Sydney Elliott: Alliance vote transfers suggest the centre is moving towards nationalism

After the first poll there could be another every seventh year. There were no criteria for the conditions necessary for calling the first poll save that the decision was in the hands of the secretary of state for Northern Ireland who is to call one when it appears likely that a majority of the people would vote in favour of a united Ireland.

With unionist and nationalist identifiers now closely matched in size, speculation turned to Alliance supporters and how they might vote. The party leader, Naomi Long, dismisses the issue as not relevant currently.

The recent rise in the size of the Alliance vote shows that it could be decisive in a future poll. In the 2015 Westminster election and 2016 Stormont election, the party averaged 7.1% of the vote. In the 2019 MEP, Westminster and 2022 Stormont elections the party averaged 16.3% of the vote.

The rise in vote share prompts speculation about the origin of the changes. Was it a new generation of young voters post Good Friday Agreement? Was it older voters, tired of the unionist versus nationalist rhetoric, and switching to Other in the form of Alliance? Whatever the explanation, it was a fact that around 40% of the eligible electorate regularly did not vote in elections and could be decisive in a future referendum or border poll.

The use of a very sophisticated method of election, namely, the Single Transferable Vote method of proportional representation for NI Assembly and NI District Council elections does provide additional information about voter preferences. Party election tactics must be to win as many seats as possible, hence, party identifiers must be persuaded to give early, especially first preferences, to their primary party choice. Analysis distinguishes between instances where a party still has candidates available to receive transfers, described as intermediate transfers, and instances where a party no longer has candidates available to receive transfers, described as terminal transfers. NI parties usually persuade voters to remain with their primary party choice in the range of 70 to 90%. Of more interest is terminal transfers, where voters give preferences to parties closest to their first choice and are then processed according to the rules of the count.

Alliance Party (AP) percentage terminal transfers in 2017, 2019 and 2022 were as follows:

• In the 2017 Stormont election, they were 26.1% to unionists, 31.2% to nationalist/republicans, 12.3% to others, and 29.4 were non transferable.

• In the 2019 district council, the terminal transfers were 23.8% to unionists, 42.0% to nationalist/republicans, 14.1% to others, and 10.3 were non transferable.

• In the 2022 Stormont election, the Alliance terminal transfers were 10.0% to unionists, 58.3% to nationalists/republicans, 8.7% to others, and 22.4% were non transferable.

In summary, Alliance terminal transfers 2017 to 2022 have gone increasingly to SDLP, SF and other republican parties. The difference in preference over unionist parties rose from 5.1% in 2017 to 18.2% in 2019 and 48.3% in 2022. At face value, this indicates that modern Alliance voters are more inclined towards SDLP, SF and other nationalist and republican parties. This trend may be influenced by Alliance seeking to extend outwards from its greater Belfast base to traditionally more nationalist areas where there may be fewer unionist party candidates.

This latter point could be tested by a closer examination of Alliance terminal transfers in the NI Assembly election of 2022. There were eight instances of Alliance terminal transfers in eight of the 18 constituencies: two in Belfast, and the other six in the north, west and south, namely, East Londonderry, Foyle, Fermanagh and South Tyrone, Mid Ulster, West Tyrone and Newry and Armagh.

Seven instances arose from eliminated candidates and one from a surplus, East Belfast. In seven out of the eight instances unionist candidates were available to receive transfers but only 10% of vote values went to unionist candidates. In seven out of the eight instances SDLP, SF or other republican candidates were still in the running and received 58.3% of the vote values distributed.

One question which arises is whether this trend has impacted on the voting intentions of party rivals of Alliance, namely, did it impact on their willingness to give preferences to AP to the same extent as in the past? Terminal transfers from unionist parties to AP showed only a small reduction of 3.5%, from 38.4% in 2017 to 34.9% in 2022. At the same time terminal transfers from SDLP, SF and other republican parties to AP showed a marked increase of 17.2%, from 41.1% in 2017 to 58.3% in 2022.

An insight into AP transfer preferences in next week’s NI District Council elections was revealed in an opinion poll published on May 2. The poll, commissioned from SMR (Social Market Research) by the Irish News/Liverpool University – Institute of Irish Studies used a sample of 1013 and at 95% it had a margin of error of +/-3.1%. It said that 37% of AP voters would give a second preference to GP, 29% to SDLP, 19% to UUP, 8% to SF, 6% to DUP and 2% to TUV. Using the categories unionist, nationalist, centrist and others Alliance preferences went 37% to nationalist parties, 27% to unionist parties and 37% to centrist parties including the GP. The balance of AP preferences remains towards nationalist parties but with a narrower gap than in 2022.

Alliance has been praised for its electoral growth in recent elections. Part of that success was down to the strategy of extending its base beyond the Greater Belfast area, giving nationalist and republican voters a non-unionist party to receive lower preferences. The figures above show that the tactic was successful. In addition, the tactics on the doorstep was to counter opposition with an appeal for lower preferences. The small reduction in unionist terminal transfers to Alliance of 3.5% between 2017 and 2022 was an indication of success.

However, the figures also lead to speculation about the impact in a future assembly election of knowledge that 58.3% of Alliance terminal transfers went to nationalist and republican parties. That figure encompasses lower preferences from SF, SDLP, Others as well as lower preferences from unionist parties, DUP, UUP, TUV and Others. Has AP become a one-way bridge for transfers across the political divide?

What are the implications of this for a future border poll? The leader of the Alliance party, Naomi Long, avoids the question as irrelevant and keeps the emphasis on the cost of living and the absence of a NI Executive. She has said that when the time is right she will give a lead on the issue. This view was repeated by deputy party leader, Stephen Farry, in response to criticism of the party attitude to participation in the Ireland’s Future conference at the end of September. Was the expansion of the party support, away from greater Belfast, and the trend in party terminal transfers an indication that many of its voters have already signalled their direction of travel.

• Dr Sydney Elliott was a senior lecturer in Politics at Queen’s University until retirement in 2009