{"id":797617,"date":"2026-10-10T02:06:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-10T02:06:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/797617\/"},"modified":"2026-10-10T02:06:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-10T02:06:12","slug":"northern-ireland-secretary-chris-bryant-bans-drumcree-parade-northern-ireland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/797617\/","title":{"rendered":"Northern Ireland secretary Chris Bryant bans Drumcree parade | Northern Ireland"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Northern Ireland<\/a> secretary of state has banned the Drumcree parade after a 13-day impasse between the Orange Order and nationalists.<\/p>\n

Chris Bryant announced on Friday night that it was \u201cnot in the public interest\u201d for Orangemen to march the contested route through Garvaghy Road in Portadown, which Catholic residents had blocked.<\/p>\n

He said he took the decision after advice from Jon Boutcher, the chief constable of the Northern Ireland<\/a> Police Service, that the parade \u201cwould carry an unacceptable risk of serious injury, disorder and a wider contagion effect\u201d across Northern Ireland.<\/p>\n

The Parades Commission ruled two weeks ago that a small, circumscribed march could pass along Garvaghy Road \u2013 a reversal of 28 years of successive bans. But police prevented the Orangemen from marching after thousands of residents and supporters, including Sinn F\u00e9in leaders, blocked the road<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Garvaghy Road residents welcomed the secretary of state\u2019s decision, saying it brought relief and certainty after a tense standoff that revived memories of the 1990s, when Orangemen fought pitched battles with police in an attempt to march the route.<\/p>\n

It was the only \u201csensible, reasonable and logical outcome\u201d, said Breand\u00e1n Mac Cionnaith, of the Garvaghy Road Residents Coalition.<\/p>\n

The Sinn F\u00e9in<\/a> leader, Mary Lou McDonald, and the party\u2019s Northern Ireland first minister, Michelle O\u2019Neill, said in a statement that residents had endured fear and anxiety. \u201cThere will be an enormous sense of relief within the community this evening.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Irish government welcomed the decision and appealed to both sides to seek common ground. \u201cThis isn\u2019t a time for triumphalism or claiming victories or anything like that,\u201d said the taoiseach, Miche\u00e1l Martin. \u201cThose on the unionist, loyalist side will look at this through a different prism. We need to be conscious of that. We need to acknowledge that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gavin Robinson, the Democratic Unionist party (DUP<\/a>) leader, accused Boutcher and Bryant of bowing to republican agitation and threats of potential violence. \u201cThese decisions are a mistake, and send profound signals that the country should be run on force of numbers and who shouts the loudest. The framework for both parading and protests now lies in tatters, and the rule of law has been fundamentally undermined.\u201d<\/p>\n

Robinson asked the secretary to state to explain what the government will do to \u201crestore confidence in the rule of law\u201d.<\/p>\n

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Earlier on Friday the chief constable asked Bryant to review the Parade Commission\u2019s determination, made last month, that conditions in Portadown enabled the parade to go ahead.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve looked at the changing situation in Portadown, the fact that it\u2019s very difficult for that procession to proceed, and I\u2019ve decided that it\u2019s not in the public interest for it to proceed, and I\u2019ve therefore banned the procession,\u201d said Bryant.<\/p>\n

He thanked Portadown\u2019s Orange Lodge for its \u201cpeaceful and law-abiding approach\u201d and regretted that both sides could not reach a compromise, leading to a standoff. \u201cWith this in mind, I call for all protests, rallies and demonstrations to be stood down. There is no excuse for a continued ratcheting up of tensions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boutcher said the dispute had affected relationships within and between communities and the police. \u201cIt is in everyone\u2019s interest that time and space is now created for conversations about finding long-term solutions to this complex and sensitive issue.\u201d<\/p>\n

The dispute has fuelled angry exchanges at the Stormont assembly and destabilised the executive, with unionists demanding O\u2019Neill step down as first minister for allegedly breaking the law at a Garvaghy Road protest<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Earlier on Friday, the PSNI sent the Sinn F\u00e9in deputy leader a letter probing alleged criminal offences relating to her involvement in the protest. O\u2019Neill said she will cooperate with the investigation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Northern Ireland secretary of state has banned the Drumcree parade after a 13-day impasse between the Orange…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":797618,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-797617","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/797617","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=797617"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/797617\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/797618"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=797617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=797617"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=797617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}