TUV's Timothy Gaston defends naming Sinn Fein MLA's son - despite solicitors branding claims 'false' and 'baseless'
Timothy Gaston has defended his decision to use Assembly legal protections to name the son of a Sinn Fein MLA – despite the man’s legal team saying claims he was involved in an act of vandalism at Belfast City Hall are “baseless”.
The TUV MLA raised online allegations about Carál Ní Chuilín’s son Naoise Ó Cuilin during a Stormont committee on Wednesday, asking whether the Sinn Fein MLA wished to make any declarations.
Ms Ní Chuilín told MLAs that she had “no interest to declare at all on behalf of myself or anyone else”, ahead of a discussion on the row over a vandalised portrait of a former DUP lord mayor at Belfast City Hall.
That prompted a statement from Mr Ó Cuilin’s solicitors, criticising the “false, erroneous and irresponsible information” which had been circulated in recent days.
They said the allegation that he was involved in the damage is “entirely false, baseless, and malicious” – and that he “did not cause any damage whatsoever to the portrait of Lord Wallace Browne”.
The Public Prosecution Service said this week that it had decided not to prosecute over the incident as “there was no reasonable prospect of conviction for any criminal offence on the evidence available”.
Speaking to the BBC on Thursday, Mr Gaston defended his actions, saying that they were in the public interest.
He argued that Ms Ní Chuilín – with whom he sits on the Executive Office committee – should have declared an interest when the City Hall incident was raised in an Assembly committee in October 2024.
Asked by presenter Stephen Nolan how it was in the public interest to name an innocent person, Mr Gaston said if he “hadn’t used yesterday’s opportunity to put that to Carál Ní Chuilín… we wouldn’t be talking about this today”.
The North Antrim MLA said the issue was “of huge public importance, there’s a huge interest in this”.
The News Letter asked Sinn Fein whether Carál Ní Chuilín should have declared an interest when the City Hall incident was first discussed in a meeting of the Executive Office committee in October 2024.
The party did not respond.