UUP leader Doug Beattie sorry for tweet about Edwin Poots' wife

Ulster Unionist leader Doug Beattie has said he is "genuinely sorry" for a joke he posted on social media that made reference to the wife of the DUP's Edwin Poots.

Mr Beattie deleted and later apologised for the post on Twitter at the weekend.

He said he had written to the agriculture minister.

Mr Poots said he accepted Mr Beattie's apology, but that the UUP leader's judgement in posting was "poor" and that his wife had been "disgusted".

"I just don't know what he was thinking about," he told BBC News NI's The Nolan Show.

"I'm a big boy, I can take a lot of abuse in politics and that's fine, but [he] shouldn't be drawing other members of people's families into anything, they have their right to their private life and, unfortunately, that has been infringed when it comes to my family."

Mr Beattie told BBC's The Nolan Show: "At times we get things wrong and it is important to stand up and say we got it wrong and apologise and I have apologised.

"I posted it as a joke, sometimes we all have to mind our language, we have to be on guard of our language, I let my guard down and I have let people down and for that I am genuinely sorry.

"I have written to Edwin to apologise, I did so yesterday."

Asked if he had apologised to Mr Poots' wife, Mr Beattie said that if Mr Poots thought it "appropriate that I apologise in person then I certainly will apologise in person".