Statement by TUV Mid and East Antrim councillor Timothy Gaston:
“Gregory Campbell’s claim that the DUP cannot get Sinn Fein out of government is revealing in many ways.
“In their 2003 manifesto – an election they fought under the slogan “It’s Time for a Fair Deal” – the DUP said:
“Regardless of the behaviour of republicans there are no adequate provisions for the removal of Sinn Fein/IRA from the Executive in the current Assembly structure.
“As we predicted, the exclusion mechanism negotiated by Ulster Unionists proved to be totally unworkable in practice because of the need for SDLP support. …
“Only a vote for the DUP can stop this.”
“Now when challenged as to whether Sinn Fein/IRA should be excluded from government the DUP response, in the words of Gregory Campbell the other night, is “Well they should be but we can’t get them out”.
“Patently the arrangements are no better than those the DUP attacked in 2003.
“Sinn Fein/IRA are in government because successive unionists parties have placed them there through the outworking of the Belfast Agreement and subsequent St Andrew’s Agreement. At the heart of each of these agreements is government that Sinn Fein are fully part of because the UUP and DUP accepted them as fit for government.
“Is Mr Campbell right to say that the DUP cannot get Sinn Fein/IRA out of government? No, not in the slightest.
“The DUP could resign without the unprincipled farce of going back in after a few days and this would inevitably bring the executive to a halt.
“The IRA Army Council are only in the government of Northern Ireland because the DUP sustain them there in breach of their commitments in 2003 and indeed every subsequent election.
“The DUP are clearly not prepared to face up to the continuing reality that they have been in government with the IRA. Even more alarming is that they are tripping over themselves to continue to sit in government with them.
“While the UUP have made the correct decision to leave the executive, they need to search their conscience over having similarly sat in government with the IRA since 1998. Mike Nesbitt continually refers back to the vision of 1998 – the Belfast Agreement – as the way forward. The 1998 vision is what placed an active, armed and fully functional IRA into the government of this country. Northern Ireland needs to move away from that nightmare, into a system based on democracy and truth.
“TUVs ‘Path to Making Stormont Work’ policy initiative has set out a democratic way forward, instead of the continually flogging of the Stormont dead horse.”