#John Finucane Sinn Féin candidate

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General Election 2019: Nigel Dodds claims that he condemns the sectarian Anti-Finucane banners being erected in Belfast this comes after a statement this morning from the DUP claiming they were unaware of any such banners being erected

Nigel Dodds said the DUP had nothing to do with the banner. Anything personally offensive, smearing and inaccurate of any candidate in the Westminster election must be condemned, DUP “Deputy Dog” Dodds has said.

It follows the removal of a banner which targeted Belfast’s Lord Mayor John Finucane on Monday

The banner, in Belfast’s Tiger’s Bay area, contained allegations about the Sinn Féin North…

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Election Diary Day 13: 12/11/19

I’ve not done a diary update in a few days, mainly because there hasn’t been much happening. The things that were most worthy of note were things that didn’t happen.

First, Northern Ireland managed to get through the second week of November without a dispute over the Poppy. Remembrance events went ahead at City Hall with John Finucane taking part as Mayor. It was all remarkably civilised.

Second, George Hamilton declined an invitation to run for election in North Down, either under the Ulster Unionist banner or as an independent. It’s been confirmed tonight that the UUP candidate will be local MLA Alan Chambers. That essentially turns the North Down contest into a 2 horse race between Alex Easton and Stephen Farry. It’s hard to imagine the UUP breaking through with a candidate who even they obviously weren’t terribly keen on.

Elsewhere canvassing is well underway. Both Sinn Féin and the DUP have been on Twitter posting pictures of huge canvassing teams in North Belfast.

https://twitter.com/johnfinucane/status/1192900094544220162?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

https://twitter.com/duponline/status/1190672352780210176?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

The SDLP team in South Belfast is maybe a little more modest, but is still anecdotal evidence of a strong ground game in that constituency.

https://twitter.com/ClaireHanna/status/1193574830358040577?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

If the bookies are to be believed, it’s less likely you will have a knock at the door if you live in Belfast West, East Antrim, East Derry, Lagan Valley, Mid Ulster, Newry & Armagh, North Antrim, Strangford or West Tyrone. Paddy Power have the leading candidate in each of those constituencies priced up at either 1/100 or 1/200. Making any more than a token effort would be unwise in constituencies that are, realistically, a foregone conclusion,

The bookies odds suggest the DUP will be the party who have their resources spread thinner than the others, particularly in Greater Belfast. They face competitive contests in East, South & North Belfast, as well as North Down, South Antrim. If knocking doors actually makes a difference, and the huge amount of effort all parties put into it suggests that it simply must, the DUP will face the difficulty of having a finite number of volunteers in the area and only being able to have each of them in one place at a time.

Sinn Féin and the SDLP face only 1 competitive race each in the Belfast area. They can put all their eggs in the North or South Belfast basket respectively.

Finally, the first of the Party Election Broadcasts has hit the air. I heard the DUP’s effort in the car on the way to work this morning and it was as memorable as a wet weekend in a caravan in Portrush. Say what you like about Mike Nesbitt and that fella walking down the Holywood Road in his pyjamas, but people remember it.

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A vote for the DUP tommorow is endorsing Terrorism and support for Loyalist Paramilitaries of the UDA & UVF and the future of the North of Ireland !!!

UDA-Linked Ulster magazine urges support for four DUP candidates and urges its members not to support Ulster’ s Alliance Party & AND THREATENS ANYONE VOTING FOR THE ALLIANCE PARTY THAT THEY “WILL BE SHOOT” ULSTER DEMOCRACY! A recent photograph of Jackie McDonald, commanding officer of the paramilitary UDA – laying a wreath on behalf of the UDA.  As two UDA members salute Jackie their leader as he…

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DUP has claimed it is 'unaware' of anti-Finucane sectarian banners being erected in Belfast

DUP has claimed it is ‘unaware’ of anti-Finucane sectarian banners being erected in Belfast

Lord Mayor of Belfast Sinn Féin’s John Finucane

The DUP has said it is “unaware” of banners erected in loyalist areas of Belfast attacking Sinn Fein general election candidate John Finucane and his family.

The DUP told the Belfast Telegraph it condemns violence or anyone inciting hatred and challenged Sinn Fein to condemn those behind IRA murders in North Belfast during the Troubles.

A number…

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Runners and Riders - Where’s Jim?

