SINN FÉIN Deputy First Minster Martin McGuinness is to be invited to speak at a fringe event at the Conservative Party annual conference in October, in a move which is expected to provoke outrage from senior figures in the party.
Mr McGuinness, along with DUP First Minister Peter Robinson, is to be on the speakers’ list at a breakfast organised by Champ, a not-for-profit organisation that has encouraged dialogue since its foundation in 2002.
Last year, Mr McGuinness attended its breakfast at the Labour Party conference in the Grand Hotel in Brighton – the location of the 1984 bomb attack on a Conservative conference which killed five people, including Conservative MP Sir Anthony Berry.
Several more were wounded, including Margaret Tebbit, the wife of the then Conservative cabinet minister Norman Tebbit, now a member of the House of Lords, who remains disabled by her injuries.
Last year, Lord Tebbit furiously condemned Mr McGuinness’s presence in the hotel.
Mr McGuinness’s attendance at the Conservative conference, to be held in Manchester in early October, will be a first for a Sinn Féin figure, though he has twice met prime minister David Cameron since the latter took up office.
The decision to invite Mr McGuinness is understood to be backed strongly by Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Owen Paterson, though senior Conservatives are worried about the reaction of some MPs and the wider party organisation.
One of the organisers of the event, Conor McGinn, said yesterday: “The Northern Ireland breakfast is one of the annual fixtures now at the conference of the party in government. Leading politicians from Northern Ireland from all parties, along with the secretary of state, have been invited. We do not see it being any different this year,” he said.
However, it is not clear whether the breakfast will take place inside the security cordon to be placed around the Conservative gathering, as happened during Labour’s years in power.
Lord Tebbit is expected to oppose Mr McGuinness’s presence in the strongest possible terms. Last year, he said he imagined Mr McGuinness had gone to Brighton “to have a look around to see why the [1984] plot failed”.
Champ’s patrons include Lord Mandelson, former Northern Ireland secretary of state; Lord Brooke; former Northern Ireland Office minister Lord Dubs; former Alliance Party leader Lord Alderdice; and former Progressive Democrats deputy leader Liz O’Donnell.