Ian Paisley’s widow savages DUP leader, calling for “confession” and honesty over Stormont mess The widow of the late Ian Paisley has savaged the current DUP leadership, saying that Arlene Foster should have stood […]

The widow of the late Ian Paisley has savaged the current DUP leadership, saying that Arlene Foster should have stood aside as First Minister more than a year ago over the RHI scandal and that there was a need for political leaders to “confess sin and confess mistakes”.

Baroness Paisley, a vice president of the DUP, said that her husband and Sinn Féin’s Martin McGuinness “wouldn’t have got into this mess in the first place”.

The party veteran’s blunt comments come in the wake of allegations that the DUP leadership was on the verge of a deal with Sinn Féin which would have restored Stormont but that Mrs Foster pulled the plug on it after a unionist backlash over the inclusion of Irish language legislation which a year ago Mrs Foster had vowed to never accept. The party denies that it had reached an agreement with Sinn Féin.

The i politics newsletter cut through the noise Email address is invalid Email address is invalid Thank you for subscribing! Sorry, there was a problem with your subscription.

Baroness Paisley said that the current political limbo in Northern Ireland – where there has been no government for more than a year, leaving civil servants attempting to make political decisions – was “heartbreaking” and that “politicians need to face up to facts”.

Mother of current DUP MP

Baroness Paisley has spoken critically about the party on several occasions since her husband resigned as party leader just a year into his extraordinarily warm period in office with Martin McGuinness, something the Paisley’s alleged was the result of an internal coup by party members unnerved by the new dispensation.

Their son, Ian Paisley Jr, is now the MP for North Antrim.

Speaking on BBC Radio Foyle this morning, Baroness Paisley – who was elected a politician before her husband – said there was a need to “confess where they’ve gone wrong – and they have gone wrong” and to “cut out all nonsense…and come back and start anew. We all need proper government at this time”.

She said the big issue was that “people do not face up to the truth; they need to be honest with one another”.

Baroness Paisley said that if today’s politicians “had followed the example that the late Martin McGuinness and my husband set for them, this would not have happened”.

‘DUP hiding from the truth’

When asked if she included the DUP in her comment about people not facing up to the truth, she said: “That’s right. They’re hiding from the truth. And you must be absolutely honest with one another because there’s only one way to be honest when you’ve made a mistake and it’s to confess your sin and confess your mistakes because no one is perfect.”

She said that her husband and Martin McGuinness “wouldn’t have got into this mess in the first place” because “whenever things go wrong you’ve got to put them right and you’ve got to go to the basis of where they went wrong and put that right.”

Then, alluding to the current DUP leader’s refusal to stand aside as first minister over a year ago over revelations about her role in the ‘cash for ash’ scandal – a decision which led to Sinn Féin collapsing Stormont, she said: “If you’re the first minister, you’ve got to put things right; if you make a mistake – and nobody on this earth has lived without making a mistake….if you’re a minister and someone in your department does wrong, the buck stops at your desk and you have got to do what is right and stand down from your position until the matter is sorted out.

“I think if that had been done at the beginning, there would be a different situation here at the moment and we wouldn’t be in the mess we’re in.”

Baroness Paisley also made clear that she did not support either an Irish language act or an Ulster Scots language act – which the DUP has suggested to counter-balance Irish language legislation.

Baroness Paisley said she didn’t think there was a need for “a stand alone act on any language because as far as I can see there is no barrier to the Irish language in Northern Ireland”.