Can ‘Smarmy Leo’ and ‘Cranky Mary Lou’ restart talks?
MOVES to get the North talks going again today are being welcomed – but can ‘Smarmy’ Leo and ‘Cranky’ Mary Lou first put their own very public differences aside.
The tension between the Sinn Féin leader and the Taoiseach has boiled over in recent months, and at times the heckling turned both bitter and personal.
Mary Lou McDonald did not take it lightly, last September, when Leo Varadkar described her as ‘very cranky’, and compared her to the French far-right leader Marine Le Pen. And the Taoiseach will have been none-to-pleased with her comment, last week, when she told Sky News: ‘Leo is kind of smarmy. You’ll have seen him in Number 10 talking about Love Actually and donning various pairs of socks. So smarmy.’
Today, the Taoiseach and Tánaiste Simon Coveney will meet the newly elected Sinn Féin leader and the party’s deputy leader, Michelle O’Neill, in Dublin, to discuss the best way to get Stormont up and running.
Mr Varadkar will ‘want to hear Sinn Féin’s assessment of the events of the last week and the prospects for an early resumption of negotiations ’, a source told the Irish Daily Mail. It’s understood Mr Varadkar will ‘emphasise’ to Sinn Féin that, ‘notwithstanding the disappointment surrounding the DUP decision to halt the talks, the only way forward for Northern Ireland is dialogue and compromise between the parties’.
The Sinn Féin leadership will then meet British prime minister Theresa May in Downing Street later this week.
Ms McDonald said: ‘We will make it clear to both governments that a return to direct rule from London is not an option. The decision by the DUP to walk away from a draft deal and collapse the talks process cannot be allowed to further impede the rights of citizens and the implementation of existing agreements.
‘Language rights, marriage equality and access to inquests are rights available to everybody else on this island and in Britain. They are not republican issues, they are people issues. These rights are for the whole of society.
‘Michelle and I will be telling the Taoiseach and the British prime minister that it is the responsibility of the two governments to implement the agreements on legacy and an Irish Language Act and to provide for marriage equality.
‘Sinn Féin remains committed to working for an agreement. However, any return to talks must be progressive and ultimately they must deliver for citizens.’
The DUP, whose ten MPs prop up the Tory government at Westminster, effectively ended talks aimed at bringing the 13-month political impasse to a close, last Wednesday.
Leader Arlene Foster said she did not believe it would be possible to form an Executive. She then called for the London government to set a budget and start making policy decisions for the North.
However, her comments, which came two days after the prime minister visited the North last Monday, surprised many who had believed a deal had been close on the contentious issues.
emmajane.hade@dailymail.ie