Inquiry evidence is ‘leaked’ to media

Mrs Palmer was speaking after the BBC revealed it had seen a written statement submitted by the Lisburn DUP Councillor to the inquiry, which is investigating the conduct of Social Development Minister Nelson McCausland’s special advisor Stephen Brimstone.

Last summer Mrs Palmer was featured in a BBC Spotlight programme in which she said she had been asked to change the way she was to vote at a Housing Executive board meeting.

In an unprecedented criticism of the party from a serving representative, Lisburn councillor Jenny Palmer, who is a member of the Housing Executive board, told BBC Spotlight that two years ago she had received a phone call from DUP minister Nelson McCausland’s special adviser, Stephen Brimstone, telling her to vote for the contract at a key board meeting.

Mrs Palmer said that he told her that “he needed me to basically go against the decision of the board on the extension of the contract for Red Sky. I said to him: I don’t think I can do that.” She added: “He said: The party comes first – you do what you’re told, otherwise there is no point in [you] being on the board, if I wasn’t prepared to do what they asked me to do.”

The head of the civil service subsequently ordered the Department of Finance to carry out a fact-finding exercise into the conduct of the DUP minister’s special adviser.

This week the BBC reported that it had seen the statement Mrs Palmer had submitted to the inquiry. The media outlet reported: “The BBC has seen a written submission to the assembly’s social development committee in which Ms Palmer said she fully complied with the review which was completed a year ago and was assured that she would be given a copy.

“To date, she said she had had no feedback, telling the committee: ‘I gave two hours of my time to facilitate this review and feel cheated that it has been buried somewhere within DSD (Department of Social Development)’.”

Speaking to the Star after the revelations by the BBC, Mrs Palmer said: “Obviously that is part of the written statement given under evidence to the committee that has been released prematurely.”