North Down hugs the coast all the way from Holywood on the boundary of East Belfast through Bangor, Groomsport to Donaghadee. In the stretch from Marino to Carnalea lies the richest real estate in Northern Ireland, It’s home to our wealthiest entrepreneurs, businessmen and professionals.
As Gerry Lynch noted back in his exhaustive 2007 profile even the very poorest parts of the constituency, like Kilcooley estate on the edge of Bangor, are relatively well off compared to other poorer parts of Northern Ireland. It’s a dormitory for Belfast with chunks of the A2 clagged up at rush hour.
It has long been NI’s second most Protestant constituency, but between 2001 and 2011 their number dropped from 80.5% to 73.2%, whilst those of no religious background almost doubled to 12.1% of the population. No sudden influx of Catholics, just a major leap in a secular identity.
Election turnouts usually come in towards the lower end, with the EU referendum being a notable exception when it reached 67.3%. Remain won, but perhaps by less than you might expect from such a prosperous place: 52.4% to 47.6%. Perhaps a fair reflection of genuine unionist ambivalence?
Politically, it’s an oddity. There is still no Nationalist representation at any level. Catholics tend to vote Alliance or Green. It has a history of electing politicians from mainstream parties who then either set up their own party (remember the UPUPs?) or like Sylvia Hermon, go independent.
At any rate, they don’t like changing MPs very often. Hermon was only the third MP since the early days of the Troubles in 1970. For those of us who grew up there (if not our parents who had to work in strife riven Belfast) the Troubles were as remote as England at the time.
So what’s at play? Hermon’s decision to step down at the last minute took a lot of people by surprise, not least Colum Eastwood and Michelle O’Neill who both announced that they’d be standing down their candidates (who between them got less than 1000 votes in 2017) in her favour.
I suspect the writing was on the wall from the 2016 Assembly election when the DUP brought home 3 MLAs on 41.7% of the total vote in what was then a six-seat constituency. In the last Westminster election the DUP candidate this time, Alex Easton came within 1200 votes of taking the seat.
No party to sustain here strength at council and Assembly level means the tide has gone out. Easton is now a firm favourite to take the seat. The UUP candidate Alan Chambers has a strong following in the east, but as in Lagan Valley, elsewhere liberal unionists are leaving for the Alliance party.
Which brings to me to an interesting scenario outlined by Richard Hunter. If you look at Nicholas Whyte’s local election extrapolations from May, the Alliance party is now the second strongest council force within the constituency area and only sits behind the DUP by about 4 percentage points.
On the face of it that could make Alliance candidate Stephen Farry more competitive than he looks on the last Westminster election in 2017. Even with the Greens standing down, a viable challenge rests on by handsomely outdoing the UUP (and DUP) on gains from Hermon.
I wouldn’t rule it out by any means, but it seems less likely than the DUP rolling over the line. Yes, it’s Remain majority, but not by much. An outside shot for a surprise on the night. With South Belfast almost certainly in the debit column and North Belfast under threat, the DUP needs this win.
Likely winner: Almost certainly, Alex Easton, but keep a casual eye in the rearview mirror for a sneaky wee Alliance surprise.
Mick is founding editor of Slugger. He has written papers on the impacts of the Internet on politics and the wider media and is a regular guest and speaking events across Ireland, the UK and Europe. Twitter: @MickFealty
Discover more from Slugger O'Toole
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
