DUP leader Arlene Foster has warned that Jeremy Corbyn as prime minister would be disastrous for Northern Ireland and ruled out working with Labour as long as she leads her party.

Ms Foster said a victory for Mr Corbyn would adversely affect talks about restoring the devolved institutions because, she claimed, he would not be neutral between the DUP and Sinn Féin.

“Despite the fact that we have a confidence and supply arrangement with the Conservative Party, they have – in terms of the Northern Ireland Office – gone out of their way to be neutral in their dealings here in Northern Ireland,” she told The House, a magazine for parliamentarians at Westminster.

“Even though some would say otherwise, that has absolutely been the case and I think it has been shown to be the case. You would not have that with a Jeremy Corbyn Northern Ireland Office. He would be very clearly partisan towards republicanism.

“It would be disastrous for Northern Ireland, because of his previous utterances in relation to Northern Ireland, and his support for the IRA at a time when nobody else was supporting the IRA.”

Big issues

Ms Foster said prime minister Theresa May should focus on big issues such as Brexit and avoid getting thrown off course by distractions such as adverse media coverage.

She condemned the British media’s coverage of the DUP after the party agreed a confidence and supply deal with the Conservatives during the summer.

Some newspapers reported on the party’s conservative views on social issues and quoted controversial statements made by DUP representatives over the years. “Some of them were saying that we were loyalist terrorists and all this sort of thing,” Ms Foster said. “I mean, my goodness, my father was shot by terrorists, it’s hardly something that I’m going to be supporting. For a party that was founded on law and order it was an incredible allegation to make.

“The difficulty with googling people is that you come across all sorts of so-called facts about them that may not be strictly correct, and some of them may be very historical facts as well. People were googling the DUP and finding things that had been said in 1974 and then forming their judgment of the party on that basis.”

Earlier on Wednesday DUP MP Ian Paisley urged Irish politicians to take a more constructive approach to Brexit, citing the example of Gibraltar’s politicians, who opposed leaving the EU but are determined to make the most of it. MPs from the foreign affairs committee are visiting Ireland this week, travelling to Co Cavan to look at the likely impact of Brexit on the Border.

The committee has no role in the Brexit negotiations but it is conducting an inquiry into the future of Britain’s relationship with other EU member states after Brexit.