Chris Heaton-Harris and Stormont parties to resume talks at Hillsborough Castle on restoration of power-sharing

The meetings come ahead of an unprecedented strike by public sector unions this Thursday which is likely to bring NI to a virtual standstill.

Secretary of State Chris Heaton-Harris says over £3bn is on the table which will settle the ongoing public services pay dispute – but will only be released when the assembly reforms.

The DUP has been boycotting Stormont since early 2022, protesting that post-Brexit trading arrangements between NI and GB – the Northern Ireland Protocol – are undermining the Union both commercially and constitutionally.

Thursday also marks the last day that the assembly can sit to elect a speaker and Stormont ministers, after which Mr Heaton-Harris must hold new Stormont elections by April 11.

The secretary of state confirmed last night that he would meet representatives of the main parties today to discuss the restoration of the Stormont Executive, ahead of Thursday’s deadline.

“I am meeting with the Northern Ireland parties today to discuss if an executive can be re-established as soon as possible,” he said.

“The focus of our talks will be the generous package that was offered to the parties before Christmas worth over £3 billion.

“This includes money to address public sector pay – that offer remains on the table. This offer was made after the effective conclusion of the Windsor Framework talks on all issues of substance.”

The DUP confirmed they would meet Mr Heaton-Harris in Hillsborough today at 12.30pm. But party leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson MP said talks would continue until there is a deal that unionists can support.

“The government has accepted our argument that Northern Ireland has been underfunded and has committed to an increased budget allocation,” he told the News Letter.

“The secretary of state has the power to direct that the pay awards are made and I trust that the Treasury will release these funds rather than attempt to use them as some kind of leverage. Such an approach would not only fail but would be wrong.

“Public sector workers deserve fair pay immediately and should not have their pay allocation used as a bargaining chip.

“Our negotiations with the government have made progress but will continue until there are arrangements agreed that unionists as well as nationalists can support.

“We want to see the NI Assembly restored but on a basis where unionist concerns have been addressed.”

TUV leader Jim Allister claimed that this week will see “the most shameful attempt at barefaced blackmail ever indulged in by a secretary of state”.

He added: “Chris Heaton-Harris accepts the depth of financial need, but is prepared to exploit that need in a blackmail and bribery spree.

“As many unions have rightly said, the just pay claims must be met whether or not Stormont is implementing the Union-dismantling protocol, which of course is the demand behind the NIO’s blackmail demand.

“Pay parity is an equal citizenship right and as such should be honoured in all parts of the UK. It is not something to be sullied by making deserving workers the secretary of state’s pawns.”

He added: “Once more in the recall of the Assembly the focus will not be in addressing the cause of the Belfast Agreement institutions being in tatters, namely the protocol, but rather on an anxiety to see unionism defeated and returning, with its tail between its legs, to Stormont to implement EU colonial rule. Whatever the pressures, unionism must continue to stand firm.”

Gerry Murphy, assistant general secretary with the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, told the BBC yesterday that their focus was on Mr Heaton-Harris.

“Our job here is to negotiate with the people who hold the purse strings,” he said.

“And the person holding the purse strings at this point in time is the secretary of state, not the Democratic Unionist Party ... He is the man who came out in that week before Christmas at Hillsborough, stood in front of the microphones and confirmed what we all knew; that he had the money available to him and that the workers in our public services deserved to be paid.”