That is a lie, an absolute unmitigated lie ... a lie from hell," Peter Robinson
seethed, after Ulster Unionist party (UUP) leader Tom Elliott accused him during a
televised debate of saying a Sinn Féin minister was "great". It was the highlight of
the Stormont election campaign so far, and the Elliott's glee at riling the
Democratic Unionist party (DUP) leader was plain to see, as he jigged around his
lectern, clutching his notes.
In fact Robinson had said in an earlier interview that Caitriona Ruane, the north's
Sinn Féin education minister, had shown budgetary discipline. Not that she was
"great". This weekend the DUP said Robinson was consulting his lawyers after Elliott
refused to withdraw his claim. The UUP leader seemed to be trying out his legal
defence, saying "if you praise a minister you are putting them on a pedestal, giving
them approval and acclaim, which is how the dictionary defines 'great'."
Elliott is probably relieved that the media spotlight has moved away from the series
of political mishaps that have bedevilled his party's campaign. At the last sitting
of the assembly before the election, Michael McGimpsey, the UUP health minister,
halted plans to build a radiotherapy unit at Altnagelvin hospital in Derry. This
caused immediate uproar and the deputy chair of the UUP, Terry Wright, who is from
Derry, said his position had become "untenable" and resigned.
Next day Danny Kennedy, the UUP's employment and learning minister, sacked Brian
Crowe, an adviser. Crowe had been boasting in online chatrooms about receiving
sexual favours from female lobbyists in return for providing access to Kennedy. He
later apologised for sending "inappropriate photographs" to a woman on an internet
chatroom, said he had betrayed Kennedy's trust, apologised for any hurt caused and
characterised his online boasts as "fantasy chat".
Elliott became embroiled in an internal party row after floating the idea of a deal
with the DUP to prevent Martin McGuinness becoming first minister if Sinn Féin
emerged from the election as the largest party. Senior party members squabbled on
radio about the rights and wrongs of this hypothetical situation, forcing Elliott to
call a meeting to calm them down.
But these are all trivial disputes compared to the huge political and sectarian rows
that dominated previous campaigns in Northern Ireland. The political temperature
dropped considerably on April 6, when 218 assembly candidates handed in their
nomination papers. It was also the day of Ronan Kerr's funeral in Tyrone.
The 25-year-old police officer had been murdered in Omagh the previous Saturday by
dissident republicans using an under-car booby trap. In an unprecedented show of
political unity, among the mourners were Robinson and McGuinness, the first and
deputy first ministers, the taoiseach Enda Kenny and Matt Baggott, the PSNI chief
constable.
If dissident republicans had hoped to put security on to the electoral agenda, they
would have been thwarted by this image of Robinson, attending his first Catholic
funeral service, and McGuinness standing shoulder to shoulder in mourning.
"You will not destroy the good working relationship between Peter Robinson and me,"
McGuinness warned dissidents.
IN the absence of contentious issues, the main problem facing political parties is
apathy, and it will be a challenge to get their voters out on Thursday. Ten days ago
200,000 UTV viewers switched off when the televised leaders' debate followed
Coronation Street.
The average audience for the programme was 91,000, or less than one in six of those
watching television that night.
The BBC has relegated its leaders' debate this Tuesday to an off-peak slot between
10.40pm and midnight.
Jim Allister, the leader of Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) and a candidate for
North Antrim, got first-hand experience of voter apathy in Portglenone last week,
with nobody answering their doors even though there were cars in the driveways.
Eventually one man provided the explanation, observing that Allister was obviously
not a football supporter. When Allister asked him how he knew, the man replied:
"Because Barcelona and Real Madrid are about to kick off."
The battle between the TUV and the DUP is one of the sharper contests within the
election. TUV wants a voluntary coalition created in Stormont and Allister, a former
senior DUP minister, has been a relentless critic of power-sharing with Sinn Féin.
He is expected to win a seat in North Antrim where, for the first time in four
decades, the name Paisley is not on the ballot paper. In last year's Westminster
election, Allister finished second to Ian Paisley Jr, polling 7,000 votes, and that
level of support would be enough to secure a seat in the assembly. The main issues
raised on the doorstep are, he admits, health and education, not Sinn Féin in
government.
