Boris Johnson visits Northern Ireland for talks to resolve power-sharing stalemate
Boris Johnson is continuing his tour of the UK with a visit to Northern Ireland this morning, where he has pledged to do “everything in his power” to restore the power-sharing executive.
The Prime Minister will meet all of the main political parties to discuss how to get Stormont, the Northern Irish government, back up and running after power-sharing broke down more than two years ago.
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Ahead of the visit, Johnson said: “The people of Northern Ireland have now been without an executive and assembly for two years and six months – put simply this is much, much too long.
“Northern Ireland’s citizens need and deserve the executive to get up and running again as soon as possible, so that locally-accountable politicians can take decisions on the issues that really matter to local people.
“I’m pleased to meet each of Northern Ireland’s party leaders today to stress that I am going to do everything in my power to make the ongoing talks to restore devolution a success.”
Government in Northern Ireland, in which power must be shared between two different political parties under the Good Friday Agreement, broke down over a disagreement between the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) led by Arlene Foster and Sinn Fein, the republican party now led by Mary Lou McDonald.
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The two parties clashed over what became known as the “cash for ash” scandal, in which a scheme designed to encourage businesses to move away from using fossil fuels meant they were given a financial incentive to burn resources.
The scheme was originally meant to cost £400m over 20 years, but left the taxpayer with a bill of about £490m.