DUP shifting towards the centre – that U-turn – and what Peter Robinson didn’t say in his speech
Some final thoughts on the DUP conference.
Sure there was all of the buzz and razamataz of flag waving, jeering and clapping as well as the conservative morality. It was the DUP’s best-attended conference. The overflow car park overflowed – a local church that was running a craft fair and wasn’t impressed when their car park filled up with non-shoppers! There were cars parked in the hotel’s tennis courts!
The men were well dressed and mostly wore ties. The younger ones looked more rural rather city slickers. They sat silently during the opening prayer. The bar allegedly only served journalists at lunchtime, other than a few sparkling waters for thirsty delegates.
But the strains of the old DUP saying “no” and “never” have faded away. After a shaky few months in early 2010 when the party wolves seemed to be gnawing at his leg to get him to stand aside (or at least telling the press that they were), he was welcomed on stage like a charismatic preacher at a revival meeting, about to preach the word and heal everyone’s ailments.
Remember the tortuous journey from being anti-agreement to ending up in government with Sinn Fein. From a position of being nervous and thinking twice nay thrice about doing the deal on policing and justice, Peter Robinson marks his period of leadership as one where he is comfortable standing on stage and telling the party that they have to make compromises, that they have to work with Sinn Fein, and that they have to make NI better for all its people.
Do the party members realise quite how far they’ve moved? The platform has shifted significantly. And for 45 minutes from noon, Peter Robinson today shifted them another step away from their old home (which is now occupied by the TUV).
Side note – the TUV issued a statement just before 2pm to show their displeasure about being labelled as “rats” in Sammy Wilson’s speech.
Whilst I didn’t hear it referred to in any of the platform speeches, the double jobbing issue was never far away. The Newsletter ran the story earlier this week, and it came up twice in interviews on the BBC’s Conference programme. Basically, there’s been a pragmatic U-turn on their policy of only allowing Sammy Wilson (and the party leader, if elected as an MP) to sit in both Westminster and Stormont.
This is what the DUP told me in October:
no dup mp permitted to run for council
in relation to sammy wilson, the party leader has asked him to stay on to see through the important budget process he has commenced, but this does not equate to sammy being permitted to hold two mandates indefinitely
longer term plan is for assembly members not to be councillors but will not be possible to implement overnight- important to ensure sufficient level of experience exists within local government- over time that is the objective- speed of change will be influenced by approach we see other parties adopting
Now – because the SDLP have only withdrawn one MLA (Mark Durkan), Sinn Fein have withdrawn none, and Lord Empey is planning to run for the Assembly while sitting in the House of Lords, the DUP don’t want to be the moral leaders. They see opportunities to prop up their vote – perhaps squeezing vulnerable seats like the Sinn Fein one in Lagan Valley – and ring back some of the withdrawn big-hitters on the May Assembly ballot paper.
Technically, the local constituency associations have been running the selection processes. But the central party executive have held back one position in each constituency so they can parachute in a vote winner. One MP I talked to wasn’t massively enthusiastic about returning to the Assembly, but promised that if they did it would be to serve the term until 2015 and not to quickly resign after a few weeks.
Compared to Margaret Ritchie’s performance in the Ramada at the beginning of November, Peter Robinson delivered a solid “presidential” performance today. Confident intonation and only a few jokes not getting the intended laughs. This was a personal Peter Robinson, a man of the people, only ever referring to party colleagues by their first names. And someone secure to mention DUP legacy demons like work starting on “the new Giants Causeway Visitor Centre”.
While he talked about the DUP winning back East Belfast at the next General Election, note that he’s also talked in the last week about retiring at a sensible age. So I’d say that Peter Robinson (62) won’t be running at the next General Election if parliament runs to its full term as the Condems promise.
But what was missing?
None of the speeches I heard on Saturday (or had copies of) mentioned the Presbyterian Mutual Society. For a story that runs like a daily soap in the pages – and often the front page – of the Newsletter, it was a remarkable omission.
Lots of party reps were thanked. But the mention of MEP “Dianne [sic] Dodds” from an earlier draft of the speech was removed.
There was more talk about soldiers and the military than the PSNI or the police reserve.
No mention of unity candidate Rodney Connor who “in less than six weeks Rodney put together a campaign and came within four votes of unseating a sitting MP” in Fermanagh and South Tyrone.
And absolutely no mention of Martin McGuinness, not even of “deputy First Minister”. It was as if he didn’t exist.
