Northern Ireland’s ‘new era’: DUP losing to nationalist party in historic election

[Applause] a reception 101 years in the making shin fein striding into history the first time a nationalist party looks set to hold the most seats in the northern ireland assembly today represents a very significant moment of change it's a defining moment for our politics and for our people today ushers in a new era which i believe presents us all with an opportunity to reimagine relationships in this society on the basis of fairness on the basis of equality and on the basis of social justice irrespective of religious political or social backgrounds my commitment is to make politics work watching on to hear that message of unity shin feins president mary lou macdonald she too had a message to the people of northern ireland despite being an elected official in a different country the republic of ireland we are here to do the business we need a functioning executive we are very very well aware that people are struggling and struggling badly now they need relief they need breathing space but shin fein's success transcends party politics and could have constitutional ramifications for the united kingdom itself so what does this mean for northern ireland's place in the union that there is a very healthy conversation already underway and i've always said throughout the election campaign that regardless of the outcome of the election that conversation was going to continue those of us that are for unification will make that case i encourage those that actually don't have that perspective at this moment in time to also enter into the conversation let's have a healthy debate mcdonald what's your message to unionists who right now will be scared don't be scared the future is bright for all of us the count yesterday went long into the night round after round of preferences being shared out in this proportional representation vote exhaustion for them tension among those whose political lives awaited judgment it wasn't until 10 p.m [Applause] and the fifth round of counting that former leader of the dup edwin poots won his belfast south seat you got there in the end but what are the next few weeks hold for you i think it's very interesting time ahead in terms of the assembly and there's going to be one very straight talking done particularly directly with the uk government and they really need to step up to the plate and deliver if they want to ensure that this assembly works they need to deliver who were the most difficult conversations going to be with sinn fein or the uk government uk government all the day long maybe a temporary thing what the uk government has imposed has the potential to do real long-term damage not just to the union but to the people of northern ireland this is the storm wrought upon unionist politics post-brexit checks on goods travelling from great britain to northern ireland known as the protocol not merely a regulatory nightmare unionists say but a threat to their identity that this part of the uk should be treated any differently to the rest of the nation given the vote has fractured and given the vote has gone predominantly more to the tv some of the hard line more hardline views how can you form a government with chimpane there will in my view be no government formed in northern ireland until the protocol sorted out because we have this terrible situation where there's a sea border between northern ireland and the rest of the united kingdom where laws are made for northern ireland over which no representative here in the assembly or westminster has any say that is untenable this election has transformed the political landscape of northern ireland the question now what will it do for the rest of the united kingdom well we still haven't got a final result some stragglers still waiting to come in it's very unlikely though that shin fein won't be the largest party but that does not mean that come monday michelle o'neill will be the first minister because of the nature of power sharing that can only happen if the dup are happy to govern alongside her but you heard lord dobson in our report he says that's not going to happen and it's not just rhetoric first of all the assembly hasn't sat since february the dup collapsed power sharing because of the northern ireland protocol they say they need meaningful change from boris johnson second of all it doesn't it's just looking at the statistics it doesn't look like the dep can change their position over this vote the unionist vote has splintered traditional voters lots of traditionally dup voters has moved to the more hardline tuv party quite simply compromise on this would mean the dp alienating more of their voters so this is a historic vote yes but not necessarily a result that will result in a government come monday paul mcnamara and derry there thank you well earlier i spoke to gregory campbell the democratic unionist party and the mp for east derry and i began by asking him what went wrong well when you look at the overall votes there does seem to be a splintering right across the political divide you know even in some national strongholds sinful throat was down but we've had better elections uh unionism is splintered but the one unifying thing that has come across is that when you look at the unionist share of the vote is most definitely and in a most pronounced way saying to number 10 you need to sort this protocol well shin fein are fine with the protocol i mean they've been quite concillatory in their victory speeches this afternoon talking about partnership what conversations have you already had with chin fan about working together well you say they're being quite conciliatory but mary lou mcdonald last night and we did predict this last week she was saying about moving towards a border pool which is totally destabilizing would be completely against all the cross-community partnerships that that might be built if a functioning executive was up and running um that would be anything but conciliatory so what we need to do is we need to have a period of either five or ten years where government in northern ireland is up and running for everyone where people are beginning to become settled and accustomed to whatever arrangements are arrived at the protocol