I trust they will now focus their attention on doing something about stopping the trans invaders from using the Stormont toilet of their choosing”.
Mr Gaston was referring to the current policy which allows men who identify as women to use the women’s toilets, and vice versa. He said this was an example of “the woke madness” at Stormont.
Addressing DUP MLAs – who he said were “rightly vocal” on such issues – the TUV man asked what the deputy First Minister Emma Little-Pengelly is doing to “bring an end to the wokery that has consumed the Executive Office”.
Reflecting on the party’s record in the Assembly, he said: “If you watch any of the Stormont debates, you'll see plenty of empty seats. The most common comment I see in social media is people asking, ‘where are the MLAs’?
“They seldom turn up, and when they do, it's only at voting time to get their name in the minutes. I would like to think that the TUV record in Stormont speaks for itself.
“I would like to think that in the last 20 months, TUV has proved our detractors wrong.
“We were told that when Jim went to Westminster, the TUV voice on the blue benches would fall silent. How wrong were they?”
On the Irish Sea border the North Antrim TUV MLA said that his rivals in the DUP and UUP had “surrendered their leverage” on the issue “for a return to chauffeur driven limousines”.