NI chief electoral officer defends Paisley petition process

Northern Ireland's Chief Electoral Officer, Virginia McVea, has defended how the petition process to unseat Ian Paisley was managed.

She said that access to the petition was "quite simply unprecedented".

"Never before in Northern Ireland has there been postal vote on demand," she said.

"No reason had to be given, and instead of one day for poll, we ran for six weeks and with two late nights on top."