Statement by TUV leader Jim Allister:-
“I am saddened by the attacks, mostly from DUP sources, on a true friend of Northern Ireland, Ben Habib. The vitriol of these attacks is no credit to their sources.
“It’s not how you start in understanding the Protocol that really matters, but where you finish!
“No one in the DUP glasshouse can afford to throw stones, considering their many faux pas:
* The then DUP leader in August 2016 joining in a joint letter with Martin McGuinness to London and Brussels demanding special Brexit arrangements for NI, which foolishly opened the door to the separate treatment of NI and ultimately the Protocol;
* The DUP prioritising money over constitutional Brexit certainty in its confidence and supply deal with Mrs May;
* The DUP initially lauding aspects of the Protocol arrangements, including access to the EU single market which inevitably meant accepting the imposition of EU law;
* The current DUP leader declaring customs checks posed no constitutional detriment;
Every DUP MLA voting on 8 December 2020 to impose 45 EU laws so as to comply with the Protocol, despite the warnings of Jim Wells and myself.
* All leading now to the DUP leadership giving up the fight and accepting the Union-dismantling Protocol and its implementation.
“Meanwhile, it was Ben Habib who spearheaded, with essential funding, the court challenge which exposed the Protocol’s breach of Article 6 of the Act(s) of Union. His generosity did not end there but included £30,000 to each of DUP and TUV to fight the Protocol. Frankly, if the TUV had somersaulted into Protocol implementers, I’d be returning his money!
“Indeed, when local unionist politicians were doing very little, it was Ben Habib who led by example.
“I therefore will not have him denigrated by those embarrassed by his continuing robust stand and whose fidelity to a Protocol-implementing DUP leadership is causing them to put party before country.”