LAST UPDATE | 25 Apr 2023

NORTHERN IRELAND SECRETARY Chris Heaton-Harris has been told that he has a “lot more to do” to satisfy the DUP over the Windsor Framework and to persuade the party to return to Stormont.

DUP MP Jim Shannon accused Heaton-Harris of trying to “disarm and bully” his party through recent comments and said he was not helping them to engage positively with the Government.

However, Heaton-Harris told the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee that he stood his words, repeating that he believed the best way to ‘secure the union’ is by restoring the powersharing institutions.

The EU and UK agreed on the Windsor Framework after a painstaking negotiation process due to unionists’ discontent with the Northern Ireland Protocol’s post-Brexit trading agreement.

The DUP, which collapsed the powersharing institutions last year, has demanded that its political and trading concerns must be met before it returns to government.

In a speech at Queen’s University in Belfast last week marking the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, Heaton-Harris said those who are proud of the region’s place in the union “should put the union first” and restore the devolved institutions.

DUP MP Jim Shannon told the committee today: “I think we as a party feel that over this past period of time, your attitude towards unionism is one that we feel particularly aggrieved about.”

“I read your comments you made at Queen’s University. Certainly from our point of view we feel that your attitude, your words that you chose, were dismissive of unionism,” Shannon said.

If you as Secretary of State wish to engage with the unionist parties and feel that that engagement can be constructive and positive, you need to pick your words much more carefully.

“My party, the DUP, and indeed my leader Jeffrey Donaldson, felt that your comments towards us as a party, were: unionism, take it or leave it.”

He added: “I would suggest that what you tried to do was disarm the DUP and bully them towards a point of view. But what you have done is you have armed loyalism and unionism back home on the streets.

“Those words were inflammatory, badly chosen and unfortunate. I think you have a lot of work to do.”

Heaton-Harris said he “fundamentally disagreed” with the MP’s remarks, adding: “I stand by every word that I said.”

“I believe there is a really positive future for the union which comes from what we have managed to achieve in the Windsor Framework which means that the union can get stronger in the not too distant future with the institutions up and running,” Heaton-Harris said.

I think there is a danger without those institutions up and running that people start to question them.

“When people start to question the institutions, whether they are working for them, that is when they start to cast around for alternatives. That is something I have every right to say.”

Consumers

Elsewhere, European Commission vice-president Maros Sefcoviv said today that the Windsor Framework will ensure consumers in Northern Ireland have access to the same goods as the rest of the UK.

But he insisted the European Court of Justice remains the sole arbiter of EU law in the region.

Sefcovic said the framework will make trade between Great Britain and Northern Ireland smoother and ensure that the same food and medicines would be available in both regions.

He was speaking remotely to TDs on the EU Affairs Committee to discuss EU-UK Relations and the Windsor Framework at Leinster House in Dublin.

“The movement of goods from Great Britain to Northern Ireland, which are not at risk of entering the EU single market, has been made smoother for trusted traders,” he said.

“Consumers in Northern Ireland, will find the same foods on supermarket shelves as in the rest of the UK, whilst safeguards will also be in place including labelling and SPS inspection facilities.

“And a permanent solution has also been found to ensure that people in Northern Ireland have access to all medicines at the same time, and under the same conditions as in the rest of the UK.”