by Kevin Meagher
We’ve heard about the Red Wall, the Blue Wall, Scotland and Wales throughout this election campaign, but not so much about Northern Ireland.
Easy to overlook perhaps, but there are 18 parliamentary seats up for grabs and on three occasions over the past 45 years unionists have held the balance of power at Westminster.
Granted, with a Labour landslide incoming we probably don’t need to worry too much about the prospect of Keir Starmer being propped-up by the DUP (although there was a strong possibility of that happening if the numbers had been slightly better for Gordon Brown in 2010).
Still, there are a few interesting twists and turns to watch out for and the result might well have big ramifications for the new government further down the road.
First, there’s the DUP.
Northern Ireland’s preeminent unionist party goes into the election holding eight seats in the House of Commons (one ahead of Sinn Fein). But it’s a record that’s unlikely to be matched this time around.
The latest poll has them 10 points down on their 2019 share of the vote. There is also the elephant in the room in the shape of their former leader, Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, who is facing 18 charges in relation to historical sexual offences.
The party’s interim leader, Gavin Robinson, is the current MP for East Belfast. He faces a stiff challenge from Alliance. Their candidate, Naomi Long, formerly held the seat beating the DUP’s then-leader, Peter Robinson, back in 2010. Is history going to repeat itself?
Like the Tories, the DUP faces a challenger to their right splitting their vote in the shape of Traditional Unionist Voice. An undiluted, full-fat Paisleyite rump that makes the DUP sound like the Liberal Democrats. They are part of an alliance with Reform UK, (although Nigel Farage has personally endorsed the DUP’s Ian Paisley and Sammy Wilson).
But the DUP’s real threat comes from the resurgent Ulster Unionists and Alliance. Both parties may take seats from the DUP. A worst-case scenario has them losing half their current tally.
