Urgent action needed to save unionism after Government's Murphy Review 'whitewash' - MP
The Murphy Review into the Windsor Framework has made clear the government’s position that unionists “must now accept” they are not entitled the same protections as nationalists, Jim Allister has said.
The TUV leader has branded the report a “whitewash” – and said that “urgent action” must be taken to challenge the Irish Sea border by quitting powersharing.
On Thursday, the review – triggered by the failure to secure cross community support at Stormont for the Irish Sea border – recommended ways to simplify administrative processes for businesses and improve regulatory clarity.
But it was slammed by unionist parties for not addressing the underlying problems with the deal, namely that Northern Ireland is no longer part of the UK’s internal market for goods.
In an article on the Parliament News website, Mr Allister said the implication of the report “is simply that we must now accept that while nationalists were worthy of protection from majoritarianism for 45 years, unionists are not, even in relation to the 10 December proposition which presented the gravest existential threat to any community since 1921”.
In a Stormont vote last December, MLAs voted to back the continuation of the Windsor Framework – despite every unionist MLA voting against. Unionists said that the cross-community safeguards of the Belfast Agreement had been torn up by the government.
The North Antrim MP added: “It is quite impossible to overstate the enormity of this political moment for Northern Ireland. If unionism is to have a future, urgent action must now be taken.
“All self-respecting unionists who wish Northern Ireland to remain in the UK but sit on the Northern Ireland Executive that is currently giving effect to the 10 December vote and the dismantling of the UK, should now withdraw with immediate effect.
“Failure to do so cannot but have the effect of accommodating the removal of a critical foundation of the Northern Ireland political settlement in a way that accepts institutional discrimination against unionists”, the TUV leader said.