The
First Minister and the deputy First Minister
(
Irish
:
Cead-Aire agus an leas-Chead-Aire
,
Ulster Scots
:
Heid Mannyster an tha Heid Mannyster depute
),
[2]
(FM/dFM for short), are jobs in the
Northern Ireland Executive
. The First Minister is not more important than the deputy First Minister. The two positions are a
diarchy
, meaning they have equal power; both are nominated and appointed by members of the
Northern Ireland Assembly
.
Currently, the position is vacant since the resignation of Paul Givan (DUP) as First Minister in February 2022. Before however, the incumbents were
Paul Givan
of the
Democratic Unionist Party
as First Minister and
Michelle O'Neill
of
Sinn Fein
as deputy First Minister.
[3]
Members of the Northern Ireland Assembly are divided into two groups, Nationalists and Unionists (although there are also some independent or "Other" members).
The First Minister and the deputy First Minister are elected on a joint ticket. Under the
St Andrews Agreement
, the Leader of the largest party nominates the First Minister, and the leader of the next largest party that is in the other group nominates the deputy First Minister.
Their joint nomination has to obtain an overall majority in the Assembly along with a majority of both
designated Nationalist
MLAs
and
designated Unionist
MLAs.
Designated Other
MLAs also vote.
This
diarchy
was created to enable the leaders of the main
unionist
and
nationalist
parties to work together as a team jointly representing both communities.
The first two holders of the office now known as "deputy First Minister", namely
Seamus Mallon
and
Mark Durkan
, were both referred to during their periods of office as "Deputy First Minister", with a capital D. This version was also adopted in 1999 for the logo of the OFMDFM.
Several weeks after Martin McGuinness took up office as Deputy First Minister in 2007,
civil servants
began asking the Assembly's
Hansard
team to replace the capital D with a lower-case d, deputy was spelled this way in the
Northern Ireland Act 1998
, the legislation which created the office.
It was neither Mr McGuinness nor his advisers who asked for the change. The
Speaker of the Northern Ireland Assembly
,
William Hay
, ordered the change and the capital D was dropped from Hansard references. The Office of the First and deputy First Minister still uses both versions of Mr McGuinness' title on their website, and their archive of press releases has been changed, but the capital D still appears in some places, and a spokesman confirmed on 20 March 2008 that the office has "no plans" to change the OFMDFM logo. However, the Assembly committee that looks at their work is now listed as the "Committee for the Office of the First Minister and deputy First Minister". It was decided that Mr McGuinness should be the deputy First Minister, unless all the other letters in the title are in capitals. Confusion is not completely resolved however; if Mr McGuinness writes to the Assembly committee, his note will have a letterhead that comes from the Office of the First Minister and
Deputy
First Minister, but he'll get a reply back from the Committee for the Office of the First Minister and
deputy
First Minister.
[4]
First Ministers and deputy First Ministers
[
change
|
change source
]
- Parties
Ulster Unionist Party
Social Democratic and Labour Party
Democratic Unionist Party
Sinn Fein