Education is indeed one of the few contentious topics. It featured in a radio debate
chaired last week by the BBC's Stephen Nolan which is due to be broadcast tomorrow.
Ruane, the education minister, declined an invitation to attend. Her place was taken
by John O'Dowd, a party colleague who often acts as Sinn Féin's trouble shooter.
Much of the debate focused on Ruane's alleged failure to agree a replacement for the
11-plus, producing an anarchic situation in which as many as five privatised tests
are used by grammar schools. There were hoots of laughter from the audience when
Nolan mockingly suggested that "the education minister's done really well, then".
There appears to be growing support for religiously integrated education, a cause
now espoused by the DUP. Steven Agnew of the Green party won applause at the debate
when he pointed out that, growing up on a Protestant estate, he "didn't knowingly
meet a Catholic until I was 18".
Nolan asked each party if they would pick the education department when d'Hondt —
the mathematical formula used to allocate ministerial positions in the assembly – is
run. Storey said the DUP would pick it after the first-minister position, and after
the finance department. "In other words," interjected Allister, "vote DUP and put
Sinn Féin back into education." At that point two young men walked out, muttering
that the debate was a farce.
Despite voter apathy, and criticism of the effectiveness of ministers such as Ruane,
there is continued enthusiasm for power-sharing as an alternative to violence.
Sinn Féin and the DUP, once the most confrontational of parties, have succeeded in
tapping into this yearning for peace. McGuinness made this pitch at a party press
conference in Belfast, saying: "The people who are providing stability for the
future ... are ourselves and the leadership of the DUP." He claimed that voters "see
a more positive future with Peter Robinson and I working together than they would
with Margaret Ritchie and, God forbid, Tom Elliott".
Earlier, McGuinness had fielded questions from listeners on Talkback, a BBC show.
After the customary volley of questions about his IRA past, he got the step change
he had been hoping for when "a Protestant lady in Larne" congratulated the former
IRA commander on doing "a wonderful job" in Stormont. She had been in an Orange band
as a teenager, the Larne woman revealed. "I would vote for Sinn Féin, yes, because I
think they are really doing well," she said. "And as I say, Gerry Adams and Martin
McGuinness, them men's [sic] trying their best."
A clearly delighted McGuinness told her what she had said "represents the new mood
of where we're going in the future. I think that you and I, along with Peter
Robinson and indeed many others, are the people who are making a difference."
There are 17 candidates in the cockpit constituency of East Belfast, including
Robinson; Brian Ervine, leader of the Progressive Unionist party (PUP),
traditionally linked to the UVF; and Dawn Purvis, who is running as an independent
after leaving the PUP in protest at continuing UVF violence. This is the
constituency that provided the big upset of last year's Westminster election when
Naomi Long of the Alliance party defeated Robinson and took his seat, more than
doubling her party's vote from 2007.
Robinson had been the East Belfast MP since 1979 and defended the seat six times.
The unexpected defeat was his darkest hour, closely following the Iris Robinson
affair and the controversy over MPs' expenses. The shock is widely credited with
encouraging him to move the DUP towards the centre and to improve his relationship
with McGuinness, who had supported him through the Irisgate crisis. In the final
stages of the election the DUP leader needs to play down the oldpals' act with Sinn
Féin in order to keep hardline unionist voters onside.
In one interview Robinson revealed that he had invited ministers in the Stormont
executive to make a contribution towards a wedding present for Prince William and
Catherine Middleton "out of our own funds", as he didn't want to put "any burden on
the public purse". Asked if McGuinness chipped in, he snorted "you can make your own
guess", and again warned of the danger of the Derry MP becoming Northern Ireland's
first minister.
McGuinness, though, resolutely refuses to play bogeyman to help out the DUP. Last
week he repeatedly wished the new royal couple "every happiness". Asked to nominate
his favourite politician outside of Sinn Féin, McGuinness didn't choose anyone from
the SDLP but instead went for Purvis, because of her work in working-class
communities.
As a member of her campaign team said, that could be a double-edged sword. This is
still Northern Ireland, after all.
