A CAMPAIGN by the First Minister and Deputy First Minister to promote the Hillsborough Agreement has run into an immediate storm of criticism.
The £20,000 newspaper campaign is encouraging everyone to read the terms of the deal concluded earlier this month which schedules the devolution of justice powers for April 12th.
First Minister Peter Robinson said: “I believe this agreement represents a considerable step towards securing the prize of a stable and peaceful Northern Ireland. It is a sure sign that there will be no going back to the past. It is important that each and every citizen takes the time to read this agreement to fully understand what it means for them.”
Martin McGuinness said: “We need to make life better for our children and for our grandchildren. This is what this agreement must mean in practice. I believe, with the support of the people, we can make that dream a reality.”
However, the Ulster Unionists, SDLP, Alliance and anti-powersharing Traditional Unionist Voice have all criticised the campaign.
“How can you seriously promote it at this stage with so many outstanding issues?” UUP deputy leader Danny Kennedy asked. “There’s no identification yet of a policing and justice minister, the issue of parading is mired in controversy by public comment and the work of the executive sub-committee is awaited with interest.”
SDLP MP Mark Durkan said the campaign was an exercise is “vanity advertising” connected to “the DUP’s pretence about significant community consultation and confidence”.
“This advertising campaign doesn’t answer any of the questions about the gaps in the Hillsborough text or the private understandings reached or undertakings given,” he said.
TUV leader Jim Allister said the campaign would change nothing. “The joint DUP-Sinn Féin advert, launched at huge public expense, is a mere vanity stunt and fraud, because the public response will not change one jot of their inter-party agreement; it will remain a humiliating defeat for unionism.”
He suggested the campaign could be in breach of the Communications Act 2003, which prohibits political advertising.
Alliance leader David Ford said the advert was unnecessary. “It’s a bit condescending for the DUP and Sinn Féin to think that the public need to be told to read it.”
The SDLP has also claimed that Sinn Féin and the DUP have conspired not to use the d’Hondt system to appoint a new justice minister, but will use it to appoint the chair of a new justice Assembly committee. The decisions will block an SDLP candidate from both posts, it claimed.
Deputy leader Patsy McGlone said: “Their on-off attitude to d’Hondt demonstrates that there are no principles involved, just tactics and politics.” He said this showed the “purely party-political nature of their gerrymander”.