THE DUP and Ulster Unionist Party are shaping up for another game of political brinkmanship after the UUP yesterday refused to make any commitment to support the transfer of policing and justice powers to the Northern Executive.
The DUP in turn has made clear it will not press ahead with the appointment of a minister for justice if the UUP refuses to endorse the establishment of a department of justice within the Executive.
A vote is scheduled in the Assembly on March 9th on the creation of a department of justice with the minister due to take office on April 12th.
Alliance leader David Ford is expected to win the support of the DUP and Sinn Féin to take over the department although the SDLP has proposed North Belfast MLA Alban Maginness for the position, while the UUP said it could not accept the post going to the Alliance leader.
On Sunday the DUP deputy leader Nigel Dodds said his party could not proceed with devolution of justice powers if it did not have the backing of the UUP.
This was confirmed by senior DUP sources who said that during the Hillsborough talks DUP leader and First Minister Peter Robinson was explicit that without UUP support the transfer of policing powers could not go ahead.
“Peter pointed out that there could be no devolution of policing and justice powers if there was not sufficient public confidence for such a move, and that the support of all the main parties was essential for that confidence,” added a senior party figure.
“The Ulster Unionists can’t be half in and half out of government,” he added.
Ahead of the Assembly vote next Tuesday UUP leader Sir Reg Empey must decide whether he will join with the DUP in supporting the creation of a department of Justice. Deputy UUP leader Danny Kennedy said the DUP with Sinn Féin had sufficient strength in the Assembly to carry the vote on policing and did not need the votes of the UUP. “They are looking for a political safety net from us which they are not entitled to,” he said.
UUP sources indicated that before they would make their final decision they needed commitments on issues such as education and a working Executive where it was accorded “proper respect” by the DUP.
In a separate development last night, President Mary McAleese said dissident republicans “carry about them the legend of failure and their predecessors had failed in every generation and they have delivered nothing”.
Speaking to leading members of the Irish community in the UK at the Irish Embassy in London, the President said she hoped “the last lingering vestiges that we see in republican dissidents, in particular, and in the old culture of sectarianism will soon disappear”.
She added: “They are tried, they are worn, they are nothing new. They are something very old and worn and they carry about them the legend of failure.
“They have failed in every generation and they have delivered nothing.”
“We hope to see an end to the culture of paramilitarism . . . That should be our focus.”
The Irish community in the UK, she said, had “coped with the strains of the Northern conflict which so often spilled over on to this country’s soil and case shadows over attitudes and relationships.
“Thankfully, many have lived to see the peace process germinate and grow, helped by a tangible warming of the Dublin/ Westminster axis,” said the president, near the end of a two-day visit to London. “The vagaries of the peace process alone teach us that we often go one step forward only to be shoved two steps backwards. It also teaches us the singular importance of not giving in to the counsel of cynicism, or despair,” she said.