What's happening in the general election campaign in Northern Ireland? All the latest news here

Wednesday 5th June

DUP leader Gavin Robinson says he sees no circumstances whereby his party would collapse the devolved institutions again – and has denied rewriting history over the party’s deal with the government to restore Stormont.

The Safeguarding the Union deal was judged as sufficient progress by the DUP for it to return to the Executive in February, but the party has recently started to distance itself from the deal, describing it as the government’s document.

Voters across the UK will go to the polls on July 4th.

Mr Robinson has said the DUP should have responded to the command paper with more “cautious realism”.

The DUP is also running the election on a policy of removing EU law from Northern Ireland – a position ultimately incompatible with the Windsor Framework and Safeguarding the Union arrangements.

Speaking on an election interview with William Crawley on BBC Radio Ulster’s Talkback programme, Mr Robinson said he would have taken the same decision to collapse Stormont two years ago if he had been leader then.When asked whether he would resort to that nuclear option again, he said: “I see no circumstances where we would travail that path”.

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DUP peer Lord Dodds has weighed in on the Smoky Bacon ban. He told the News Letter: “The Windsor Framework Protocol strikes again at at manufacturing in Northern Ireland.

“Manufacturing is already paying extra duties and costs on inputs from Great Britain.

“It is why, building on progress to date, we must continue to fight to fully restore Northern Ireland’s place within the United Kingdom including removing the application of EU law in our country and the internal Irish Sea border which it creates”.

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TUV leader Jim Allister has hit out at the latest discrepancy prompted by the Irish Sea border arrangements and the continuing application of EU in Northern Ireland.

New EU rules on certain smoke flavoured products will mean products such as smoky bacon crisps can’t be produced by companies in Northern Ireland but can be ‘imported’ from Great Britain and consumed here.

The TUV-Reform UK candidate for North Antrim said: “The latest plan out of Brussels is to ban the use of smoke flavourings in crisps, which, of course, will hit our legendary Tayto factory at Tandragee. Potato crisp factories in GB could still produce such crisps, but not here because of our subjection to EU law - the very thing the DUP claimed they had stopped in the dud Donaldson Deal”.

It comes after the EU began a risk assessment on smoke flavourings in 2007. No specific health risks have been confirmed – but experts have been unable to rule out “concerns regarding genotoxicity” for eight smoke flavourings.

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The News Letter has revealed that the Ulster Unionist Party will run a candidate in East Belfast – meaning a three way split in the unionist vote. However, the party has chosen Ryan Warren – a relatively low profile candidate – in Gavin Robinson’s constituency, which is unlikely to cause the DUP leader too many sleepless nights. It does mean that the unionist vote is further fragmented, with TUV-Reform UK also running for the seat in which Gavin Robinson faces a challenge from the Alliance leader Naomi Long.

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