Northern Ireland Votes: North Belfast

Belfast is, roughly speaking, divided along an East/West line, with Protestants/Unionists in the East, and Catholics/Nationalists in the West. As such, that means North Belfast is itself extremely divided, and in some ways the constituency is Belfast writ large. A kaleidoscope of different areas, side by side lives rich and poor, Catholic and Protestant. It also takes in some areas of heavily Protestant Antrim. About 40-5% can be described as Catholic, as opposed to about 50% Protestant. It has historically been healthy DUP territory and it is the Westminster seat of Nigel Dodds, the DUP deputy leader. The result from the 2010 election is below:

Candidate	Party	Vote	Change
Nigel Dodds	DUP	40.0%	-2.9%
Gerry Kelly	Sinn Fein	34.0%	+7.1%
Alban Maginness	SDLP	12.3%	-4.5%
Fred Cobain	UUP/Con	7.7%	-1.8%
William Webb	Alliance	4.9%	+2.0%
Martin McAuley	Independent	1.1%	+1.1%

Nigel Dodds was re-elected with a slightly diminished majority. This may perhaps be a result of his expenses, which were the worst in Northern Ireland, and 13^th highest in all of the UK. This may also explain the slightly diminished turnout (only 56.5%). Sinn Fein had made the seat a key target in 2010, and to some extent this may explain the fall in the SDLP and UUP votes as Nationalists and Unionists may have tactically voted. While the 2001 census shows a larger Protestant population, the 2010 voting figures show an interesting parity, with the two larger Unionist parties getting 47.7% of the vote together, and the two Nationalist parties getting 46.3%, it’s always possible that there may have been a demographic shift in the preceding 10 years. Unfortunately for Sinn Fein, the SDLP vote here is stronger than the UUP vote, so the seeming parity of the two blocs allows a DUP victory. So the 2007 result:

MLA	Party	First Pref	Round Elected
Nigel Dodds	DUP	23.5%	1
Gerry Kelly	Sinn Fein	18.2%	1
Carál Ní Chuilín	Sinn Fein	12.4%	3
Fred Cobain	UUP	8.4%	9
Nelson McCausland	DUP	8.3%	9
Alban Maginness	SDLP	7.4%	9
William Humphrey	DUP	N/A	N/A

Best Losers	Party	First Pref	Round Eliminated
Pat Convery	SDLP	6.3%	8
William Humphrey	DUP	5.6%	9
Raymond McCord	Independent	4.4%	8

Overall Result

Party	Vote	Seats
DUP	37.4%	2
Sinn Fein	30.6%	2
SDLP	13.7%	1
UUP	8.4%	1
Green Party	2.0%	0
Alliance	1.6%	0

The Incumbents

Nigel Dodds (DUP) stood down in 2010, subsequent to his re-election to the Commons. He was replaced by William Humphrey the third placed, and subsequently eliminated, DUP candidate from 2007. A local councillor and former High Sheriff of Belfast, Humphrey stood for Westminster in West Belfast last year, and is a member of the DUP party executive. He is also a noted community activist, involved in the greater Shankill taskforce (this constituency covers part of the notorious Shankill Road) and other community groups. He is also a senior Orangeman and was recently Deputy Lord Mayor. Despite having been co-opted into the seat the DUP vote here should be more than enough to hold both their current seats, so Humphrey should be safe.

Gerry Kelly (Sinn Fein) has a biography that reads like a history of the Irish Republican movement. Born on the famous Falls Road in a family with eleven siblings Kelly volunteered for the IRA, and was found guilty of various charges relating to a to an attempted bombing of the Old Bailey when he was 19. Kelly was then involved in hunger strikes and the Maze Prison escape the biggest prison escape in British history. He was then on the run for three years before being captured in the Netherlands. Upon leaving prison, legally this time, Kelly became actively involved in Sinn Fein and in secret, eventually open, talks with the British government, helping to lay the groundwork for the Good Friday Agreement. He has been a MLA for the constituency since 1998, is the party’s spokesman on policing and justice and the Sinn Fein junior minister in the office of the first and deputy first minister. As a prominent Sinn Fein MLA with a solid base of support Kelly is, I feel, perfectly safe assuming he runs again.

