The Orange Order has plunged back into public controversy over disciplinary action against senior members — including Ulster Unionist leader Tom Elliott — for attending the funeral of murdered Catholic PSNI constable Ronan Kerr.

Mr Elliott and his party’s minister, Danny Kennedy, were exonerated over the issue last month following separate internal inquiries.

The organisation’s rules allow an appeal against the verdicts, which the Belfast brethren who initiated the original complaint have now lodged.

It is not clear, however, what the next step will be, but it is understood the refreshed complaint will be discussed by the Order’s supreme body, the Grand Lodge, at its next meeting in December.

Senior Orange figures and Ulster Unionists had breathed a sigh of relief after MLAs Elliott and Kennedy — both long-serving members of their local lodges — were found to have “no case to answer” by county lodges in Fermanagh and Armagh.

Now the decision of the Sandy Row lodge to appeal will drag the embarrassing internal row out for several more weeks at least.

The Grand Lodge could, however, decide against allowing the appeal to go ahead, although opinions differ over internal procedures, and some argue the complaint will have to be heard.

There was no immediate response from Mr Elliott and Mr Kennedy but their party’s chairman, David Campbell, has spoken of his “shame and disgust” over the row.

Speaking at the recent UUP annual conference, he said: “As an Ulster Unionist Party member and an Orangeman for over 30 years, I was ashamed and disgusted that a Belfast lodge saw fit to try to discipline our leader and our minister because they paid their respects on behalf of this party to a young police officer murdered by terrorists.

“They exhibited a greater Christian charity than that lodge’s members can ever hope to.

“I welcome the dismissal of this issue by Tom and Danny’s county lodges.”

A spokesman for the Order declined to comment on the grounds the complaint was an “internal matter”.

The row first surfaced in June when it was learned that the lodge, St Simon's Church Total Abstinence LOL 821 on Sandy Row in Belfast, formally wrote to Mr Elliott and Mr Kennedy’s county lodges arguing the two men “should have known better”.

Background

Among the rules for Orange Order members is the instruction: “You should not countenance by your presence or otherwise any act or ceremony of Popish worship.” In the past, Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble and then party chairman Dennis Rogan faced disciplinary action for attending the funeral Mass of three victims of the Omagh bombing.

Belfast Telegraph