Northern Ireland election predictions

Have spent this weekend (and chunks of the last) tidying up my elections site. Not being on the ground, it’s impossible to have a sense of the likely shift of votes; and opinion polls are notoriously useless. But, on the basis of the twin elections for Westminster and the local councils in 2005, I can say the following:

i) The DUP are likely to keep the three gains made by defection from the UUP after the last Assembly election (two seats in Lagan Valley and one in Fermanagh-South TyroneEast Belfast from PUP leader David Ervine, and in North and South Belfast, from the UUP. They have outside chances of further gains from the UUP in East Londonderry and Mid Ulster, but are vulnerable to Sinn Fein in West Belfast

ii) The Alliance Party has tricky defences in Lagan Valley, South Antrim and Strangford, but I remain optimistic (indeed they ought to have a chance of picking up one of the Nationalist seats in South Belfast).

iii) The fate of independent MLA Kieran Deeny in West Tyrone is an interesting question. In 2003 he won a seat from the SDLP which in my view would otherwise have fallen to Sinn Fein. He put in a storming cross-community perfomance in the 2005 general election, though failed to win. While SF is certain to win two seats, and the Unionists another two, it’s very difficult to read which two out of Deeny, the SDLP, and a third SF candidate will make it.

iv) With total certainty, I can predict that some of the above predictions are wrong.

One thought on “Northern Ireland election predictions

Comments are closed.