Northern Ireland 'can't be in limbo forever,' its first minister-elect tells Club

President Joe Biden’s upcoming visit to Northern Ireland should boost prospects of a power-sharing agreement among the region’s leaders after last May’s election, First Minister-elect Michelle O’Neill said Thursday during a Headliners Newsmaker event at the National Press Club.

“We can’t be in limbo forever,” said O’Neill, whose political party, Sinn Fein, won a plurality of seats in the Northern Ireland Assembly. “The democratic outcome of the election must be respected.”

Biden’s planned visit “sends, once again, the strongest of messages of support from the USA that we continue to enjoy that solidarity, that support for peace, for stability and for economic prosperity in Ireland,” O’Neill said.

Northern Ireland is marking the 25-year anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, a US-brokered deal that ended decades of sectarian violence known as the Troubles. The region is being tested once more: Its government collapsed over disagreements over the region’s future following Britain’s contentious withdrawal from the European Union, known as Brexit. 

Sinn Fein, an Irish republican party that seeks unification with Ireland, opposed Brexit and pressed for an open border with the European Union. On Feb. 27, Britain and the EU struck a trade agreement that kept Northern Ireland largely part of Europe’s single market, which O’Neill said she supports.

But the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), the national conservative party that supported Brexit, has refused to cooperate with a power-sharing agreement over its opposition to the open-border deal, known as the Northern Ireland Protocol. DUP's leader, Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, spoke at the National Press Club Thursday.

Just as Biden had personally pushed the sides to resolve its messy trade dispute, O’Neill said, “the president would encourage all of the parties to work together” on a governing coalition.

The government would face a cascade of problems: high cost of living, labor union strikes, declining education services and a health service that has been brought “to its knees” by austerity measures imposed by Britain's conservative government, she said.

Sein Fein’s rise to prominence reflects, in part, a dissatisfaction with British conservatives, known as Tories, which have cut funding to North Ireland for 12 years, O’Neill said.

“We’re faced with decisions, as locally elected ministers, to try to mitigate the worst impact of Tory austerity,” O’Neill said. Brexit has been “an eye-opener for people” to realize “the British government can take decisions so fundamental as that, and take you out of the EU without your consent.”

While being a devout Irish nationalist, O’Neill pledged to to be a “first minister for all.” She praised the “pragmatism” of British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in forging the EU trade agreement after his predecessors, Liz Truss and Boris Johnson, reneged on deals.

She said the Good Friday Agreement was ironclad, and “there’s no going backwards.”

“In this 25th anniversary year, we need to be making politics work,” O’Neill said. “Power sharing is the only show in town.”

“Despite all of the challenging politics of the north of Ireland, there’s no doubt it is one of the most successful peace accords,” she added. “It’s been a lasting – a challenging, but a lasting, peace.”