Minutes after a stunning success in the European election, any ordinary
party would have been lost in a whirlwind of celebration.
But no sooner was the final verse of God Save the Queen over, and the Union
flags put away, than DUP minds fixed on the Westminster election.
In the King's Hall café, the party's leading lights discussed plans to
target North Down and South Belfast. Upstairs, a senior figure stressed the
importance of running the right candidate in South Antrim.
It's that forensic focus and hunger which makes the DUP successful. If the
Ulster Unionists possessed even a fraction of that formula, poor old Jim
Nicholson wouldn't have had to wait until almost dusk to scrape home third.
Denying the DUP's triumph is pointless. It's not just that a candidate who
was hardly Mr Personality, managed to convince one in three voters to
support him.
It's the likelihood that it can only get worse for David Trimble. Forget
about battle-buses. The DUP will soon need its own aeroplane to transport
its team to Westminster. Eleven DUP and no UUP MPs isn't fantasy.
East Antrim has long been in the bag with South Antrim and Upper Bann also
possible. But by outpolling the UUP by two-to-one in leafy North Down and
South Belfast, the DUP now has a real chance in these, especially if - as
rumoured - Alliance contests the former and Diane Dodds carries DUP colours
in the latter.
For too long the UUP has been protected from reality by the political and
media establishment. It needs to face a few home truths. Trimble is
intellectually brilliant. But, politically, he has no street sense.
Ordinary unionists neither trust nor identify with him.
Trimble is a beaten docket. He will never again lead unionism. But even if
he is ousted, it's too late for the UUP. Now Jeffrey Donaldson has gone, it
lacks a credible alternative leader. Sir Reg Empey would bore voters to
death.
UUP criticism of the DUP's plans to restore devolution will fall on deaf
ears. Unionist voters might listen to cries of 'sell-out' if they came from
those with a solid track-record. Bob McCartney's UK Unionist Party could
have been a danger to the DUP had it remained intact.
But no-one will listen to tirades about treachery from those they blame for
the Belfast Agreement. Just like the UUP, the SDLP resembles those on the
Titanic who scoff at the very idea of bringing out the life-boats.
The party is finished. Even John Hume couldn't have held the European seat.
Martin Morgan was a great candidate who emerged from the battle with great
dignity. But he had been kept in the shadows for far too long. Why wasn't
he on the SDLP talks' team years ago?
During the war, the SDLP escaped with being fat and lazy. You knew an
election was approaching when its advice centre in west Belfast opened.
The only reason for voting for the party was that it wasn't the nasty men of
violence. So when sexy, shiny, post-ceasefire Sinn Féin arrived, it cleaned
up.
A symbol of the SDLP's continuing bourgeois ineptitude is its decision to
hold a conference later this year to discuss "party re-structuring".
Undoubtedly a wordy, worthy report will follow.
Let's be truthful about Mark Durkan. He's a clever man, with some great
one-liners, but he's a born back-room boy, not party leader. He doesn't
inspire. Although, as with the UUP, the SDLP has no alternative.
Newry and Armagh will be lost to Sinn Féin at the next election. Foyle
should be safe but Eddie McGrady will have to stand again to stop South Down
falling to St Catriona of Colombia.
Like or loath his politics, Eamonn McCann was one of the most impressive and
principled candidates in the election. Even unionist politicians privately
expressed respect for him. He polled a disappointing 9,268 votes. In the
often lacklustre world of Northern Ireland politics, his is a refreshing
voice.
The same can't be said of the pompous, plastic John Gilliland, standing on
the ludicrous slogan 'Action, not politics'. He might have got away with it
had he looked tougher. But Gilliland is hardly Arnie Schwarzenegger. And
some of us have this quaint little notion that politics is actually what
elections are all about.
