The phenomenal performance of TUV in the European election illustrated the existence of a large group within the Unionist community who had we not contested the election would have been disenfranchised. The DUP spent months arguing that such a section did not exist. Last December Peter Robinson predicted that Traditional Unionists would poll around 30,000 votes in the European election. TUV achieved more than double that figure. Not bad for a party of “flat earthers” with “brown paper bags” over our heads! Having confounded our critics, it now behoves the media to reflect the reality that 1/3 of Unionists are not represented in the Assembly.

Monday’s DUP re-shuffle  amounted to desperate moves by a desperate man, the promotion of second raters to the front bench of a second rate regime. But for Mr Robinson there is method in the madness of promoting second raters - it makes it a front bench not just bereft of talent, but, very importantly, bereft of threat. Not much threat to Peter's position from Edwin, Nelson or Robin Newton - much safer for the Leader than being surrounded by Nigel, Gregory or Jeffrey!

TUV is prepared to put the wider interests of Unionism ahead of its own narrow party political advantage. Our party would be willing to have discussions with the DUP and UUP over a possible electoral pact for non-safe unionist seats but we will adopt a universal approach to Assembly and Council elections where PR voting allows the electorate the luxury of choice without the danger of splitting the vote.

In future elections TUV will force the DUP to face up to its betrayal. In 1998 Peter Robinson observed: “Trimble and Taylor’s comical assertion that the Union is stronger may be entertaining but it is not credible set against the presence of … McGuinness in government; a nationalist veto in the Assembly; an all-Ireland Executive structures and murderers walking out of jail. Come off it! The deal is the launch pad to a united Ireland.”

St Andrews did nothing to change the basic architecture of the Belfast Agreement. Its key structures of mandatory coalition, joint First Ministers and multiple north-south bodies all remain.

In fact only one thing has changed – Peter Robinson and the DUP! And a large section of those who formally voted for them have now switched their allegiance to the only party opposed to terrorists in government – TUV.

Pro-Agreement Unionists may like us to believe that devolution has made a fundamental difference to peoples’ lives here. The reality, as the ordinary voter in the street will tell you, is very different. Look at the chaos in education. What clearer example could one have of dysfunctional government? Sinn Fein/IRA, driven by its Marxist, anti-stability agenda, wishes to destroy our schools. We have seen academic selection, not saved as an integral part of our education system, as promised, but expelled outside the confines of regular and prepared primary/secondary school progression to the wilderness of unregulated mayhem for parents and pupils.

Mr Robinson hails the so-called Unionist veto. Yet DRD Minister (and convicted terrorist) Conor Murphy was able to change all references in a planning document to Londonderry to somewhere called “Derry” and all references to Northern Ireland to “the North” behind the back of the Executive. The First Minister accused Murphy of breaching his pledge of office and threatened court action. Yet today, almost a year after the Belfast Telegraph broke the story, we still await Mr Robinson’s clamp down on his wayward colleague.

And the veto, such as it is, works both ways. Remember the DUP were unable to call a meeting of the Executive for five months until they rolled over to Sinn Fein/IRA on the issue of policing and justice.

What of the IRA’s terrorist campaign? Mr Robinson claims that their war is now over and they have signed up to the rule of law. Really? I suggest that the DUP leader speak to his chief whip in the Assembly, Lord Morrow, who during a debate on the murder of a young South Armagh man in February of last year said, “It seems that Sinn Féin reserves the right to take someone like Paul Quinn and batter him to death if it is expedient to do so.”

Who now calls for justice for Robert McCratney? Indeed, who calls for justice for any of the 2,000 people butchered by the military wing of the DUP’s partners in government? What of the DUP’s promise before the last Assembly election that the IRA’s ill-gotten gains would have to be returned? Have you seen any truck loads of money being returned to the Northern Bank on Donegal Square?

And in spite of what others say there is an alterative to Belfast Agreement style terrorist inclusive government. The Belfast Agreement only works because Unionists agree to make it work.

TUV is not opposed to shared government. We are opposed to terrorists in government and to a system which guarantees their permanent rule over us. In the rest of the UK the route to shared government is through voluntary coalition, and so it should be here. After an election those who can agree form a coalition (if necessary by a 60% qualified majority to guarantee cross-community involvement) and those who can’t are the Opposition, capable of offering an alternative government at the next election.

For any country to be truly democratic its legislature must provide two essentials. Firstly, there must be an opposition to hold the government to account. An absence of an opposition – to highlight the flaws in government policy and puncture the arrogance of self-important politicians – has made Stormont a stale debating chamber and government policy is not subjected to the scrutiny which it would be in a truly democratic instruction. More than that, Republicans have made it plain that they are in the Executive to undermine the state, not bring us good government. One of Mr Robinson’s Sinn Fein colleagues put it like this:  “We don’t consider the Good Friday Agreement as a settlement …. We have a different view of what the constitutional future of this island looks like and it’s not in this building (i.e. Stormont)”.

It is political suicide for Unionism to form an alliance with such a party.

To set the record straight on Mr Robinson's disingenuous smear that I once advocated coalition with Sinn Fein, I challenged Peter's advocacy, at the meeting in question, of mandatory coalition with Sinn Fein, by declaring that it would be more honest of him and those who felt likewise to go for voluntary coalition with the Shinners, if coalition was what they wanted, rather than hiding behind the skirts of mandatory coalition. So far from ever advocating coalition of any form with Sinn Fein - mandatory or voluntary - I was in fact undescoring my implacable opposition to such. Mr Robinson well knows this, but his willingness to twist the truth is indicative in itself of his present desperation. For me, coalition, voluntary or mandatory, with IRA/Sinn Fein was, is and will remain "out of the question"!

Secondly, under the terms of the Belfast Agreement you can never vote Sinn Fein/IRA out of government. Some Unionists foolishly argue that Belfast Agreement devolution strengthens the Union. The reality is that it is the very antithesis of British democracy.

As citizens of the United Kingdom we are entitled to the same form of devolution as other regions of the UK. Look at Scotland. When the electorate got fed up with the Labour Party they kicked them out of government and replaced them with the Scottish Nationalists. You can never replace your government in Northern Ireland.

At least not yet.

TUV will offer people the opportunity to vote for a party which is implacably opposed to Sinn Fein in government and the system which gifted them that position. We believe in British devolution for British Ulster.

Unlike the DUP in Trimble’s time we will not prop up a terrorist inclusive executive by taking places within it. We will be there to thwart Sinn Fein’s advancement to the heart of our government and force those Unionists who gifted them that position to see if they are going to work mandatory coalition in circumstances where a sizable block of Unionism is outside it.

Pro-Agreement Unionists often talk about future generations as if a government which includes representatives of those who butchered generations in the past is going to result in a brighter future. Our vision is of Northern Ireland where our children can grow up not under the heel of unrepentant terrorists but in a truly democratic society where all are equal under the law and equally subject to the law.