Catch other coverage from the DUP Conference through three posts on Ivor’s Hand of History blog.
You say you “oppose” SF in govt, yet you propose a form of coalition that would easily include SF. Hmmmm
Do you think their absence was deliberate, Alan? Is this the first conference Ian P Snr didn’t attend?
David
Is that final sentence actually finished or are you just unaware of how poor your grammar actually is ?
And do please feel free to amuse us further with your serially failed attempts to acquire some minor shareholding in the commodity of decency.
David
LOL, That’s an eventuality we won’t mercifully get to grapple with. The electorate don’t want your poisonous reactionary garbage, that much we do know my old son.
I must say though that I’m still half-impressed that you have the nerve to show your face in public after that shellacking Nolan gave you on the radio pre-election David. Not so gifted at the oul’ sums in school then mate, huh ?
Hi David, I neither a republican nor a nationalist: I consider myself to be apolitical, and I do, very much have a problem with the Ulster Resistance and your apparent moral hypocrisy. Loyalist terrorism is exactly the same as republican terrorism: inexcusable.
And, just incase you did not see my reply to your message earlier and since you have failed to answer, I shall post it again for you to consider…
David, your response to my question is not only disturbing but indicative of regressive and dangerous politics: how can the TUV not be concerned with a ‘shared future’, and remain so dismissive of advancing a ‘shared society’ in a country deeply scarred by decades of social injustice and devastating conflict? You cannot begin to speak of an ‘equal’ Northern Ireland without engendering a ‘shared’ and mutually respectful society: can you explain to me what an ‘equal Northern Ireland’ means, and how this differs from a ‘shared society’.
I would imagine the reason Lord Bannside and his wife were not at the conference was because of their hectic activities with the House of Lords etc. He is not young anymore and that cold would drain anyone!
I am not surprised with Willy Hay not showing, no doubt he was busy doing Speaker stuff but the antics of the DUP horde in the Chamber can only be discribed as childish. The abuse of process must also be embarrassing tto the Speaker when the DUP uses “Petition of Concern” in an unprincipled way to achieve selfish party gain at the expense of the integrity of Stormont itself.
As regards Peter Robinson, he has proved himself a brilliant politician. He has survived a traumatic year both personal & political, he has learned a lesson that he cannot play two masters, the old way and the new way. He had to stop looking over his shoulder at the TUV and stick with the task in hand – making a shared future work.
With the UUP lost at sea, it’s good to see Peter Robinson’s DUP with it’s vision of a strong, progressive self-confident Unionism building a shared Northern Ireland – and an inclusive anti-sectarian education system (it’s nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts nuts to educate NI’s next generation separately from each other.)
A few years ago I wouldn’t have thought I’d say this – but the DUP are showing true leadership for Unionism in helping build a shared society, whereas Tom Elliott is just nowhere and scrabbling around with Jim Allister for the scraps of hardlineness.
As someone who’s supported the UUP for many a year, it’s sad to say, but it may be the DUP who’s carrying the progressive non-sectarian banner forward from now…
David, would voluntary coalition not possibly result in a completely nationalist government? In a hung parliament, which it would be, the party with the largest share of the vote gets the first chance to form a government. In the last two elections that has been Sinn Féin.
SF are most likely to form a rainbow coalition with SDLP and Alliance since they share most in common with them. That would put the DUP in opposition and the TUV might not even get a look in.
Are you not concerned about the risk of most ministries being held by people who are actively against the existence of the state itself and the newly empowered first minister post going to an ex-IRA commander?
Or would you want some kind of mechanism by which the largest Unionist party is first to form the government?
You are right Alan, sorry for diverting the topic of the thread.
I have to say that I was very impressed by Peter Robinson’s speech, which I thought demonstrated a strong, confident, positive and forward looking message, which should be welcomed.
It would appear that Robinson, the ‘eternal pragmatist’ within the Democratic Unionist Party, is indeed endeavouring and, thus far successfully, moving the DUP beyond its traditional areas of concern towards the ‘middle-ground’ of Unionist and local politics.
What I found particularly striking about the DUP conference was not only the intense level of excitement exhibited by the ‘grassroots’ and party representatives but rather the evident and genuine depth of care displayed by many of the delegates towards Robinson, which I had not quite expected.
