Govt says no rush for new election in N Ireland

UK Northern Ireland Secretary Chris Heaton-Harris said Thursday he would not rush into a decision on fresh elections in Northern Ireland, even if a deadline for power-sharing in Belfast is missed.

“If no Executive is formed today, I’ll be under a legal duty to hold elections to the Assembly in the next 12 weeks,” he tweeted, as the clock ticked to the midnight cut-off.

But he added: “I’ll use the next few weeks to carefully assess all options about what happens next and continue to talk to all interested parties before I make any decisions.”

Northern Ireland has been without a devolved government at the parliament in Stormont for almost a year because of a walk-out by the pro-UK Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). The DUP collapsed the power-sharing executive with pro-Irish nationalist party Sinn Fein in February 2022 because of its opposition to the Northern Ireland Protocol.

The protocol, signed between London and Brussels as part of the UK’s Brexit divorce from the European Union, governs trade in the British province, and keeps Northern Ireland in the European single market and customs union.

The DUP wants the deal overhauled or scrapped entirely, arguing it casts Northern Ireland adrift from the rest of the UK and makes a united Ireland more likely. It had been due to share power with Sinn Fein, which became the biggest party in the assembly after elections last May.

“The DUP are hiding behind the protocol,” Sinn Fein’s first ministerelect Michelle O’Neill told journalists in London.

“I suspect it’s a lot more about the election result in May. I suspect it’s because they don’t want to serve alongside a republican first minister,” she said.

Northern Ireland was created just over a century ago as a pro-UK, Protestant-majority entity under British rule, as Ireland cast off colonial governance from London and later became a republic.

If power-sharing is not restored, Mr Heaton-Harris is obliged by law from yesterday to announce a date for a new election within the next six weeks to allow a further six weeks of campaigning.

Under current rules, this would mean an election would have to be held no later than April 13 — three days after the 25th anniversary of the 1998 agreement that brought peace to Northern Ireland.

It is widely expected that the UK government will push elections further into the future.