Arlene Foster is finally gone. No surprise, but she should have gone a long time ago. This is, after all, the same Arlene Foster who presided over the RHI scandal, wasting hundreds of millions of public money, not to mention Stormont’s disastrous and deadly COVID response.
The same Arlene Foster who presided over a party whipping up sectarian tensions and added fuel to the fire during riots this month. The same Arlene Foster who propped up the Tories and stood cheerily with the likes of Dee Stitt as money was being pumped to paramilitaries via the SIF fund.
We have never had one iota of confidence in Arlene Foster, nor any of her DUP cronies who represent a party steeped in division, sectarianism, homophobia, racism, and almost every other feature of reactionary politics that exists on our own little patch of earth. The DUP have utterly failed working class people and no rearrangement within the ranks of its right-wing leadership will offer any hope for working people or for progressive politics.
Indeed, the entire Stormont Executive has failed working people; from their shambolic Covid response, to welfare cuts, and the deprivation and hardship that wracks working class communities. Frankly, it’s not good enough to be marginally better than the DUP if you will sit by them in government presenting little challenge to their politics of hate.
If the past year has taught us anything, it’s that now more than ever we need a new type of politics, which can unite working class people across the communal divide, Protestants, Catholics and all other working class people. People Before Profit is up for that fight.