A meeting of party officers on Friday is “categorically not” a “make or break” moment for the party’s return to Stormont, the DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson has said.
He told reporters on Monday the “so-called senior DUP sources who made this claim are ill-informed” and were “not people who are around the party officer table, they are not people who are privy to all of the detail that the party officers have been dealing with”.
Mr Donaldson said no agreement has been reached between the DUP and the UK government and discussions will continue.
On Friday there was intense speculation that party officers were about to decide if the DUP should re-enter powersharing after the BBC’s Stephen Nolan Show quoted a “senior DUP source” as describing this as the “deal or no deal moment” for the party.
No vote was held at the meeting of party officers, and the DUP subsequently issued a short statement saying it would not give a “running commentary on our position, save to say, we will continue to engage with the [UK] government.”
Northern Ireland has been without a functioning Executive or Assembly for almost two years due to the DUP’s continued boycott of the Stormont institutions in protest at post-Brexit trading arrangements.
An attempt to restore the Assembly and Executive before Christmas failed, but a £3.3bn financial package remains on offer, and the UK government said negotiations had “effectively concluded”.
The other main Northern parties – Sinn Féin, Alliance, the Ulster Unionists and the SDLP – have repeatedly called on the DUP to drop its boycott and return to Stormont.
Sinn Féin’s vice-president and the North’s First Minister designate, Michelle O’Neill, has said she fears the democratic institutions of the Belfast Agreement are in “free fall” and the Irish and British governments must work together on “Plan B” if the DUP re-enter powersharing.
The most recent deadline for the restoration of the political institutions passed last week, and Mr Heaton-Harris is due to introduce legislation at Westminster shortly which will outline the “next steps”, expected to be a further extension and the basic powers needed to keep Northern Ireland functioning in the absence of a devolved government.
The DUP leadership is divided over the return to Stormont, with the 12 party officers understood to be split between those in favour, those against and those who are undecided.
Asked if sources who were briefing the media were trying to damage his leadership, Mr Donaldson said “they will have to explain, if they are prepared to step out from beside their anonymity, what their real motive is, but I am very clear, none of this spooks me”.
Outlining the DUP’s position, Mr Donaldson said there “remains a number of important issues that have to be finalised if we are to see a restored Assembly and Executive”.
He said “further progress” had been made on many issues since Christmas and on Friday he provided party officers with “a detailed update on the contacts and discussions” with the UK government.
Further meetings would take place this week, he said, and his focus would be on finalising a number of “outstanding issues” and on securing enough progress to make a decision.
“But we are not there yet,” Mr Donaldson said.
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