For the first time since the changes brought in with the New Decade, Same Approach con job in 2020, the DUP has decided to start abusing the petition of concern mechanism again to block Stormont resolutions they don’t like.

It won’t happen until the new year, because among the reforms brought in five years ago to stop abuse of the mechanism is a 14-day period of reflection. The DUP will ignore that opportunity.

Their petition, supported of course by the cowardly UUP (what is that excuse for a party for?), will block a Sinn Féin motion to ask the European Parliament to allow representatives from the north to have observer status.

What makes the DUP antics quite ridiculous is the SF motion itself doesn’t amount to a hill of beans.

Newton Emerson: Could council call-ins backfire on the DUP?

Leona O’Neill: No, Sir Richard, you are not getting my children to send them to war

If passed, it would be for the UK government to ask the EU to give observer status to the north’s politicians. The UK wouldn’t, for various reasons, including the fact that Scotland would ask for it too.

The reasons the........

© The Irish News