Ulster Unionist Party MEP, Jim Nicholson, has accused the President of the European Parliament Martin Schulz of bull-dozing through the inter-institutional compromise on the Tobacco Products Directive which may result in over 200 job losses in Ballymena.
Jim Nicholson said:
“Mr Schulz has abused his Presidential prerogative; he has moved the goal posts in the last ninety seconds of the match. The voting list he has presented to the European Parliament has a preordained result which will certainly be in his favour.
“The President is manipulating the rules and interpreting them to suit his own agenda. The European Parliament is supposed to be a bastion of democracy; what we will face tomorrow is more akin to a dictatorship.”