Northern Ireland

Westminster committee calls for urgent reform of Stormont election rules

The Northern Ireland Affairs committee wants a ‘supermajority’ rule for the election of a speaker, first minister and deputy first minister

The DUP, led by Jeffrey Donaldson, has been blocking power-sharing at Stormont for over a year

Election rules at Stormont should be urgently reformed so that a speaker can be elected by a two-thirds majority of assembly members, according to a Westminster committee.

The Northern Ireland Affairs committee has also proposed that the same threshold should be used to elect first and deputy first ministers.

As part of a raft of proposals which the committee said would assist in restoring and stabilising the power-sharing institutions, it also recommended rebranding the first ...