Editorial: DUP finds itself in a corner as the North is frozen by strike

Philip K Dick once wrote that “reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away”. Politics – or at least as it is practised in the North – again proves itself an awkward exception to that rule.

Once a conviction takes hold, it is conferred with unique qualities, rendering it immutable and impervious to empirical fact.

For nearly two years, voters in Northern Ireland have been without a government.

Today, civil servants there are on strike, frustrated that they are not being paid money the British government has approved, but which cannot be signed off because the Stormont Assembly is in cold storage.

The DUP boycott of Stormont is responsible for the paralysis. It argues that trade is being harmed by post-Brexit agreements, and will not return to the assembly until its demands for changes have been met in full.

The damage being done by the perception that the North is not functioning as befits a normal democracy – or how a mass strike will play out among potential investors – is clearly not factored into the DUP’s considerations of the long-term economic outlook.

The deadline for the restoration of the political institutions runs out today.

First minister designate and Sinn Féin vice-president Michelle O’Neill told the Stormont Assembly yesterday – which met again in a doomed bid to elect a speaker – that she fears the democratic institutions of the Good Friday Agreement are now in freefall.

“If it is the case that the DUP will not respect the outcome of the election and restore democracy, then there is an obligation on both the British and Irish governments to look at plan B,” Ms O’Neill said.

Any plan other than chaos would be welcomed with open arms.

Disregarding the democratic mandate of an election for such a long period makes for a precarious political landscape. The wishes of the people cannot be set aside.

The Alliance Party, Ulster Unionists and SDLP have all also called on the DUP to drop its boycott.

More than 170,000 workers will strike in today’s mass protest. There is clearly anger at the economic fallout from the stasis at Stormont.

The anger appears to be aimed at secretary of state Chris Heaton-Harris. He has said the finances to dampen the burning industrial issues are in place, but they will only be released once Stormont is reinstated.

As the North freezes, workers are being told not to drive because the roads will not be gritted – council drivers are on strike.

The DUP must know it too is on thin ice if it believes it is reasonable to bring the machinery of politics to a halt because the Brexit deal done by its government did not meet all its expectations.

For as intimated earlier, in the real world, one either deals with reality or eventually it will most surely deal with you.

Get ahead of the day with the morning headlines at 7.30am and Fionnán Sheahan’s exclusive take on the day’s news every afternoon, with our free daily newsletter.