During the Iris Robinson scandal in January, Suzanne Breen of the Sunday Tribune predicted that Peter Robinson would not survive long within the DUP because she believed that whilst he always had the mind of the DUP, he never had its heart: I think that the warmth extended towards Robinson during the conference demonstrates a real shift of opinion and power within the party insomuch that Robinson is, as Martina Purdy has suggested, no longer a feared leader but rather a loved leader.
Perhaps this is a premature assessment, but there is no doubt that Robinson is a changed man: a much more confident, calmer and likeable personality of whom many have now warmed to both within and beyond the DUP. Certainly, I have been extremely impressed by his performance in recent months both as DUP leader and as the First Minister alongside Martin McGuinness of whom he has evidently worked hard with to develop a positive and constructive relationship for the betterment of everyone in Northern Ireland.
I was greatly encouraged by Peter Robinson’s interview on the Politics Show this morning in which he declared that the DUP is no longer a party of protest; that it is now rapidly moving towards the centre ground of politics in Northern Ireland and evolving beyond Unionism. It is, as he readily admitted, now concerned with matters beyond the mere constitutional issue of Northern Ireland, of which he considers finalised.
The fact that Robinson is now investing significant political capital in middle ground and positive policies should surely encourage and invite new disaffected voters to place there trust in an increasingly moderating party. What I like about this, as it were ‘new’ DUP is the fact that many of my friends, who are nationalists, are now viewing Robinson in a much more favourable light because they believe that he is sincere in power-sharing with the nationalist community and respectful of nationalist concerns.
So yes, I believe that Robinson – perhaps free from the chains of Paisley – is moving the DUP towards a better and more positive position within Northern Irish politics: a move which will surely encourage a diverse range of voters. I have never had a particularly positive view of the DUP prior to 2006 but I have to admit that Robinson’s recent behaviour is causing me to rapidly reassess my view of his party and in particular of his own political leadership.
It was once said that Robinson was a coward because he lacked the conviction to posit a more positive Unionist message, and perhaps because of the near death of his own political career he is finally taking the courageous steps to diversify and develop the party beyond its traditional support bases. I think he deserves enormous credit.
I too was wondering why the Paisley’s were not present for Peter Robinson’s speech: I thought that Paisley SNR was particularly conspicuous by his absence. It has been suggested that there is still some bad vibes between the Paisley’s and Robinson, and that the latter was disappointed in Paisley SNR’s lack of support during the Iris scandal, and the subsequent less than veiled attacks upon his leadership in recent months via the Newsletter. Whether this is true or not, I do not know but irrespective of the Paisley’s, it would appear that Robinson is rapidly becoming his own man and at last escaping Paisley’s shadow.
Lastly, thanks Alan for providing such a in-depth, considered and intelligent assessment of the DUP conference; were you also suprised by the warmth extended to Peter Robinson?
Peter Robinson would have made a great republican !
When suggesting that PR’s conversion to moderation was influenced by how people in EB voted in last election (for Naomi), I did so tentatively. From subsequent comments here I am stronger in this view even if DUP supporters do not wish to acknowledge that PR is only keeping up with the electorate.
I enjoy the terminological inexactitudes being pointed out by Sluggerspawn. I mean, this really is the place to visit if one wishes to engage in refined debate. Apart from the abuse heaped upon unionists who do NOT see any reason to appease the IRA, I see little other reason to visit this site thee days. A cold house for unionists, unless of course they are “progressive” and “embrace shared future idiocy.
Some time ago, on a different topic, I asked what a ‘progressive’ Unionist might be.
Still haven’t found out.
Hey David, just incase you did not see my reply to your message earlier and since you have failed to answer, I shall post it again for you to consider…
David, your response to my question is not only disturbing but indicative of regressive and dangerous politics: how can the TUV not be concerned with a ‘shared future’, and remain so dismissive of advancing a ‘shared society’ in a country deeply scarred by decades of social injustice and devastating conflict? You cannot begin to speak of an ‘equal’ Northern Ireland without engendering a ‘shared’ and mutually respectful society: can you explain to me what an ‘equal Northern Ireland’ means, and how this differs from a ‘shared society’?
I suppose, Thomas, a unionist who has progressive values. That usually means centre left.
lol seems someone threw the toys out of the pram; sluggerites you’re famous in right-world now!
I’d admit there are many smartass commentators here, but I think the description of slugger as a ‘hate-site’ is somewhat unfair…
http://www.atangledweb.org/2010/11/29/greener-than-the-hulk-but-lacking-the-wit/