Some things you should know about the DUP

The British public outside of Northern Ireland probably do not know much about the DUP, so let’s dig into their background.

Theresa May has confirmed that the Conservative Party will work with the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) to allow her to form a government. Whether it will be an official coalition or a loose alliance is yet to be confirmed.

So who are the DUP?

Buckle your seatbelts.

They are an anti-abortion, anti-same sex marriage party who dislike women’s rights and they have strong links to Loyalist paramilitary groups. Specifically, the terrorist group Ulster Resistance was founded by a group of people who went on to become prominent DUP politicians.

One example is former First Minister Peter Robinson who was DUP leader and Northern Ireland’s First Minister until last year. He was an active member of Ulster Resistance.

And the media were on Jeremy Corbyn’s case for his links to the Irish Republican Army (IRA). The DUPSome things you should know about the DUP’s antipathy toward Jeremy Corbyn is because of his connections to the group.

The DUP leader, Arlene Foster, launched a scathing attack on him for this but given her party’s own connections to extremist groups, the irony is obvious.

The Chair of the DUP’s Education Committee, Mervyn Storey, and a number of other DUP figures, are a member of the Caleb Foundation. They believe that Earth is less than 10,000 years old. Known as ‘Young Earthers’, they subscribe to the literal interpretation to the Book of Genesis, Meaning, that God created the planet in six days.

One survey even found that 40% of DUP activists believe in Young Earth creationism and want it taught in schools.

Their anti-abortion stance is largely the reason why women in Northern Ireland do not have access to abortions. The party leader, Arlene Foster, promised to retain a ban on access to abortion except when a woman’s life is in danger. She said she would “carefully consider” individual cases where a pregnancy is the result of rape. This makes the DUP the largest pro-forced pregnancy party in the UK.

Moving on to climate change, their stance on the issue is unspoken, but they once appointed a climate change denier, Sammy Wilson, as Northern Ireland environment minister. That says a lot.

While in the position Wilson banned government ‘Act On CO2’ adverts from TV because he said he thought they were propaganda.

Their opposition to same-sex marriage was condemned by David Cameron while he was Prime Minister, and in 2013 a DUP Assembly Member, Tom Buchanan, told school children that homosexuality was “an abomination.”

Their sudden prominence in nationwide politics seems to have caught them by surprise as their website crashed in the early Friday hours as people rushed to find out who Theresa May could be aligning the Conservatives with.