Mary Lou accuses Tories of ‘petulance’
SINN Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald has accused the British government of ‘Tory petulance’ after she was excluded from attending roundtable talks with UK foreign secretary James Cleverly over the Northern Ireland Protocol yesterday.
Ms McDonald said the situation was ‘bizarre and unprecedented’. But unionist representatives suggested it was a diplomatic issue and that Mr Cleverly could not meet Ms McDonald ahead of meeting his counterpart in Ireland.
Instead the meeting went ahead with the unionist DUP and UUP and the cross-community Alliance party present. The nationalist SDLP joined Sinn Féin in refusing to attend.
Ms McDonald spoke to the media in Belfast while the talks were taking place nearby in the city. She said: ‘We are in a very important time when progress needs to be made on the issue of the protocol, on getting the executive back up and running, getting the Assembly into action and ensuring people have government.
‘We had hoped to make progress on those issues at the leaders’ meeting. I travelled for that meeting because I believe it is an important meeting and bizarrely, and in an unprecedented way, the British government choose to seek to exclude the leader of Sinn Féin.
‘The whole thing is unacceptable. We had a chance to mark progress, to exchange views, to listen to each other. But rather than having that kind of meeting, a kind of British Tory petulance has emerged. That is a terrible shame.’
In a tweet, Sinn Féin Stormont leader Michelle O’Neill accused the British government of ‘bad faith’. A UK government spokesman said: ‘The meeting is for Northern Ireland politicians to talk through issues around the Northern Ireland Protocol with SOSNI [Northern Secretary Chris Heaton-Harris] and the UK foreign secretary. The leader of Sinn Féin in the Assembly [Michelle O’Neill] was invited.’
After the meeting, DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson said he did not want to get drawn into the row. He said: ‘My understanding is the NIO [Northern Ireland Office] didn’t exclude any party. There was an issue around the protocol of Mary Lou McDonald meeting the foreign secretary ahead of the foreign secretary meeting his counterpart in Dublin. That is not a matter for me. I am not going to get drawn into this.’
He added: “It is better when all parties are at the table. I want to see all parties in Northern Ireland putting their views across... I hope next time the parties will be back at the table.’