I thought it would be worthwhile to put all the confirmed candidates so far in a post. 

Belfast East

Alliance                                 Naomi Long                                        

DUP                                       Gavin Robinson

Belfast South

Alliance                                 Paula Bradshaw                

SDLP                                      Claire Hanna      

UUP                                       Michael Henderson                        

DUP                                       Emma Little-Pengelly

Belfast West

People Before Profit              Gerry Carroll                      

SDLP                                      Paul Doherty      

Alliance                                 Donnamarie Higgins        

Sinn Féin                              Paul Maskey

Belfast North

DUP                                       Nigel Dodds        

Sinn Féin                              John Finucane                                  

Alliance                                 Nuala McAllister

East Antrim

Alliance                                 Danny Donnelly                

SDLP                                      Margaret McKillop

Sinn Féin                              Oliver McMullan              

DUP                                       Sammy Wilson

East Derry

SDLP                                      Cara Hunter                                        

Alliance                                 Chris McCaw                                      

Aontú                                   Seàn McNicholl                                

Sinn Féin                              Dermot Nicholl

DUP                                       Gregory Campbell

Fermanagh & South Tyrone

Alliance                                Matthew Beaumont                                      

UUP                                       Tom Elliott                          

SDLP                                      Adam Gannon                                  

Sinn Féin                              Michelle Gildernew

Foyle

SDLP                                      Colum Eastwood                                              

Alliance                                 Rachael Ferguson                                            

People Before Profit              Shaun Harkin                                    

Sinn Féin                              Elisha McCallion                                              

Aontú                                   Anne McCloskey                                              

DUP                                       Gary Middleton

Lagan Valley

UUP                                       Robbie Butler                    

DUP                                       Jeffrey Donaldson                          

Alliance                                 Sorcha Eastwood            

SDLP                                      Ally Haydock

Mid Ulster

Alliance                                 Mel Boyle                                            

SDLP                                      Denise Johnston                                              

Sinn Féin                              Francie Molloy                                  

UUP                                       Neil Richardson

Newry & Armagh

Sinn Féin                              Mickey Brady

SDLP                                      Pete Byrne

Alliance                                 Jackie Coade

Aontú                                   Martin Kelly

North Antrim

Sinn Féin                              Cara McShane

Alliance                                 Patricia O'Lynn

DUP                                       Ian Paisley          

UUP                                       Robin Swann

North Down

DUP                                       Alex Easton

Alliance                                 Stephen Farry

South Antrim

Alliance                                 John Blair

DUP                                       Paul Girvan

SDLP                                      Roisin Lynch

Sinn Féin                              Declan Kearney

UUP                                       Danny Kinahan

South Down

Aontú                                   Paul Brady

Sinn Féin                              Chris Hazzard

UUP                                       Jill Macauley

SDLP                                      Michael Savage

Strangford

Alliance                                 Kellie Armstrong                                              

SDLP                                      Joe Boyle

Upper Bann

DUP                                       Carla Lockhart                                    

Sinn Féin                              John O'Dowd                                    

Alliance                                 Eóin Tennyson

West Tyrone

Sinn Féin                              Órfhlaith Begley                                              

Alliance                                 Stephen Donnelly                                            

SDLP                                      Daniel McCrossan

 As widely covered, David Simpson and Sylvia Hermon are stepping down at this election. All other incumbents are re-selected, with the interesting exception of Jim Shannon in Strangford. I’ve checked all the usual places but I can’t see any confirmation of him being selected, or even confirming he wants to run again. It’s probably just a case of them being a little slow to get the paperwork completed, but there are only 2 days to go until nominations close.

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Election Diary Day 6: 05/11/19

Proper journalists often like to borrow a metaphor for from religious sctipture or classical works of literature to build a piece around. St Paul is popular, as are Shakespeare, Marcus Aurelius & F. Scott Fitzgerald. But I’m not a proper journalist, and although I’ve got a copy of Plato’s Republic in the next room, I’ve never actually got round to reading it.

So. There’s this bit in the BFG I’ve been thinking about today as a metaphor for where this election has gone.

