Alliance joining Punch and Judy show

Ulster Unionist North Belfast MLA, Fred Cobain, has said that the Alliance Party has "abandoned the middle ground in favour of the greasy pole".

"It seems that the Alliance Party is willing to abandon every previous position in order that David Ford can become the political equivalent of a ventriloquist's dummy: a mere puppet minister, jointly controlled and worked by the DUP and Sinn Fein. Acceptable to the DUP because he's not a republican as such. And acceptable to Sinn Fein because he is 'agnostic' on the Union.

"It doesn't seem all that long ago that Alliance were setting themselves up as the official opposition to the DUP-Sinn Fein 'axis of hostility' in the Executive Committee. Now, it seems, they are prepared to endorse and participate in that axis.

"Again, not very long ago, Alliance condemned 'side-deals,' but now it is prepared to be part of a side-deal on Policing and Justice.

"And on Monday evening, the party that has always said it disapproves of the culture of double-jobbing, rowed in behind Sinn Fein and the DUP to defeat a UUP motion calling for the end of double-jobbing.

"A party that lectures the rest of us about the costs of division and carve-up is now happy to take a post that was created as the result of a carve-up. That's in very stark contrast to a manifesto position that 'the timing for the devolution of policing and justice should be primarily determined by the correct conditions being in place, including the executive operating in a collective and responsible manner.'

"The Alliance Party is now thoroughly compromised. It has abandoned the middle ground in favour of the greasy pole."