INTERVIEW:Peter Robinson says he will fight to save his political career and his marriage
IT HAS been a jaw-dropping week that has shattered the personal lives of Peter and Iris Robinson, astonished the public, seriously disturbed the Democratic Unionist Party, and has threatened the foundations that hold up powersharing.
At DUP headquarters in east Belfast, Robinson was more composed than he was on Wednesday when he revealed his wife had had an affair and attempted suicide.
He said he was glad when The Irish Timesasked how his wife was doing. Some have attempted to suggest her illness was "alleged" or sham, he said. "Iris has had a very difficult time, she has received psychiatric support. She had at the height of her illness to spend over two periods of six or eight weeks at her clinic. A number of psychiatrists have been very helpful and supportive in these matters. As you would expect, she is in a position at the present time where she is very vulnerable. While both her solicitor and mine are keen to deal with certain matters, we have to be very careful and have some concern about her condition."
And how is he? "I have had better days and better weeks but politics is a rough trade and I think from my point of view I am being tried by the press and media. I am being tried in the court of public opinion and while it would be very nice for me to clear my name through a defamation action against Spotlight– and I don't rule out the possibility – it is something that is likely to take a year or so."
He said he couldn’t afford such time and he therefore decided to try and expedite an inquiry into whether he had breached any rules in relation to not reporting to the parliamentary authorities the £50,000 his wife allegedly raised to support the business of her former lover Kirk McCambley.
He has asked the Office of First Minister and Deputy First Minister "to engage senior counsel so that senior counsel [can] engage the Departmental Solicitor's Office to look at the Spotlightprogramme [and] be free to ask me any questions that they would and give an opinion as to whether I have breached any obligations, whether there was a requirement on me to disclose [or] where I have failed to comply."
Robinson did not specifically say he would resign if such an inquiry found against him, but it appeared implicit in his reply. “I’ll be open in terms of the outcome and if the outcome indicates that my judgment has been wrong in these matters then I will say so and I will obviously have to take the consequences.”
But he seemed to expect vindication. “If [this inquiry] indicates there was no requirement on me to disclose under the Ministerial Code of Conduct . . . then I hope that those who made the smears will be prepared to stand up and apologise . . . I have done nothing wrong, therefore I want to uphold my reputation, I want to clear my name.
“If it is deemed by the party there is someone better to lead, or if it is deemed by the party, including myself, that the issues relating to me are getting in the way of the party message getting through, then I will not be the one who is holding tight to the armchair and insisting on staying.”
Robinson said there was nothing coming down the line financially that would damage him or suggest he was involved in some form of impropriety, regardless of rumours. He intends to remain as leader.
Like many others, he said that he, too, was shocked by some of the allegations in the Spotlightprogramme. "I have to say it was as much a surprise or shock for me as for others to hear some of the other allegations, some of the allegations relating to Iris's affair and some of the allegations relating to her financial arrangements . . . The messages I have been getting are that I need to stand up: I need to tell the public what the circumstances were and let me deal with the financial issue involved."
He said he followed the correct course of action in ensuring the repayment of the £50,000. “I challenge anybody to show where there is a requirement to register [with the parliamentary authorities], for that was the only information that was available to me,” he said.
He was careful in relation to commenting about the raft of allegations against Iris. “I think we have to remember Iris’s legal rights in all of this. I think it is more important that she has the opportunity to answer these questions. They are for her to answer, rather than me. What I am saying – and it is the one allegation made against me – is that I have taken steps to clear my name.”
Robinson also addressed the public surprise that in March last year he could appear in the Assembly chamber to speak at the despatch box on the day Iris tried to take her life with a prescription drugs overdose.
“I think this is an indicator of the mindset of the people who were preparing the programme,” he said. “First of all they showed a shot of me in the Assembly that day. First Minister’s questions lasts for about half an hour, there were a number of serious questions asked of me. They weren’t interested in showing any clip of them but a question was asked [about agriculture] and I think everybody knows I am from east Belfast and not representative of the agricultural community, and I made a light-hearted response.”
And then he dealt with the deeply personal: “Let me give you the background of Iris’s attempt to take her own life. We took immediate steps to ensure that the drugs were removed from her body. We took immediate steps that she didn’t go to sleep. We took medical advice what to do and we carried that out to the letter. She became . . . completely lucid during the early part of the morning. I ensured that she had family members who were taking care of her when she went to sleep and after that I left for the Assembly. During the course of my period during questions in the Assembly the people in the home took medical advice and as a precaution she was taken into hospital. As soon as I was informed of that I went straight to the hospital.”
In relation to politics, he indicated there could yet be a resolution of the standoff between the DUP and Sinn Féin over policing and justice. “The party is determined and I am determined that the remaining issues should be resolved. I indicated to Martin [McGuinness] yesterday that my new year’s resolution would be to work to make the Assembly and Executive more effective and . . . also to work to ensure that the devolution of policing and justice would occur.
“Clearly Sinn Féin are keen that there should be a date. The DUP has always been condition-driven and we are looking at ways of dealing with the outstanding matters so those conditions might be removed.”
We concluded the interview with a question about whether he still was anxious to rescue his marriage.
“I indicated in my statement on Wednesday that I wanted to save my marriage, that it was important after all these years that I made a real attempt to do so. I indicated that I didn’t believe that it was a road that had any guarantees attached but that it was not a road without hope.
“That is my position, clearly the additional matters that I have learned of mean that there are further obstacles that we have to overcome. But I still believe that it is important that I attempt to make the marriage work.”