“This place we’re flying over now isn’t in the atlas, is it?’ the pilot said, grinning. ‘You’re darn right it isn’t in the atlas!’ cried the Head of the Air Force. ‘We’ve flown clear off the last page!” - Roald Dahl

This election is unlike anything we’ve seen before and it’s impossible to say what will happen next. Until a couple of weeks ago the conventional wisdom was that Sinn Féin’s policy of abstentionism was seen as an insurmountable obstacle to an effective remain pact. But events are moving very quickly and electoral strategies that have stood for decades are coming under pressure. Alliance are opposed to electoral pacts, but it isn’t in their DNA in the way abstentionism is for Sinn Féin.

The Greens have shocked everybody by endorsing Claire Hanna in South Belfast. That a party from the middle ground has joined the “Remain Alliance” has given it credibility and turned up the heat on Alliance. The contest in South Belfast is now seen as moving away from their reach, and even their own representatives are no longer taking every opportunity to drop the name Paula Bradshaw into every possible answer, preferring instead to talk up Naomi Long.

But the Greens have also given their blessing to Sylvia Hermon in North Down, which potentially causes a big problem for Alliance. The position they have maintained for decades is that electoral pacts are cynical exercises that deny the people their say and that they aren’t interested. But we’re a now a couple of moves away from the remain parties + Hermon finding a way to fall into step with one another.

Jack Hermon was the Chief Constable of the RUC when Pat Finucane was killed. Anyone reading this will be familiar with the allegations of collusion that surround that killing. Mr Hermon later made some fairly unsavory remarks about Finucane. If his son John can find it within himself to ask Sinn Féin supporters in North Down, and there are a few, to vote for the Hermon’s widow, the question is why on earth can’t Alliance make an exception to their policy and ask their supporters to do likewise?

The obvious answer is that their motive is the hope that Stephen Farry could maybe take the seat next time around, should Hermon be defeated by the DUP in December. In short, it is now they who look cynical. It is a bad look, and they are coming under pressure.

That pressure is starting to cause cracks to appear in the Alliance strategy. According to Stephen Farry, Alliance will run in all 18 constituencies, but will be “focusing resources elsewhere” in the event that Sylvia Hermon decides to stand again. That presumably means standing a paper candidate in North Down in the hope that enough of their voters can read between the lines.

But of course. We are in completely uncharted territory already. If Sylvia Hermon opts not to run Alliance will stand a great chance of taking the seat in North Down. But we’ve gone past the end of the atlas. Who know what lies ahead.

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Banner targeting Sinn Féin Lord Mayor appears on the loyalist Shankill Road

Belfast’s new Lord Mayor John Finucane, whose father Pat was murdered by loyalist terrorists Picture by Hugh Russell

LOYALISTS have erected a banner on the Shankill Road attacking Sinn Féin Lord Mayor John Finucane. The banner targetting the party’s Westminster candidate appeared on the wall of an apartment block on the Lower Shankill early yesterday. Mr Finucane’s father, human rights lawyer Pat…

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SDLP to give Sinn Féin's John Finucane a free run in North Belfast

SDLP to give Sinn Féin’s John Finucane a free run in North Belfast

Michelle O’Neill said John Finucane was seeking to unseat ‘an architect of Brexit’ in North Belfast. Picture by Liam McBurney/PA Wire

THE SDLP is to stand aside in North Belfast, handing Sinn Féin’s John Finucane a greater chance of ousting sitting MP Nigel Dodds, The Irish News can reveal.

The SDLP has also chosen not to field candidates in North Down and East Belfast in a bid to maximise the…

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Pact Checking

Yesterday’s posts were written before viewing last night’s episode of The View. The programme began with an extended debate about pacts and tactics in the various constituencies. Everyone on the panel struggled equally, but some might have struggled a little more equally than others.

Alliance and the DUP have the advantage of knowing what they will be doing. The other parties can’t commit to a position yet because they are still working out what their final position will actually be. The leaves them with a choice between coming across as either clueless or shifty.

The 2 parties in the eye of the pact storm are the SDLP and UUP. Claire Hanna’s approach was to admit that she simply didn’t know what they would do in North Belfast, while Steve Aiken attempted to duck the question over and over again. Hanna came off looking better. Mark Carruthers had Aiken floundering from the first question and that’s where he stayed. He needs a better answer quickly, but the SDLP can get away with claiming ignorance for a while as long as they can keep Nicola Mallon away from camera and microphones.

