Letter: Sinn Fein fight tooth and nail for nationalists, but the DUP and UUP lack the same drive

Now that the local election results appear to confirm that Sinn Fein’s vote has increase significantly, while both the Ulster Unionist Party and DUP share of the vote has reduced it is time for unionism to carry out a post mortem. The present situation unionism is in needs analysed and remedial work carried out to ensure we recover from this electoral disaster.

The two main unionist parties have failed to represent grassroots unionists properly for years. In my constituency there was only a 45% turnout resulting in unionism losing a seat to Alliance. When I speak to friends and neighbours there is little or no appetite to vote for poor representation.

When trade union members meet to vote for a shop steward they appoint someone who is going to robustly stand up for their rights and fight for better pay and conditions. The representatives we have are not of the calibre we require, there is too much nepotism and cronyism. Sinn Fein unashamedly fight tooth and nail for the nationalist community, both the UUP and DUP lack any drive in looking after our interests.

There is too much self interest in unionist politics, heads need knocked together and a clear strategy created. Unfortunately the current crop of unionist politicians have been poor to say the least, we need fresh faces and a dynamic grassroots membership of a new unionist party or movement to restore confidence and increase the turnout in future elections. Only radical changes will improve things for the better.

William McFarland, Lisburn