Member

Now the Government are on the verge of making matters much worse by seeking to validate this injustice. In 1972, it was determined that in the future it would be wrong to force on a reluctant community majority voting on controversial issues at Stormont. There have now been no majority votes on matters of controversy at Stormont where any community has objected for over 52 years. Yet, on 31 October, less than two weeks away, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland is required to send a message to the Assembly asking it to vote on the most controversial proposition to ever come before Stormont in 103 years. The motion will be to endorse Articles 5 to 10 of the Windsor Framework. The practical effect of voting for this is, first, the endorsing of an all-Ireland single market for goods and thus the removal of Northern Ireland from the UK single market for goods—a precursor to unbundling the UK and forming an all-Ireland economy. The second would be the creation of an all-Ireland legislative framework to govern the all-Ireland single market for goods, where the legislation is made by the Republic of Ireland and 26 other countries, but not Northern Ireland or the UK. The third would be to renounce the rights of the people of Northern Ireland to be represented in the legislature making the laws to which they will be subject in 300 areas for up to eight years.