What's behind the DUP's latest move in Northern Ireland?

Analysis: the resignation of the First Minister seems to have less to do with the Northern Ireland Protocol and more to do the party itself

By Darren Litter, Queen's University Belfast

Last Thursday at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Belfast, the Democratic Unionist Party leader Jeffrey Donaldson affirmed the resignation of NI First Minister Paul Givan. The move was met by widespread disapproval from across the political spectrum - both within and outside NI - with fellow unionist leader Doug Beattie describing it as "another manufactured crisis" that will harm both the stability and the people of the north.

Donaldson, historically considered a moderate by the Irish government, offered a series of explanations for the DUP's decision. But as the leading NI journalist Sam McBride noted, none of them provided any clear basis for the DUP's sudden Stormont withdrawal. This leaves the impression that the DUP is acting narrowly in the interests of their party, rather than the interests of the NI entity it purports to defend.

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From RTÉ Radio 1's Morning Ireland, DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson sets out the reasons for Paul Givan's resignation

The first theme of the defence offered by Donaldson and colleagues is the familiar line of argument about the NI Protocol being imposed. The DUP leader at least acknowledged the culpability of the Boris Johnson administration in this (a fact which regularly goes omitted), but neglected to mention that the NI Assembly voted in favour of the Protocol, or that recent trends indicate 52% of people regard it as a "good thing".

Though accepting that progress has been made, Donaldson also did not do justice to the "unprecedented" degree of flexibility demonstrated by the EU. If the EU was the nefarious actor some unionists portray, it would have simply held the British government to the original terms of the Protocol the EU went to great length to make sure was understood and accepted on the British side.

Instead, it has endeavoured to come to arrangements which will alleviate problems in Great Britain-NI trade, something which would likely already be achieved if the pragmatic UK civil service did not have to grapple with outside Brexiteer ideology. The EU wants to strengthen the effectiveness of how the Protocol operates; a unifying position in NI. But the DUP and figures like Lord Frost have wanted to change the Protocol in a way that makes it no longer the Protocol. There is no precision as to what that looks like, or how it meets the challenges it was agreed by the EU and UK were uniquely addressed by the Protocol.

From RTÉ 1's Nine News, Jeffrey Donaldson says there will be no return to NI power-sharing unless Protocol issues resolved

The second part of the DUP's leader intervention was economic, with a claim that the Protocol is costing NI £100,000 per hour or £2.5 million per day. But as the SDLP MLA and former HM Treasury official Matthew O'Toole has detailed, this is predicated on one analysis by Esmond Birnie, the former UUP MLA and Ulster University economist. O'Toole describes this as an "extrapolation" based on a few reports on only four businesses, and has pointed out that - contrary to DUP claims - it is not in fact the finding of the NI Fiscal Council, of which Birnie is a member.

The picture of economic duress caused by the Protocol also does not synch with the more endemic GB supply issues NI has avoided. Indeed, it has outperformed the rest of the UK economically (one economic projection that has actually been borne out). The DUP should be aware that it will be this potential for the Single Market-based NI to discredit Brexit, rather than a sense of unionism, which is motivating the concerns of the many Brexiteers they count as friends.

It already appears lost on the DUP that the last time they threw their lot in with such people it was in the context of a prime minister who convinced them of one intention, only to then deliver an outcome much more egregious to their preferences than what was on offer with Theresa May. The cost this time may be the squandering of the greatest economic opportunity NI has had in recent memory.

From RTÉ's Brexit Republic podcast, RTÉ Europe Editor Tony Connelly, RTÉ Northern Editor Vincent Kearney, RTÉ London Correspondent Sean Whelan and RTÉ Deputy Foreign Editor Colm Ó Mongáin dive into the detail of the week the DUP pulled the plug on Stormont to change the NI Protocol.