These pacts happen in every election. It becomes obvious to the electorate when this party or that withdraw in a particular area, but there are other more subtle ways of doing things. For example a particularly strong candidate might run or be replaced by someone unknown to the general public. If they don’t get the respect they deserve strong political parties throw the occasional elbow, but it needs discipline in the rank and files.

It’s gone out of fashion for unionist politicians to refer to senior Sinn Féin figures as “Godfathers of Terrorism”. Ken McGuinness used to be fond of using that line. But in recent times Sinn Féin have become the godfathers of Belfast politics.

Standing aside in South Belfast 2010 allowed Alasdair McDonnell to take the seat relatively comfortably. But as Don Corleone explained in that scene in the Godfather when Bonasera asked him for a favour, someday Sinn Féin were going to call upon the SDLP to do a service for them.

That day came in 2015 in North Belfast. Unlike Bonasera, who fulfilled his obligations by preparing Sonny's body for burial, the SDLP were found wanting when called upon. They decided to run high profile MLA Alban McGuinness, the UUP withdrew and Dodds winning easily became a formality. In response SF ran Máirtín Ó Muilleoir in South Belfast. He could never win but Ó Muilleoir could draw votes away from Dr. McDonnell and the intent from SF was for the SDLP to find a horse’s head in their bed. He narrowly survived but 2 years later when faced with a combination of Ó Muilleoir and a unionist pact Dr. McDonnell slept with the political fishes. By then they had worked out what was happening and decided to run the largely unknown Martin McAuley in North Belfast, but Sinn Féin weren’t willing to do business.

Sinn Féin have a new plan in North Belfast. They’ve replaced Gerry Kelly with John Finucane. They’ve gone from someone known for shooting a man in the head on his way out of the Maze, to a little boy who had his world torn apart over breakfast one morning when his father was gunned down in front of his eyes. To say Finucane's life story means he cuts a more sympathetic figure is an understatement. The contrast is jarringly stark.

But that might not be enough against a single unionist. If there is a pact SF will want the SDLP out of the way. If the SDLP don’t want to have Máirtín Ó Muilleoir on the ballot in South Belfast they will have to find some way to get out of North Belfast.

And if Ó Muilleoir isn’t on the ballot in South Belfast, his profile and charisma will be available to be deployed elsewhere in the city. Things might have been simple for Alliance on The View last night, but they will have high hopes of retaking East Belfast from Gavin Robinson. A high profile, charismatic candidate from Sinn Fein in East Belfast can’t ever win there, but it could cause havoc for Alliance’s plans.

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Taking Command

Next year the Royal Navy plan to put a new aircraft carrier into service. The HMS Queen Elizabeth. And someone will end up as the captain. Likely an incredible honour for some chap in his 50s towards the end of a career stellar at sea, spent entirely in the service of HRH Queen Elizabeth. He’ll be charged with a vessel that took a decade to build and has cost the UK taxpayer a cool £3bn.

It sounds like an incredible responsibility. And it probably is. But people in the Royal Navy carry an even greater weight.

If the worst happens and the HMS Queen Elizabeth goes down, either to an iceberg or a torpedo from some hostile nation, the crew will head for the lifeboats and the taxpayer will pick up the enormous bill. The skipper will either go down with his ship, or worse, survive and spend the rest of his days explaining his actions.

The greatest burden in the Royal Navy sits on the shoulder of the submarine commanders. Should the worst happen to his ship everybody on board dies, and he has to find a way to know that and close his eyes every night. If he curry's nuclear weapons on board that isn’t even his greatest responsibility.

Most people reading this will have worked out by now that today’s post is working it’s way around to being about the new UUP Leader. Thanks to the good fortune of there being no major wars in the years of his service, Steve Aiken never faced an enemy who could point superior firepower at his vessel, until now. The rest of us are spectators on his attempts to apply training to the situation he now faces.

Expectations of the UUP are lower than the average submarine. The SDLP are still seen as being able to give Sinn Féin a bloody nose, but the same isn’t true of the UUP. That’s largely because the SDLP have worked out who their rivals are, and haven’t given up on the idea of actually winning. For all the challenges they face they are still throwing themselves at every opportunity.

