United stance against protocol has ‘unwavering support’ from voters, DUP leader tells Lurgan rally

At the anti-Protocol rally in Lurgan, the DUP leader urged unionists to “stand united, to stand as one” against the post-Brexit trade deal which all the pro-Union parties believe is transferring sovereignty over Northern Ireland from the United Kingdom to the European Union.

Jim Allister, the TUV leader, meanwhile told the demonstration that the Protocol was being used as a transitional device towards a United Ireland.

While the Ulster Unionist leader has decided to attend no more anti-Protocol mass protests his running mate for the UUP in Upper Bann said he would participate in the Lurgan demonstration. Glenn Barr, the current Lord Mayor of Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon Borough Council, said before the event he would be in Lurgan as a member of his local Orange lodge.

Alderman Barr said he was “not participating as in getting on the stage” to speak from the platform during the demonstration in which 60 bands took part.

His party leader and fellow UUP Upper Bann candidate Doug Beattie said he was no longer taking part in the protests because they were “raising tensions” across the Province although he stressed this party would oppose the Protocol through political means.

Alderman Barr insisted yesterday that the UUP had told him he was free to take part in the rally. UUP sources told the News Letter that so long as the Banbridge councillor did not speak on the platform he was entitled to attend.

Sir Jeffrey Donaldson said the enduring message that had to be sent out from Lurgan on Friday night regarding the Protocol was “not about who did or didn’t attend but rather about unionists standing together in principled and united opposition to these arrangements.”

The DUP leader continued: “The Protocol has undemocratically altered Northern Ireland’s constitutional position and dealt a hammer blow to prosperity in all corners of our Province. It is now 27 percent more expensive to transport goods into Northern Ireland from Great Britain. Millions of pounds are being lost from our economy each week. With the cost-of-living crisis and end of grace periods on the horizon, the situation is even more bleak.”

Sir Jeffrey added: “Our opponents see the election on 5th May as an opportunity to weaken Unionism and divide the anti-Protocol cause. If they succeed, they will use the result to justify the status quo and force the Government to do nothing. We cannot allow that to happen. It is critical that our families go to the polls and transfer down the Unionist ticket.”

TUV leader Jim Allister told the rally that the “core premise of the Protocol is that GB is a foreign country and that Northern Ireland, in trading terms, is an integral part of the EU on what is to be the economically integrated island of Ireland.”

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