The third aspect of the DUP position was in relation to the 'principle of consent' - a cornerstone of the 1998 Belfast/Good Friday Agreement. The DUP argues here that the Protocol infringes on NI's right to have a say on any changes to its constitutional arrangements, with Donaldson bizarrely invoking John Hume, and taking particular aim at the Irish government.

Of course, Article 1 of the Protocol affirms NI's existing constitutional position, and it is unfair to say that the Irish government has been anything other than a constructive actor within the EU-UK dynamic. When the EU misguidedly moved to block Covid-19 vaccine exports to NI, nowhere was more outraged than Dublin, and it has since consistently sought to be a conduit for genuine concerns.

Prof Brendan O'Leary - whose technical knowledge of the 1998 Agreement is perhaps unrivalled - puts to bed this notion that the Protocol represents a deviation from the consent principle. As he puts it, "the UK's sovereign parliament has decided to take Great Britain, not Northern Ireland, out of the EU’s single market, and out of its customs union, while leaving Northern Ireland within the single market’s regulations, and subject to the EU’s customs code for imports from Great Britain".

From RTÉ Radio 1's Drivetime, former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern talks about the latest developments in Northern Ireland over the NI Protocol

O'Leary further points out that consociational consent mechanisms such as the parallel or weighted majority "apply solely to powers within the competence of the Northern institutions" i.e. not customs arrangements. But if there is to be a non-technical discourse on consent, clearly it must begin with NI's 56% to 44% vote against Brexit.

Though some choose to ideologically believe it, the Protocol is not "existential" for NI constitutionally or economically. What has become existential is the DUP's near 20 year stint at the top of NI politics. It is this which most accounts for developments over the last number of days, beginning originally with a shock August 2021 poll putting the DUP at just 13% of the vote. With no realistic prospect of the Protocol being replaced as demanded, pressure on the DUP's place in the Executive became critical last month when LucidTalk found that two-thirds of unionists and 81% of their voters favour the DUP scrapping Stormont over the Protocol.

This was brought to a head when Edwin Poots - previously taken out as party leader by Donaldson, having himself just taken out Arlene Foster - was parachuted from Lagan Valley into the South Down constituency. This was allegedly at the direction of Donaldson (though he denies this), who just so happens to want a seat for himself in Lagan Valley. While still to be confirmed by the party's executive, Poots suffered the humiliation of being rejected in favour of another candidate; and Sammy Wilson has claimed that that candidate, Diane Forsythe, was supported by the party leader. The TUV leader Jim Allister – the thorn in the side of the DUP – queried if this was Donaldson's "final revenge on Poots".

From RTÉ Radio 1's Today with Claire Byrne, SDLP MP for South Belfast Claire Hanna, and PA News Agency's David Young on Edwin Poots' Protocol moves

Poots decried the leaking of internal processes, springing into action by ordering a halt to Protocol checks, which were not carried out by the relevant department, and have now been temporarily suspended by the Belfast High Court. The person Poots appointed to the First Minister position, Givan, was gone from the office within 24 hours of his close ally’s initial act.

The former BBC NI Political Editor Brian Walker raises the very possibility that all of this has to do with Poots in turn "seeking revenge". As he says, it has effectively forced the hand of a leader otherwise more inclined to the "stalling strategy" favoured by elements of the British government. For instance, the DUP leader – who is also a UK trade envoy to Cameroon and Egypt – continues to call for a new Protocol deal, in addition to attending Stormont party leader meetings, and having the DUP engage with the institutions outside of the function of the Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister. He had also previously been quite pragmatic on the prospect of Irish Sea controls, stating that "customs checks doesn't mean that you change the constitutional status of a part of the United Kingdom".

From this standpoint, last’s weeks scenes at the Crowne Plaza may be more about Donaldson taking control of a move than starting it. To what degree he might rue that come the next Assembly election remains to be seen.

Darren Litter is a PhD Candidate in the School of History, Anthropology, Philosophy and Politics at Queen's University Belfast.

The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ

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