For the first time the UUP may have a leader who has worked out that Sinn Féin might be an enemy, but they aren’t a rival. If you want to win as UUP leader you aren’t going to do it by taking the fight to the Shinners. You might not like them but you aren’t going to win or lose votes to them. The UUP can only take votes back from the parties they have been bleeding them to for decades. The DUP and Alliance.

The UUP have been a doormat for the DUP for years. In 2017 they stood aside for the DUP all over the place and couldn’t even extract a free run for Danny Kinahan in South Antrim from their negotiations. As a result they were swept from the board. This time they need to give them a bloody nose. In the early hours of December 13th it might mean seeing John Finucane being carried out of the Belfast count centre on the shoulders of Sinn Féin activists, but the time after that, but the thing they should really be watching for is outraged DUP members who have learned that the UUP still have some fight in them.

In the days and weeks that follow Prime Minister Farage isn’t going to come to the rescue of the DUP. No deal is dead, and has been since Johnson & Varadkar came to terms both could live with on The Wirral. Today's polling from Lucidtalk shows a plurality of self declared unionists now support remaining in the EU against the Johnson-Varadkar agreement. And that doesn’t include the large percentage of Alliance or Green voters who have abandoned the Unionist parties in recent years.

The UUP can’t beat the DUP in this time, but remain unionism is obviously fertile ground and they can lay the groundwork to win another election somewhere down the road. As a brand new leader Steve Aiken has the time to think about the election after this one. When the blame comes, and it’s coming, the DUP are inextricably linked to Brexit (that’s a phrase the UUP should consider using for what it’s worth).

The UUP backed remain at the referendum. If they back it again now everything that has happened in between times will be forgotten. But what 2019 might be remembered for is the moment when momentum moved against the DUP. They face uphill battles in a number of constituencies. The simple act of the UUP standing a candidate, even a paper one, might be enough to see one of the big beast taken down.

It’s a high risk strategy, but it’ a rare thing for a political party to turn away someone who has a membership form and a years dues. Should the UUP come to an end the bulk of their members will end up in the unionist wing of alliance or the liberal wing of the DUP.

Steve Aiken has slept with a lot worse than that on his mind.

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Judge says man facing extradition over David Black murder could be subjected to 'inhuman and degrading conditions' in Maghaberry.

Judge says man facing extradition over David Black murder could be subjected to ‘inhuman and degrading conditions’ in Maghaberry.

Co Tyrone man Damien McLaughlin was arrested in Co Donegal in March on foot of a European Arrest Warrant after going missing from a bail address in west Belfast last November Damien McLaughlin David Black High Court A judge in Dublin has said a man facing charges over the murder of prison officer David Black could be subjected to “inhuman and degrading conditions” in Maghaberry Prison if he is…

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Constituency Preview: North Belfast

This is the 18th and final constituency preview. And there is no doubt that North Belfast is the headline act of this election. It has been since the moment the SDLP announced they were stepping aside.

This one is going to be close. Anyone can tell you that though, so I’m not going to sit on the fence. I think John Finucane will win.

Finucane doesn’t quite fit in Sinn Féin. At time he seems almost semi-detached from the rest of his party. He’s just a little too middle class. A bit too handsome. After the horrors he experienced during his childhood, nobody would have blamed him if he had left school and taken himself to the United States. If he had done so, and gone into politics there, he might have been a contender to succeed Nancy Pelosi as speaker of the house by now.

But he’s a much better fit for North Belfast than for Sinn Féin. He’s a local boy made good. He went to the local school, lives in the constituency, and still plays in goal for his Gaelic Football team. His being the Sinn Féin candidate is enough for most voters in Ardoyne and the New Lodge. The Sinn Féin base are energised at the prospect of victory, but the DUP base and Sinn Féin base are mirror images of each other, and will probably cancel each other out.

The difference Finucane can make, is that he can reach further than any other Sinn Féin candidate who comes to mind. Alban McGuinness might not have been able to bring himself to say he would be voting for John Finucane, but he said enough to make it clear that he would be, and to encourage SDLP voters to do likewise. Alban McGuinness simply would not have gone that for for Gerry Kelly or  Carál Ní Chuilín

McGuinness helped Finucane with that statement, not least because he has been a strong opponent of abortion liberalisation. Knowing that he is voting for Finucane will enable some other people with similar outlook to put a cross beside a Sinn Féin candidate.

