Upper Bann MP Carla Lockhart announced on Friday 31 October that she will set out her political future early next week, amid mounting speculation that she is preparing to walk away from the Democratic Unionist Party over the Drumcree parading row.
In a statement on Facebook, Lockhart said the dispute was never about her own position. There is much interest in me and my future. But this has never been about me. It has always been a point of principle.
What lies behind the DUP crisis
The standoff centres on the Orange Order's Drumcree parade in Portadown, and a protest on the Garvaghy Road last month that stopped the procession from going through the predominantly nationalist area. According to RTE.ie, Lockhart argues that Sinn Féin First Minister Michelle O'Neill can no longer hold office because she took part in what police are investigating as an unlawful, unnotified protest on 27 September.
Lockhart had called on her party to withdraw deputy First Minister Emma Little-Pengelly from office, a move that would automatically force O'Neill from her role and effectively collapse the Stormont Executive. The DUP stopped short of that step, but announced on Thursday that Little-Pengelly would no longer take part in joint engagements with O'Neill, and would withhold permission for O'Neill to carry out solo engagements as First Minister.
Lockhart said the party's response falls far short of what the vast majority of unionists want, and pressed for profound consequences for O'Neill, including removal from office. She quit the party's main strategy-making body last week over the issue.
Gavin Robinson's response
DUP leader Gavin Robinson told BBC Radio Ulster on Friday morning that he hopes Lockhart will not quit the party.
Well, I hope that's not the case. I mean all of us share the same anger toward Michelle O'Neill. All of us want to see political sanction.
Robinson said his party is pressing the London government to legislate for tougher sanctions against Stormont ministers who breach their pledge of office. He refused to criticise Lockhart, saying he understood her position entirely and did not want to see her go.
Real consequences for the North's institutions
The practical effects of the DUP's boycott are already being felt. O'Neill and Little-Pengelly did not travel to an economic event in Glasgow on Friday, where they had been scheduled to meet British Prime Minister Andy Burnham, Scottish First Minister John Swinney and Welsh First Minister Rhun ap Iorwerth. A separate meeting with Burnham on the stalled Stormont budget has also fallen through.
Burnham told the meeting it was a shame colleagues from Northern Ireland were absent, though he said work would continue with them on the shared agenda of raising growth, according to the Oxford Mail.
The blocking strategy will also prevent a planned meeting between the two Stormont leaders and President Catherine Connolly at Áras an Uachtaráin, and O'Neill will not attend Remembrance Sunday at the Cenotaph in Belfast in her capacity as First Minister. The Impartial Reporter notes that withdrawing Little-Pengelly would collapse the devolved administration, since the Executive could no longer meet to take significant decisions, although departmental ministers would remain in post for up to six months and the Assembly could continue to sit.
Drumcree and the Garvaghy Road
The row has its roots in a decision by the Parades Commission to allow the Orange Order to parade down the Garvaghy Road for the first time in almost three decades, a route that was a notorious flashpoint during the Troubles. The decision prompted a two-week standoff, and the parade was ultimately stopped by the sheer number of protesters on the road.
Northern Ireland Secretary Chris Bryant then overturned the commission's decision and banned the procession, a ruling upheld by a High Court judge on Wednesday. Under parading law, protests must be notified to and approved by the Parades Commission. Police investigating the Garvaghy Road protest have said invitations to attend interviews were sent to individuals reasonably suspected of committing offences.
An election in the air
All of this is unfolding against the familiar backdrop of political manoeuvring at Stormont ahead of an Assembly election, with the next poll due in May. For nationalists and for anyone who values the power-sharing institutions, the sight of a party once again prepared to hold the Executive hostage over a parading dispute is a wearying one, and the Northern Echo reports that speculation about Lockhart's departure is dominating the political conversation.
Lockhart, for her part, urged the public to contact their DUP MLAs and tell them how let down they feel, calling for a moment to reignite a fire within unionism. She insisted she will continue to represent Upper Bann with the same energy as always.
Rest assured, I am not going away.
Whether she stays or goes, the institutions that nationalists and unionists alike depend on remain hostage to a dispute that should never have been allowed to reach the doors of Stormont.