Hume gave a press conference on the 12th at which he explained why he was withdrawing support from the parliament: ‘There comes a point where to continue to do so is to appear to condone the present system. That point, in our view, has now been reached.’ The SDLP then proceeded to set up what it called ‘an Assembly of the Northern People’. The party issued a call for a campaign for civil disobedience which it suggested should include a rent and rates strike and the withdrawal of all Catholics from public bodies.
