The UK government has abandoned plans to introduce a law that would have allowed the leader of the Democratic Unionist party to potentially “double-job” in the Stormont assembly while remaining a Westminster MP.
Before a debate on the legislation in the Lords on Wednesday afternoon, Boris Johnson told the Commons that an amendment enabling dual mandates was being withdrawn.
He was responding to a question from Simon Hoare, the Conservative MP and chair of the Northern Ireland affairs committee, who had described the amendment as “a bad idea”.
“The vast majority of people and indeed politicians across Northern Ireland believe that whatever the question, double-jobbing is not the answer. Could I urge my right honourable friend to listen to the majority and ask him not to move the government amendment in the other place later today?” Hoare said.
Johnson replied: “I’m grateful to my honourable friend and I’m advised that I think the amendment in question is indeed going to be withdrawn.”
The government had faced an avalanche of criticism over the amendment, with five of the six parties in Stormont and the Labour party opposing double-jobbing. The DUP was the only Northern Ireland party to support the move, with its leader, Jeffrey Donaldson, confirming this week that he would stand in his Lagan Valley constituency if selected for May’s local assembly election.
On Tuesday Labour called on the government to immediately withdraw the proposal. The shadow Northern Ireland secretary, Peter Kyle, said Labour would vote against it as the government had “clearly failed the sufficient consensus” test among local parties for its passing.
Donaldson said on Wednesday that the DUP had been “willing to support this proposal because it would have enabled an MP elected to the assembly to have a transitional period up to the following general election, bringing us into line with other parts of the United Kingdom.”
With all parties now on an election footing in Northern Ireland, rivals lost no time putting the boot in. The Ulster Unionist party peer Reg Empey described the government’s decision as “a victory for positive dialogue and engagement”.
In a sideswipe at the DUP, he added: “You don’t have to threaten to crash the institutions for unionism to have influence with government. There is another way.”
The SDLP leader, Colum Eastwood, described the withdrawal as a “humiliating defeat for [the Northern Ireland secretary] Brandon Lewis and the DUP”. There was “no support for politicians squatting on seats to protect their own political position”, he said.
