There is now a strong prima facie case that the Democratic Unionist Party was caught up in a very serious breach of British electoral laws in the 2016 Brexit referendum campaign. What is not at all clear is whether the DUP’s involvement in what looks like a scheme to subvert the law on campaign spending was knowing and deliberate or naive and accidental.

Either way, however, we are dealing with what seems to be the most serious undermining of the voting process in the modern history of these islands. This apparent scheme has momentous consequences for both parts of Ireland. It is imperative that the DUP tells all it knows about what happened.