No Pope Here! DUP Boycotts Meeting

No Pope Here !
DUP boycotts meeting
Irish News. Wednesday, April 6, 2005
By Staff Reporter

SEVERAL DUP councillors boycotted the start of a meeting of Ballymena Borough
Council in Co Antrim while the party's mayor expressed sympathy over the Pope's
death.

Mayor Hubert Nicholl said he could understand how Catholics felt and hoped that
councillors could empathise with his remarks, at the meeting on Monday.

After he finished his remarks a number of DUP councillors filed into the room.
A council source said: "There are some members of the DUP who have a
fundamentalist opposition to the Catholic Church on religious grounds
and they could not bring themselves to support the mayor's comments."