To my mind, it is extraordinary that the Prime Minister failed to avoid alienating the DUP in the position she adopted on Brexit. I would have thought it would be her top priority in the discussions. What clearly happened was a trust issue as much as a substance issue, in that things were said in private about the Government’s position on Brexit and the opposite in public.
On the specific issue the hon. Gentleman raised, I am sorry but I do not withdraw my contention that since 2010 the fact that the Government have been dependent on the DUP to govern, unofficially between 2010 and 2015 and officially since then, has understandably made that Government, at a prime ministerial level and possibly at a Secretary of State level, unwilling to exercise the kind of pressure for compromise that was exercised in the past. That is just a statement of fact. The progress in Northern Ireland was largely a consequence of the honest broker role that the Government in the south and the Government in Westminster played during that period, and the change in that dynamic here has undoubtedly had an impact.
A change in dynamic has made a difference in the south as well. In the south, Sinn Féin is now a serious political challenger to the two leading parties. This inevitably changes the nature of the relationship and inhibits the trust between the Government in the south and Sinn Féin that has been so important to progress in the past. It is not credible to deny that those massive changes in political dynamic have had an impact on the ability to get the parties to compromise.