He’s also a Sinn Féin candidate more socially liberal moderates can vote for. In 2017 John Finucane found over 5000 new voters in North Belfast. Turnout climbed significantly, from 59.2% in 2015 to 67.6%. My theory is that the lion’s share of the people he was able to bring out to the polls were middle class Catholics who up until a few years ago were no more than nominally nationalist. Brexit has the potential to put a barrier between these people and their uncle’s holiday home in Donegal, and they just aren’t going to stand for it.

But Brexit didn’t dominate politics in 2017 as it does now, and it think there are probably more Eamonns and Aislings who will come out tomorrow for the first time in a long time. If turnout is up in St Peter’s Church Hall, or is holding up better than in other parts of the constituency, Finucane will almost certainly win.

The Sinn Féin campaign has been designed to bring that middle class vote out. The Catholic v Protestant bar chart that backfired so spectacularly in 2015 is long gone. In everything from Party Election Broadcasts to billboards and leaflets they have adopted neutral colour schemes and abandoned flags. This approach has been unwittingly boosted by the loyalist banners about the Finucane family erected around North Belfast. They are every bit as crude as the Sinn Féin leaflets of yesteryear, and achieve nothing but draw attention to the trauma the Finucane family have endured, and the fortitude them have shown in the face of that trauma.

There isn’t really an equivalent unionist block of middle class voters in North Belfast. The constituency ends before Jordanstown, and the protestant equivalent of Eamonn and Aisling have moved to Ballyhackamore, where they will probably vote for Naomi Long. Where they do exist though, I have seen some anecdotal evidence on social media in the last 48 hours, that a handful are considering voting for Finucane. Like Alban McGuinness they won’t actually say the words in many cases, but are saying things like “no other anti-Brexit candidate can win” and that they will “vote tactically on this occasion”.

I suspect many of those venturing this opinions like this on social media are doing so partly to assess how it goes down among their peer group, and partly to talk themselves into it. The probably won’t know if they will actually do it until they have the pencil and ballot in front of them. The only way anyone will know if this actually happened is by looking at the Alliance vote. In the absence of a Green Party candidate the Alliance vote would usually be expected to go up. If it goes down, it means at least some followed through.

The DUP approach has been trying to get out their base, while discouraging moderate nationalists from voting. Their main strategy has been to associate Finucane with the attempt on Nigel Dodds life in the Royal Hospital in 1996 and make everyone look as bad as each other.

Finucane hasn’t handled the question brilliantly. If he comes up short he will regret not squashing this line of attack weeks ago. Every answer he has given has been less convincing than simply saying “I don’t know really what happened. I was only 15 at the time. But I know as well and anyone that terrible things happen in conflicts. Just as I think bringing weapons of war into hospitals in Gaza is wrong, it doesn’t seem right that guns were used in a Belfast hospital”.

But this election isn’t about 1996. It’s about 2020 and Brexit.

This constituency being the most important battleground in the whole election, I expect turnout to be closer to the 2017 figure than the 2015 figure. It may even increase, in spite of the time of year and pressure of Christmas. It will be extremely close, but I have a feeling that Finucane will take win. If for no other reason because he has a sunnier disposition than Dodds and just looks like one of life’s winners.

PREDICTION: Sinn Féin GAIN

Current Odds: DUP 4/5, Sinn Féin 10/11, Alliance 66/1

[votingforturkeysatchristmas]

Election Diary Day 19: 18/11/19

The phony war is, if not over, coming to an end. All the candidates are declared, meaning the pacts are now as they will be. This issue, which has dominated this campaign so far can begin to fall away and probably be largely forgotten by the time we all go to vote.

 A new group pro-European group called “Our Future Our Choice” has been established, and has endorsed the following candidates in local constituencies:

Stephen Farry – North Down

John Finucane – North Belfast

Claire Hanna – South Belfast

Naomi Long – East Belfast

Danny Kinahan – South Antrim

Colum Eastwood – Foyle

They haven’t yet pointed their followers in one direction or another in the battle between the UUP and SF in Fermanagh & South Tyrone. It will be interesting to see if they decide between the UUP, whose commitment to supporting remain has been far from steadfast, or an abstentionist Remainer from Sinn Féin.

