Upon receiving the results of the 8th Assembly Election earlier this month, the our parties immediately entered into good-faith negotiations with the Labour Party of Northern Ireland and the Ulster Unionist Party in an attempt to form the next Northern Ireland Executive. We entered these talks in the hope of realising a progressive vision for Northern Ireland, as befitting the make-up of the Assembly.

Earlier today, our parties received word from the UUP leader u/J_Ceasar that his party would no longer participate in the Executive, believing that the Justice Minister u/jgm0228 would be unfit and biased in office, even after UUP votes elected him to the position on a cross-community basis. Following this, u/jgm0228 was presented with an ultimatum: either see the UUP exit the Executive or resign positions he holds in Wales. We all saw Minister u/jgm0228 opt for the latter, having him be humiliated over the issue of devolution in Wales, even though such a policy has essentially no bearing on the Executive’s own draft Programme for Government.

It is this action, after a long drawn out period, that has pushed us to make this statement today.

From the beginning, the UUP leader has engaged in behaviours which have reduced trust and made it difficult to complete talks in good-faith.

Some weeks ago, the public may have heard about the UUP’s disagreement with a supposed illegal pact to install u/ka4bi as deputy First Minister. In counter-briefing the press though, the UUP failed to acknowledge that this was a tentative proposal, that there was no pre-election pact as was claimed, and that the UUP’s own leader indicated that he believed that the arrangement would be lawful immediately prior to making this hostile statement.

When he eventually went back to the table, we were more than willing to accommodate his concerns despite a number of flaws with his own proposal. This proposal included the idea of banning the Alliance Party from the Executive; this would be in contravention of the provisions of the Good Friday Agreement. Unlike u/J_Ceasar, however, our parties decided to work in good faith to sort this out instead of leaking to sabotage talks, with all parties agreeing that the Alliance Party has enough seats to warrant the right of Executive participation.

Eventually, our parties agreed to settle on the composition and appointment method for the Executive. Even after we all said we agreed though, the UUP leader then started to attach conditions—the UUP informed us that they would only tolerate a proportional D’Hondt method if the LPNI refused to nominate u/jgm0228 to the position of Finance Minister and if parties agreed to a set of UUP policy ‘red-lines’ before the opening of ministerial nominations. Only after the SDLP and IPP made it clear that proportional allocation should be considered a baseline for talks did the UUP relent and revert to its original position.

When we reached the point of nominating a figure for the position of Justice Minister, we believed that the UUP would be willing to support a competent and enthusiastic nomination for the position in the form of u/jgm0228. After all, the UUP had insisted on the appointment of a LPNI member for that position, noting that it should be held by someone who is non-sectarian. The UUP leader even agreed to back a number of proposals and ideas set forth by Minister u/jgm0228 in personal conversation with him. Only today we received a final word on this u-turn, reportedly done at the behest of other UUP members.

The UUP’s justification for threatening to collapse the Executive, that u/jgm0228 had a lack of independence, holds no water. This is particularly the case when it comes from a party where both Executive Ministers are in the current Westminster Cabinet; in fact, one is the Chancellor and has an interest in managing the block grant issue. u/jgm0228 had policy priorities which were agreed to by all sides, he had the drive to deliver this legislation, and he has maintained a consistent record of reaching out to all parties. Instead, our parties believe that this is another unnecessary u-turn by the UUP, and it is one which reveals an unnecessary vendetta against u/jgm0228 by some quarters of the Conservative Party as an organisation.

This, and the initial idea to prohibit the LPNI from making their own nominations under D’Hondt, shows that the UUP are more afraid of working with individuals they disagree with than working together to deliver the governance that people gave a mandate to in the last Assembly elections, and it is worrying given the number of challenges facing people across Northern Ireland.

While a number of issues can be raised here, we are disappointed in the UUP’s consistent habit of u-turns in talks as it means that we cannot take u/J_Ceasar at his word without there being new conditions attached later on. Holding Ministers ransom and forcing them to humiliate themselves is well out of line and has degraded this trust further.

Without basic trust, talks cannot progress. Unfortunately, the UUP’s leader has lost this trust at the current moment. We believe that only a new UUP leader could provide the much-needed credibility to move any future talks along after all that has happened in the past weeks, and our parties will be ceasing participation in this Executive.

The Rt. Hon. u/SoSaturnistic MLA - Leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party

The Rt. Hon. Sir u/ka4bi KP PC MLA - Leader of the Alliance Party

The Hon. u/imadearedditaccount5 MLA - Leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party