DUP leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson takes aim at Lagan Valley rivals

The DUP leader accused the TUV’s Lorna Smyth of not being on the ground to hear unionist concerns in the constituency, and also hit out at Sorcha Eastwood for what he called “anti-unionist rants”.

Ms Eastwood was elected as an Alliance MLA in May this year, while Ms Smyth was around 700 votes short of the fifth and final seat won by David Honeyford of Alliance.

In a Facebook post on Tuesday afternoon, Mr Donaldson said: “Recently Lorna Smyth from Bangor, unsuccessful TUV candidate in the Assembly elections and Sorcha Eastwood of Alliance have taken to attacking me on social media for my stance in standing up for Northern Ireland.

“Perhaps if Lorna caught a train and visited Lagan Valley every now and again, she would hear what I am hearing from unionists the length and breadth of this constituency.

“They are fed up with petty bickering by those small number of unionists who seem to believe that unionist infighting and division is the best way to protect the Union and remove the protocol.

“Have the election results taught them nothing?”

Mr Donaldson went on to say: “As for Sorcha, who proudly describes herself as Irish, she is desperate to undermine unionism and our British identity.

Her Party demands the rigorous implementation of a protocol that is harming businesses and consumers across Northern Ireland and undermining our place in the Union.

Now Sorcha and the Alliance Party want to exclude unionists from Government and frankly they don’t want a unionist about the place.

“That’s why they are vigorously targeting unionist seats.

“I will not be deflected by Lorna’s feeble attempts to undermine my stand for unionism nor Sorcha’s anti-unionist rants”.