Precisely – you need to learn from your mistakes. That’s why the party is now on 5-6% and not 2-3%, but it does mean we have to think about how we approach a Westminster election in which, even when we were at a higher level still, we have never won a seat.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/8092235.stm

If he is successful, would there be any harm in splintering the nationalist vote by introducing the southern parties to the north?

I imagine they would have some difficulty sitting in the UK parliament, but perhaps that could be done under an SDLP banner (FF-SDLP, FG-SDLP, Lab-SDLP)?

“Shinners are stealing our clothes”

Well there you go Danny

But the most telling is

“Durkan says….” “…people wont listen”

alot of people walked away from the SDLP during their ‘post nationalist’ flip flopping

To be honest the party was John Hume, and I think thats evident

A little better? Jesus H Christ, people talk about SF spin, have you forgotten West Tyrone already? 3 candidates, 1 quota, 0 seats. That one should leave any self respecting SDLP member with a redner for long, long time to come

Well then you must be very selective with your choice of statistics. Why not use the 2007 assembly elections statistics when the SDLP outpolled the UUP in 1st preference votes? Hardly a disaster for nationalism now. If the SDLP had played their vote management game a bit better then they could have had an extra assembly seat or two and thus a second ministry.

You are not seriously comparing anything with the UUP of 2007 as some kind of victory, are you? Good grief.

And yes, if the SDLP weren’t so bloody incompetent Nationalism could have had another seat, possibly two. Which probably remains true if they can get their vote out

“You are perfectly free to disagree. I simply say it like I see it. I also have done enough Maths in my time to know what is and is not statistically worth mentioning”.

Well then you must be very selective with your choice of statistics. Why not use the 2007 assembly elections statistics when the SDLP outpolled the UUP in 1st preference votes? Hardly a disaster for nationalism now. If the SDLP had played their vote management game a bit better then they could have had an extra assembly seat or two and thus a second ministry.

IJP

“There’s nothing so stupid as to do the same thing to get the same results when the results aren’t very good”.

Well I would suppose your party has a particular expertise in that area

It strikes me some of SF’s problems in the South are similar to the SDLP’s in the North.

Undoubtedly. The context is somewhat different though; the SDLP are the former frontrunners and could have legitimate ambitions to get it back. SF are coming form 0 in the South and won’t be the main party in a coalition, at least not in my lifetime a least. So while they need ot answer many of the same questions, they have to set out their stall a bit differently I think.

Also: SF just didn’t raise expectations. They didn’t turn up the temperature on the election at all. They knew they were getting the seat, had a reasonable chance at topping the poll, why bother when there are tougher battles elsewhere? It’s a mature response that maybe gives some indication they’ve learnt from their experience in the South.

So you’ve peaked then ? I’ll stop ..

.. agree it’s not really appropriate to read much into a European election. Let’s see how we do at Westminster.

Kensei makes the legitimate point that this hardly marks a disaster for SF – and, at least, they didn’t make the mistake of raising expectations. Flat lines can be ok.

Objectively it does strike me, however, that SF has to do something else to stand out from the crowd as the real opposition to the FF/Green calamity government.

You make a lot of points any serious political party should take on board.

There’s nothing so stupid as to do the same thing to get the same results when the results aren’t very good.

Certainly our tallies seemed to put SF narrowly ahead in Foyle, but two key points here:
1. It was very hard to see the ballots properly; and
2. Durkan, in an X-vote election, would “borrow” some Unionist votes – enough, I suspect, to see him home.

oneill

That’s a highly relevant question. Whatever anyone thinks of Alliance’s “£1 bn wasted on segregation” or the Ulster Unionists’ “UCU project”, they do at least serve to answer the question “What is your party for?”

In my opinion, the SDLP does genuinely need to answer that question, and fast. Its result proves there is still hope, but there’s nothing that bores the activists more than ongoing stagnation.

Kensei > despite your protests, on the contrary, it seems that you are pushing a wholly political agenda.

You are perfectly free to disagree. I simply say it like I see it. I also have done enough Maths in my time to know what is and is not statistically worth mentioning.

CS

I’m not trying to push any particular agenda,

but the fact is that SF’s vote decreased, however slightly.

I agree that it would be wrong to reach any real conclusions, hence the use of the word may in reference to the potential for decline. And frankly, the deputy leader losing the party’s only seat in what should be a core constituency should be causing alarm bells to ring. You can’t say this is anything other than a serious setback to the notion of SF as an all-Ireland party, and this misdirection about the Stoops looks like an attempt to distract people from that.

There are big problems in Dublin some of which were inevitable, I think. But they walked in with 54 council seats and walked out with 53, when you take out the defection. The PDs had 25 in 1999. The Greens, currently in government have 3. Yes, that is 3. SF have issues, but they are likely to be about for quite sometime, maybe a bit bigger, maybe a bit smaller based on circumstance. Small parties can implode in the South. I can’t see how that is projected from a flat line, other than wishful thinking.

Bit highly strung there

If I hear any more bollocks on the inevitability of anything on this site, I think my head will explode.

Is its relationships with other political parties in the south an issue?

Looks like the word ‘toilet roll’ scrawled on the edge of the page to me.

As for the mysterious ‘hotel room for two’, just go and look at the PDF allowance claim for July 2005. The claim submitted by Mark Durkan to the Parliamentary Fees Office was for £945.74, and it was part-supported by an invoice from Mark submitted – and marked “Adults – 2″ – for full bed and breakfast, totalling £352.00 for one double room for two nights. The Fees Office denied the full payment for the hotel bill and would only pay for one person, thereby deducting £176.00 from the claim made by Mark and giving him a total of £769.74.

So never mind how Mark tried to explain it all away with his oh-so-innocent blubbing about him having notified the Fees Office of a silly-billy mistake – which is a story that quite literally doesn’t add up.

(Even if he had done, Mark still walked away with £58,000 of tax-payers money – on top of everything else Big Bird mentioned.)

Just look at the facts folks. D’arcy’s clearly been the ‘twitter’ on this occasion.

Big Bird got it right with the facts, and right about the questions. Why hasn’t Mark been hounded for some of his infamously not-so-straight answers? Then again, has anyone got the bloody energy to listen and work out what he’s actually trying to say?

I’m not trying to push any particular agenda, but the fact is that SF’s vote decreased, however slightly. I agree that it would be wrong to reach any real conclusions, hence the use of the word may in reference to the potential for decline. And frankly, the deputy leader losing the party’s only seat in what should be a core constituency should be causing alarm bells to ring. You can’t say this is anything other than a serious setback to the notion of SF as an all-Ireland party, and this misdirection about the Stoops looks like an attempt to distract people from that.

That does not on any planet translate into “long slow decline”. And long is a long time in politics; presumably there is enough time to turn it about. This is wishful thinking and fantasy. Come back when you have some actual proper evidence.

Bit highly strung there.