Sinn Fein does not have just one, but two former prisoners in North Belfast as Carál Ní Chuilín was arrested in 1989 on explosives charges and served four years of an eight year sentence. Like Kelly she enjoys a healthy bedrock of support. Her 2007 score was not quite enough to be elected in the first round, but the moment Kelly’s surplus was transferred in she went. Carál can therefore count itself as safe, and I would expect Sinn Fein to run a third candidate here in May, though I find it difficult to see such a candidate actually being elected.

Fred Cobain (UUP) is the sole UUP MLA for the seat. A MLA for the seat since 1998, Cobain is the UUP Chief Whip. Slightly uniquely for the UUP Cobain is a trade unionist and a former member of the bi-communal Northern Ireland Labour Party and he is generally considered to be left-leaning in his views, and a ‘civic unionist’ of more than a generation ago. As such Cobain represents a left-leaning streak in a party usually considered right-of-centre, which once again goes to show how irrelevant labels of left and right can be when applied to Northern Irish politics sometimes. Cobain is in serious danger here, holding just 8.4% of the vote in 2007 and an even smaller 7.7% at the general election. Yet he has pretty much always been in danger here. The UUP got only 10.9% here in 1998, and 9.4% in 2003. As such the UUP vote here, while falling, has demonstrated remarkable resilience in this constituency when compared to the rest of Northern Ireland where, in the same period, it was fallen from 24.2% to 14.9%. This may demonstrate some particular local popularity on the part of Fred himself. That said, his vote has fallen and he has only ever been elected on transfers. Part of Cobain’s resilience may be explained by the fact that there was, until recently, a fair PUP vote here and the left-leaning Unionist vote may have defected to him. A continued UUP slide in the constituency will likely be just be enough to unseat him.

Nelson McCausland (DUP) is the second DUP MLA for this constituency is the Minister for Culture, Arts and Leisure in the Northern Irish Executive. A former member of the UUP McCausland defected to the DUP in 2001 and has been there ever since. He has been a MLA since 2003 and has twice been suspended for ‘unparliamentary language’ due to accusing Gerry Adams of being a member of the IRA. McCausland hit the headlines in May 2010 when he sent a letter to the Ulster Museam asking that it display Creationist material. With Dodds having left the Assembly and the strong DUP vote in this divided constituency McCausland can count himself as safe.

Alban Maginness (SDLP) is a bit of a SDLP veteran, he marched in the Bloody Sunday protests and then joined the SDLP soon after. He was elected to the Belfast City Council in 1985 and in 1997 became the first Nationalist Lord Mayor. Maginness has held his seat since 1998 and was known for his trademark moustache, which he had shaved off for Children in Need 2008. He stood as the SDLP candidate for the European parliament in 2009, alas coming fourth (Northern Ireland elects 3 MEPs). He was also the SDLP’s candidate for Justice Minister when the position was created and while technically the ministry should have gone to him but a deal was hatched so that the Alliance Party got it instead. While Maginness was elected in the last round and on only 7.4% of the vote, there was a second SDLP candidate in the constituency, Pat Convery (more on him later). The full SDLP vote is not quite enough to reach quota in this seat, but it’s almost there, so they should be able to hold a seat on transfers. Maginness should be fine, with one proviso (which we’ll talk about soon).

The Challengers

I’d say one seat is really under threat here, and that is Fred Cobain’s seat and I’ve outlined much of that above. If the UUP do lose this seat it is almost certain to go to the DUP. The Alliance score of 4.9% in 2010 (a gain of two points), is impressive and with a good candidate, and a quality campaign with a fair wind from decent transfers they may be able to pull off a shock win, but this is incredibly unlikely in my view. The Nationalist vote would have to climb substantially from their 2007 and 2010 results to be likely to win the seat.

The SDLP is, oddly, running two candidates here. I say oddly because on the party’s recent performance there’s only just enough support for one seat. This seems to be a function of having two fairly heavy hitters in the constituency, the previously mentioned Alban Maginness, and Pat Convery. Convery stood in this constituency in 2007 and was the ‘best loser’, only 1.1% behind Maginness. He is also the current Lord Mayor of Belfast. Therefore there is an interesting intra-party contest here where two SDLP candidates battle it for what will, likely, be only one seat.