 A lucidtalk poll has put support for the local parties at

DUP 28% (2017 – 36%)

SF 24% (2017 – 29%)

AP 16% (2017 – 8%)

SDLP 14% (2017 – 11%)

UUP 9% (2017 – 10%)

The poll being conducted before all nominations were submitted means the results are to be taken with a slight pinch of salt, but it is interesting nonetheless. Based on those figures an assembly election being called in January would surely leave Alliance with multiple new MLAs. Santa Claus could be receiving a lot of requests for yellow election posters this year.

[votingforturkeysatchristmas]

Throwing An Elbow

First past the post elections tend to put parties in situations where the least worst option available is to find a dignified way to withdraw. The way the SDLP withdrew from North Belfast was the way to do it. They sent Claire Hanna into the TV studios last week. Her failure to confirm an SDLP candidate would stand in North Belfast floated a trial balloon, and was an attempt to nudge the UUP into standing. Had they read between the lines they would have realised the SDLP would do the same in riposte, and that withdrawing would have the effect of humiliating their new party leader, without offering any real benefit to Nigel Dodds.

The UUP membership didn’t read between the lines. Aiken was humiliated. The SDLP followed through with the action they had hinted at, and found fig leaves for themselves in East Belfast and North Down. Chris Hazzard has previously floated a Sinn Féin trial balloon about withdrawing in South Belfast and that will now happen. The smart money is that Claire Hanna and John Finucane will both now be elected to Westminster and the exercise with have been worth it.

Both nationalist parties get something tangible out of this. It’s very difficult to see what the UUP are actually getting out of withdrawing from North Belfast. Fermanagh & South Tyrone is an uphill battle even for an agreed unionist. A single unionist candidate hasn’t been able to take the seat in 2 of the last 3 elections, and the demographics of the constituency are moving away from unionism.

The DUP were able to bounce the UUP out of North Belfast, and obviously don’t respect them. The UUP party membership are, to put it mildly, a diverse bunch. There isn’t much they agree on, but despite them being prepared to take their medicine in North Belfast, the rank and file can’t stand the DUP. This latest humiliation will do nothing to temper that attitude. If only for the sake of self-respect, the UUP need to do something to let the DUP know they are there.

The UUP probably won’t take a seat in this election. The Alliance surge probably takes South Antrim out of the reach of Danny Kinahan. The outside chance in Fermanagh and South Tyrone is likely the best shot they have. It’s a shitty situation but the thing they can do is leave a mark on their unionist rivals.

They can do that in South Belfast. The extended logic of reluctantly withdrawing in North Belfast because the risk of an abstentionist MP is so unpalatable, is that a Sinn Féin withdrawal in South Belfast allows them to play their strongest possible hand there.

Mike Nesbitt is popular and enjoys a high profile. He spend the better part of his live being beamed into all our houses alongside his wife on the UTV. The viewers shared in the significant moments in his life and feel they know him as a person in a way that just isn’t the case for any other politician in Northern Ireland. And he lives in South Belfast.

At the last assembly election the UUP scored 9% of the vote with a much lower profile candidate. Nesbitt would only have a slim chance of taking the seat for the UUP at this election, but it would be enough of a chance to be able to claim a realistic hope of winning. He would also have an excellent chance of winning an assembly seat there, while another UUP candidate could likely hold his assembly seat in Strangford.

Crucially it help would unseat Emma Little-Pengelly. The narrative of the election would end up being lost seats for the DUP, who would know the UUP had stitched them up in one of them. The UUP could then point to their withdrawal in North Belfast as being evidence of their willingness to embrace co-operation among unionists.

And there will always be another election on the way. Possibly with new boundaries and new least worst options in new areas. The DUP will probably be looking for another arrangement, but an Ulster Unionist Party who have demonstrated their ability to throw an elbow would be able to cut a better deal that they can this time.

[seachranaidhe]

Nigel Dodds Canvasser's 'smear' criticised. 

Nigel Dodds Canvasser’s ‘smear’ criticised. 

Dale Pankhurst, fellow Orangeman and canvasser for Nigel Dodds in North Belfast. A PROMINENT DUP member who is canvassing for North Belfast candidate Nigel Dodds has been criticised for a tweet described as a “horrible smear” on Sinn Féin candidate John Finucane. Mr Finucane‘s father Pat was murdered by the UFF in front of his young family at their Belfast home in February 1989. His youngest son,…