The DUP deputy leader, Mr Peter Robinson, and the North's Minister for Victims, Mr Adam Ingram, were involved in a verbal clash yesterday over the victims issue. Mr Robinson called on the Northern Secretary, Dr Mo Mowlam, to sack Mr Ingram, while the Minister accused the DUP of engaging in "outrageous political opportunism".
The dispute centres on comments Mr Ingram made in the Belfast-based News Letter last week in which he said he would not "waste energy on those political opportunists who have only now taken up the victims' cause as a political football to kick around".
Mr Robinson accused Mr Ingram of refusing to meet the recently-formed south Armagh Protestant victims' group, Families Acting for Innocent Victims. It proved that Mr Ingram was more interested in the paramilitaries than their victims.
"This thoroughly nasty little man, Ingram, who is supposed to be looking after the interests of victims, never has any words as harsh as that for the terrorists. I call on the Secretary of State to sack Adam Ingram from this post," said Mr Robinson yesterday.
Mr Ingram accused the DUP of exploiting victims. The "outrageous" remarks were taken out of context and were a "clear example of the political opportunism regularly displayed by the DUP. I have made plain that my whole concern is focused on the needs and demands of individual victims, and I am always ready to meet victims and their representatives."
