And the gold medal for hypocrisy goes to ...

Michael Wolsey

IF there was a gold medal for hypocrisy it would be a close contest between Rishi Sunak and the Democratic Unionist Party.

The DUP insists that Northern Ireland should operate under the same laws and regulations as Britain but its policies down the years have been aimed at ensuring that is not the case.

If the party had its way, Northern Ireland would have very different laws on abortion, same-sex marriage and LGBT rights.

Its founder, Ian Paisley, wanted to “save Ulster from sodomy”. He launched the campaign in 1977 because the UK government, which had decriminalised homosexualtiy a decade earlier, wanted to extend that rule to Northern Ireland .

Paisley said Westminster had legislated for “perversion and immorality” and claimed Britain was not committed to the same moral values as Northern Ireland.

It’s a blast from the dim and distant past. But in 2004 the

DUP was making the same argument when it forced the postponement of a vote in Westminster to allow samesex civil partnerships. All the DUP’s MPs threatened to vote against the measure which did eventually get passed and was introduced in Northern Ireland against the wishes of the party.

The DUP was singing the same hymn in 2019 when it opposed moves to extend the civil partnership law and allow for same-sex marriage. Being out of step with Britain did not worry its new leader, Arlene Foster.

And the party was not worried about loss of Britishness when, in 2021, it tried to prevent Britain’s relatively liberal abortion law being extended to Northern Ireland. When that failed, the DUP continued to fight the measure, striving, through legal challenges and general obstruction, to ensure that Northern Ireland would be different from Britain.

And Northern Ireland is different in many ways.

It is the only part of the United Kingdom where a large number of citizens (about 700,000) hold an Irish passport.

It is the only part of the UK that restricts the imports of live animals and animal products from England, Scotland and Wales. And that’s not some devilish rule imposed by Brussels, but a long-standing Stormont regulation to protect farming, a much more important industry in Northern Ireland than in Britain.

Northern Ireland shares Britain’s currency but uses its own notes, issued by local banks. Its most popular sport, Gaelic football, is hardly played in Britain. It has a public holiday on July 12 to mark a battle fought more than 300 years ago that few people in Britain know anything about.

None of Britain’s political parties has serious representation in Northern Ireland; the main opposition party doesn’t even have a presence there.

The DUP does not believe any of these vagaries threatens the

North’s constitutional position within the UK, yet it sees a major affront in some Customs regulations, introduced as a result of Brexit.

The party is now trying to decide whether it will approve the deal struck between the EU and the UK which allows the North to enjoy the benefits of the Single Market while sharing the isolation chosen by Britain when it voted for Brexit.

The deal gives Northern Ireland “an unbelievable special position:’’ according to that other arch hypocrite, Rishi Sunak.

Britain’s latest prime minister told people in Northern Ireland they now had “a unique position in the entire world in having privileged access not just to the UK market but also to the EU Single Market.”

In other words, they can have the same terms everyone in the UK enjoyed before Brexit. And where did Mr Sunak stand on Brexit, the move that denied Britain this privileged access? He supported it and voted for it.

The deal he is now lauding is quite similar to one negotiated by Theresa May when she was Britain’s prime minister.

Except that Ms May’s agreement would have left the entire UK in the Customs Union and, so, would have ensured there was no trade border between Britain and Northern Ireland.

That deal was voted down in parliament by, among others, Rishi Sunak and all the Democratic Unionist MPs. They deserve each other. Sadly, the rest of us have to live with the consequences of their hypocrisy.