Agreeing to power-sharing now could ruin the DUP

Once upon a time, a young unionist politician marched out of a talks process. Recalling the incident later, he said: ‘I asked myself the question, could I walk out of here and go down to my constituency, the people of Lisburn, look them in the eye and say this is a good deal. I could not do that in all conscience.’

That politician was Sir Jeffrey Donaldson speaking about Good Friday 1998, unable to support his then Ulster Unionist party leader David Trimble as he prepared to sign the Belfast Agreement. Donaldson then devoted his energies to championing the irascible anti-Agreement wing of unionism, monstering Trimble and chipping away at the Ulster Unionists before he defected in 2003 to the DUP.

The irony of Donaldson now facing a similar conundrum to Trimble is not lost on those who remember the chicanery of those days.