having been dealt with so that we have good we have good trading relationships on a west east basis between gb and northern ireland and also on an earth strike basis uh between northern ireland and the republic there is no answer to the protocol is there you are going to have a hard border either in the irish sea or between northern ireland and the republic it's one or the other isn't it no no it's not it's absolutely not because the the the reality that many people have missed is that there can't be a hard border on the island of ireland the reason there can't be is a it's a physical impossibility to build one there are 300 crossing points on the 300 miles of the border so there's no way no there's no political will there's no physical possibility of constructing that border so the north-south trading relationship is there and won't be breached in any way but similarly we have to have an east-west trading relationship which also can't be breached and and is sacrosanct within the internal market within the uk that's what boris johnson promised he would do and that's what he needs to deliver and he needs to do it quickly on this point about a border pole since shin fein are the majority party now it would seem there is a mandate for a border pole you could be looking at the prospect of a united island in a few years well i don't know how you can say that whenever the majority of votes cast in this election were not in favor of a united ireland and weren't in favor of a border pool the only party that's looking for a border pool is sinn fein and and their vote only went up by one percent uh you know all of the other parties to different degrees have said that they don't want their border pool so if you're going to abide by democracy you have to say the 70 of people who voted for other parties who don't want a border pool would have to prevail over the 30 or 29 of those who do and even within that even within that there is a cross-community consensus which is needed to try and stabilize government in northern ireland there's no cross-community consensus for for a border pole because unionism is opposed to it as well as many sections of nationalism and the alliance party as well okay we're going to have to leave it there thank you very much for joining us thank you now in the rest of the uk it was labor and the liberal democrats who made gains as the conservative party lost almost 500 council seats the tories were also pushed into third place in scotland by labour with the snp finishing as the biggest party there but for labour leader sakir stalma the victory has been overshadowed by the so-called beer gate with durham police confirming they are investigating whether he and other labour staffers broke lockdown rules last year manny stevenson has this report ministers who knowingly mislead parliament will be expected to offer their resignation does the prime minister believe that applies to him will he now resign why is he still here the party's over prime minister said sakirstama repeatedly calling on boris johnson to resign over those now infamous downing street lock-ins during lockdown only now he's facing allegations of hypocrisy over his own alleged antics as durham police announced they would investigate whether he broke coved rules at this gathering at the time socializing outside your household was banned but starmer insists he was working as i've explained a number of times i was working in the office we stopped for something to eat there's no party there was no breach of the rules i'm confident about that police obviously got to do their job throughout partygate sakia stammer has taken the moral high ground he knows he's dishonest and incapable of changing so he drags everybody else down with him why does the prime minister think everybody else's actions have consequences except his own pitting labour's the moral and decent party after police fines engulfed the tory party but the hangover of beergate could put the politician in a very precarious position i think if he actually gets a fixed penalty notice he really has to consider his position i mean i don't think he will i think this is a lot of sort of hype built up by the tory press but if he were to get a principality notice he would have to consider his position but today what labour really want you to focus on is their local election wins over the conservatives their biggest victories were in england labour won 42 seats and took control of five more councils the conservatives lost 341 seats and 10 councils and the lib dems gained 191 new councillors in scotland the smp kept its place as the largest party winning 22 more seats labour pushed the conservatives into third place they lost 63 council seats and in wales labour stays in first place played comrey comes in second and the conservatives were pushed into fourth believe you me this is a big turning point for us a joyful kirstarm are celebrating those wins but durham's police decision has undoubtedly overshadowed those local election gains deputy labour leader angela rainer also according to her party attended the so-called beergate gathering but today durham police told us they wouldn't be commenting further as in their words this is an active police investigation of course durham police have found themselves here before you'll remember dominic cummings now infamous road trip to barnard castle during lockdown we agreed that we should go for a short drive to see if i could drive safely that fell to them to investigate with the police force finding that the former number 10 adviser might have broken coveted rules but no further action was taken the labour leader says he's confident he's done nothing wrong and his critics believe it's oberst armour could regret

Channel: Channel 4 News

Views: 158,720

Keywords: politics, elections, local elections, election, London, England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales, UK, conservative, labour, green, lib dems, liberal democrats, boris, boris johnson, Keir Starmer, Keir, Tories, Prime Minister, Westminster, results, polling, polling stations, seats, ballot, vote, voting, votes, channel 4 news, c4 news, c4, channel 4, northern ireland, sinn fein, NI election

Id: BICyffIRpUk

Length: 12min 50sec (770 seconds)

Published: Sat May 07 2022