Statement by TUV leader Jim Allister:
“Last week, we had a carve-up by the main parties and then an offer of the crumbs. Of course, those crumbs did not meet any of the desires of those of us who have been sent here on a mandate equal to that of everyone else.
“In the Business Committee, it was made sure that there was no representative from outside the five main parties until that carve-up had been completed.
“The result in my case is that I have been denied a place on the Windsor Framework Democratic Scrutiny Committee because deep-dive scrutiny is not what is required. It is the form rather than the substance of scrutiny that the protocol-implementing parties in the Assembly wish to see. Almost 8% of the electorate voted TUV – No Sea Border and it is scandalous that their view has been excluded from the committee which supposedly deals with the matter.
“On that Committee or not, elsewhere, I will continue to shine a light on the dark deeds of colonial rule from the EU in this place.”