Election result 'a boost for the UUP-Tory link'
WHEN the DUP surged ahead of the Ulster Unionists as the largest unionist party, many thought that the UUP would never again regain its lost position.
However, following last week's dramatic European election results, leader Sir Reg Empey is confident that his party is bouncing back for the next Westminster election.
Sir Reg believes that the European election was a "big test" of the new link with the Conservatives and says that the fact it yielded the first upturn in the party's fortunes for 10 years had enthused party members.
Sitting in his east Belfast office, he stresses that lessons have been learned from the first joint campaign between the two parties and that some things will be done "differently and better" in future campaigns.
Senior UUP figures held a brief gathering after the count which Sir Reg says was "very enthusiastic" and he says that personally it was a "very significant" election for him as leader.
"There's much more bounce in the party – if you take it from my personal point of view, I've been doing this job for four years; I've done the reforms; we have made big strides to straighten ourselves out financially when we are the only major party in Northern Ireland that doesn't get a penny from the Government and this is now the second election I've fought."
Sir Reg is justifiably pleased with the outcome of the European election, where, he says, his party fractionally improved its share of the vote in a close three-way unionist fight for seats.
"In nine or ten seats we are either ahead of the DUP or equal with them and the implications for that clearly are that there is no constituency left in Northern Ireland which is a safe DUP constituency."
Sir Reg says that North Belfast and Foyle were two of the seats that the DUP were still in the lead but that his party had re-discovered its traditional rural voting base while the Tory link had brought it new results in the greater Belfast area.
"When you consider the scepticism that people had for what we were doing – I think that one newspaper, not yours, said that we had been derided for it – I think we have proved that we do represent a significant view of unionism and this election has turned the DUP into the meat in the sandwich.
"They are now betwixt and between. We have distinctive position; a unique product to offer the community at the next General Election and the DUP are going to have to go introspective and decide which direction to take."
The veteran east Belfast politician says that the election had "a huge impact" on the party's morale.
"It's the first election for many years where we've really been seen to come up because we've been subject to a downward trajectory really for 10 years.
"No matter how you look at last week, the fact that Jim was standing on the platform with 132,000 votes in his bag and Diane was there not getting the quota was a huge humiliation for her.
"My own personal opinion is that she was used. She was used because of her name – they tried to do the same in the European election as they did in the Fermanagh by-election by bringing in a big name to try and hold onto the seat."
Last month Conservative leader David Cameron told the News Letter that there was no way the Conservatives and Unionists would enter into electoral pacts with the DUP to not stand in certain constituencies.
Asked if there are any circumstances under which his party would stand aside in the General Election, Sir Reg said that he "would not be rushing into anything".
"We are going to do a detailed analysis of this vote but the one positive thing I would say is that, although it was very marginal, despite the low turnout the pro-union share of the vote actually did go up.
"I'm going to sit back, look at it and take stock across the board. We are fully aware that the whole dynamics have changed in the last week or so, however, we are actually trying to move away from this purely sectarian headcount stuff because we believe there are lots of people out there who are prepared to vote for a pro-union party.
"We have to grow the number of people in Northern Ireland who vote for the union and you can't simply confine your marketing to people of a particular religion.
"I believe that there is a large swathe of people out there who potentially could be persuaded to vote for the union so we are going to have to look very carefully at that over the next couple of months and I'm not going to charge into anything.
"We want to offer our vision of the future to everybody and I am not convinced that simply by trying to suppress things in a particular constituency - for perfectly understandable reasons - that that necessarily adds to the total number of people who vote for the union.
"We are not convinced that by doing these sort of deals that it necessarily protects the pro-union position but I'm going to analyse it, think about it and take stock over the next period of time.
"I'm not in any way moving away from the position that has been stated (by David Cameron)...I think that Allister did bring out a vote that would have otherwise stayed in the house and possibly the second pro-union seat could well have been lost had that not happened."
Sir Reg also revealed that his party was asked several weeks ago to draft the Tory General Election manifesto for Northern Ireland, something he said was an unprecedented input to Government policy from an Ulster party.
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Tuesday 29 May 2012
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