'100 days of DUP sell-out' - TUV leader Jim Allister claims the choice for Unionist voters has never been clearer

TUV leader Jim Allister pictured at his party's conference earlier this year where he announced an electoral pact with Reform UK. Picture by Stephen Hamilton Photography

Jim Allister says that the DUP has failed to deliver on removing the Irish Sea border and that the party has focused its energies since Stormont’s return on trying to remove scrutiny on the post-Brexit frontier.

In a message sent to TUV members on Friday – marking 100 days since the return of devolution – the party’s leader said reuniting the UK was an “essential task” for his party and its alliance with Reform UK.

The North Antrim MLA said: “It is now 100 days since the DUP rolled over on the Union-dismantling Protocol and enthroned Sinn Fein in Stormont. EU rule and Sinn Fein rule are now the DUP’s mantra.

“Whereas a lot has happened in the last 100 days in terms of the DUP leadership, very little has happened in terms of the promised delivery.

“The Protocol - every word of it - still rules. The Irish Sea border - both green and red lanes - still partitions our United Kingdom. EU law still prevails, indeed we have had the DUP slavishly voting in Stormont to accept EU colonial rule. Northern Ireland is still in economic alignment with the Republic.

“On the Irish Sea border all the DUP has achieved is to try and hide it by removing scrutiny of its operation with no questions now allowed in Stormont as to its operation. But what we do have in Stormont is an abundance of Sinn Fein rule with them in control of every economic portfolio.

“The only bright spot for unionism in the last 100 days is the pan-unionist alignment between Reform UK and TUV. Reaching out and cementing relations across the UK is not just the opposite of implementing the Union-dismantling Protocol but the route to travel in the essential task of reuniting the United Kingdom.

“The choice for unionism has never been clearer: DUP/UUP implementation of the Protocol and its all-Ireland agenda or TUV/Reform UK’s plan for the reunification of the UK. In coming months that choice will be brought to every household.”

The DUP’s Phillip Brett said this week that his party “has been consistent in arguing that all barriers to trade should be gone and secured progress in undoing the damage the damage of the Protocol” and accused Mr Allister of attaching more effort to attacking fellow unionists.

'100 days of DUP sell-out' - TUV leader Jim Allister claims the choice for Unionist voters has never been clearer

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