Doug Beattie: UUP leader welcomes 'disillusioned' DUP members
- Published
Doug Beattie was addressing business leaders in Belfast on Friday
The new leader of the Ulster Unionist Party has said his party would welcome any disillusioned members of the DUP and that discussions had already taken place with some councillors.
However, Doug Beattie added that any new members would have to endorse the UUP's vision and values.
Members of the party met virtually on Thursday evening to ratify Mr Beattie as the new UUP leader.
He succeeds Steve Aiken, who stepped down earlier this month.
Addressing business leaders in Belfast on Friday, Mr Beattie said of DUP members: "They have an awful lot to offer as politicians, wherever they decide to call home, whether that's to stay within the DUP or whether they look to go elsewhere."
'I will talk to anyone'
He said the UUP's "door is always open" to anyone who wants to join, but "if they want to do so, they come understanding the party's values".
He added: "I will talk to them or anyone who wants to come to make sure they understand that, before I offer them the ability to join.
"We're a welcoming party, but if we bring anybody in, it must be going in our direction, seeing Northern Ireland through our eyes, and not just carry on with what they were doing previously, but in a different party."
He stressed that no MLAs from the DUP had approached him in recent days.
"We may have some from local government and other members or activists who may be talking to us now, but that's talking, that's conversations. It's seeing what people think and what their vision is for Northern Ireland.
"If it matches ours, if we have somewhere they can fit in to our structures and promote our party and what is good for Northern Ireland, then we can offer them a place within the party.
"If they don't, we'll respectfully say no because that doesn't work for us. We're not going to give somebody a home just to get one over on the DUP."
'Bringing people together'
Democratic Unionist Party leader Edwin Poots has denied his party is divided after tensions flared at a meeting to ratify his leadership on Thursday night.
Speaking at his own ratification meeting on Thursday, Mr Beattie said the UUP was "about bringing people together, making this the best part of the United Kingdom that we possibly can, and trying to forge and create a union of people, where people are happy to say: 'I live in Northern Ireland, part of the United Kingdom'".
Doug Beattie and UUP chairman Danny Kennedy stand outside the party's headquarters on Thursday
Earlier this month, Mr Aiken announced his decision to step down as party leader after less than two years in the job. He said he had taken the party as far as he could.
Mr Beattie was the only candidate to run for the top post in the party.
He is the third new leader of the Ulster Unionists since 2017, and the fifth in a decade.
The 55-year-old Upper Bann assembly member had been named as a potential leader in 2017 and 2019 - both times he opted not to run and supported Robin Swann and Mr Aiken respectively.
He had then argued that a leadership contest would have been a "distraction" from the wider issues of Brexit and elections.
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