Stormont: Sinn Féin in fresh bid to recall assembly before strikes

Sinn Féin is seeking a recall of the Northern Ireland Assembly in a fresh attempt to elect a Stormont Speaker.

It comes ahead of a legal deadline to restore the executive by next Thursday before fresh elections are required.

Signatures from 30 assembly members are required for the petition to succeed.

There have been six recalls since May 2022. Every time there has been a vote to elect a Speaker, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) has blocked the move.

The party's veto, which is unlikely to change before next week's recall, means no other assembly business can take place.

The latest legal deadline for the assembly to be restored coincides with a mass strike involving thousands of public sector workers calling for better pay and conditions.

The Sinn Féin recall petition is expected to be backed by the Alliance Party and Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP).

In a post on X, the social media site formerly known as Twitter, the party's vice-president Michelle O'Neill said it was "decision time for the DUP".

"Our public sector workers play a pivotal role right across our society working in our hospitals, schools, on trains and buses, and within the civil service."

A sitting of the assembly could take place by Wednesday, but parties have to select a new Speaker before they can take any other decisions.

The DUP has been blocking the restoration of Stormont's power-sharing institutions since 2022 in protest against post-Brexit trade checks between Northern Ireland and Great Britain.

It believes the arrangements under the Northern Ireland Protocol diminish the region's place within the UK internal market.

A new deal, called the Windsor Framework, aimed at addressing those concerns was agreed in February 2023 between the government and European Union.

But the DUP said this did not go far enough, and for months the party has been in talks with the government seeking further changes.

In December, Secretary of State Chris Heaton-Harris said those talks had "effectively concluded" and offered a £3.3bn financial package for Northern Ireland if the Stormont institutions are restored.

That financial package includes almost £600m to solve the pay disputes at the heart of the public sector strikes.

The recall petition is seeking to debate a motion supporting those pay demands and calling for the DUP to resume power sharing.

If no executive is formed by Thursday, the Northern Ireland secretary is under a legal duty to call an early assembly election.

However, Mr Heaton-Harris has pushed this deadline back several times before and has indicated he may do so again.

In the last assembly election in May 2022, Sinn Féin became the largest party at Stormont for the first time, pushing the DUP into second place.

But Stormont's structures governing power-sharing between unionists and nationalists mean an executive cannot be restored without the support of both parties.