Northern Ireland politicians misses election cancellation deadline

• The Northern Ireland Protocol, according to unionist leaders, weakens Northern Ireland’s standing within the UK.
• The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) is preventing the resumption of power-sharing.
• If no executive is in place by Friday, the NI secretary is prepared to call a vote.

Politicians in Northern Ireland have failed in their last-ditch attempts to reinstate devolved governance before the deadline for scheduling an assembly election.

On Thursday, the parties convened, but no Speaker or first or deputy first ministers were chosen.

If no executive is in place by Friday, the NI secretary is prepared to call a vote.

In an effort to voice opposition to the post-Brexit trading arrangements, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) is preventing the resumption of power-sharing.

The Northern Ireland Protocol, according to unionist leaders, weakens Northern Ireland’s standing within the UK.

It maintains Northern Ireland’s adherence to a few EU trade regulations to guarantee that goods can traverse the Irish land border without restriction.

Sinn Féin, which won the most seats in the most recent assembly election in May, called on the DUP to stop its protest as assembly members gathered in Stormont.

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The DUP rejected the assembly meeting as a “flawed and failed attempt” to restore power-sharing and refused to designate ministers to the executive.

The people of Northern Ireland need a fully operational, locally elected executive that can address the difficulties the communities there are facing, the prime minister has urged the DUP to return to Stormont.

To ensure that nationalists and unionists work together to form a government, the executive is composed of ministers from the two main parties.

“Leadership failure”

Alex Maskey, the speaker, declared before a contentious discussion at Stormont on Thursday: “If the assembly is unable to elect a speaker and deputy speakers, it cannot proceed to perform any other work, including the nomination of ministers.”

Before an executive can be constituted, a new Speaker must be chosen, but efforts to elect Patsy McGlone of the Social Democratic and Labor Party (SDLP) and Mike Nesbitt of the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) both fell short.

Since the election in May, the house has convened four times without electing a Speaker.

She said that if power-sharing could not be restored, there should be a “joint approach” between London and Dublin.

There is little sign that the impasse will be resolved before Friday at 00:01 BST, which marks 24 weeks since the election in May.

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Northern Ireland Secretary Chris Heaton-Harris will have to call an election for the assembly within a year if the deadline is missed. The 15th of December is the most likely time for a poll.

Since the DUP left the government in February, ministers have been in office but with very little authority.

This is because as part of its anti-protocol demonstrations, the DUP, the largest unionist party at Stormont, also obstructed the election of an assembly Speaker.

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