Alliance gathered for their annual conference in the Stormont Hotel in East Belfast. 400 delegates heard their leaders pitch for reform of the institutions and the upcoming Westminster elections. I have attended every Alliance conference since 2014 and this is one of the most upbeat and energetic that I have witnessed. The party’s local election saw growth but unlike, Sinn Fein, it was a mixed bag with losses in some places and failure to break through in others.
The Deputy Leader and sitting MP for North Down, Stephen Farry made his pitch for re-election;
Throughout my term I have sought to stand up for North Down and Northern Ireland, and focused on our public finances and maintaining relations with the European Union.
Trust and confidence need to be restored in our politics.
My values, and Alliance’s, are based around equality, fairness and inclusion.
And I have approached my work with commitment, compassion, empathy and humanity.
Whenever the General Election comes, I look forward to an even stronger Alliance Team heading to Westminster.
The party leader, Naomi Long spoke to delegates about the need for reform of the institutions;
We consolidated our proposals for reform into our policy, Sharing Power to Build a Shared Future, in June 2022 and have shared those proposals with two Taoisigh and two Tánaistí and three Prime Ministers and two Secretaries of State for Northern Ireland.
Our proposals for reform are not just consistent with the principles of the Good Friday Agreement – principles of power-sharing, inclusion and respect – but they also acknowledge and address the inherent instability and inequalities of the structures created to implement it.
The enshrine the right of parties to be in government based on the strength of their electoral mandate, however, they remove the right of any one party to deny the people of Northern Ireland a government.
They allow those who wish to get on with the work of government to do so and those who don’t to sit it out if they choose: no-one would or should be excluded, but no-one party would or should be able to exclude everyone else.
Our proposals also ensure that we end reliance on parallel consent votes to measure cross-community consent – ironically, the least cross-community votes of any in the Assembly, in that the votes of genuine cross-community parties count for less than others.
Instead, they would be replaced with weighted majority voting, which would incentivise cooperation in a way that mutually reinforced vetoes have not.
On the upcoming Westminster Election, Long set out her target to retain North Down;
The only thing this morally bankrupt government can do to protect democracy now is to call a General Election. And the sooner the better.
Because conference, we are ready.
Ready for change and ready to bring change.
You have just heard from our Deputy Leader. In the few short minutes available this morning he has reminded us of his breadth of knowledge, his depth of commitment to his constituency, to promoting progressive liberal values in an increasingly illiberal Parliament, to building a shared and inclusive future for everyone.
I have had the pleasure of visiting business, community and voluntary organisations across North Down with Stephen over the last few years and his knowledge of their issues and attention to their concerns is matched only by their respect and appreciation for his advocacy on their behalf.
He has enabled people to live and work in dignity, reuniting them with families stranded across borders and helped many constituents remain in North Down who otherwise would have lost that right.
On the targets for growth;
But that is by no means the ceiling of Alliance’s ambitions for the forthcoming Westminster Election.
Think just how much more we could achieve with an increased Alliance Westminster team, working hard for their constituents.
And we have real opportunities to deliver just that.
Right here in East Belfast, in Lagan Valley and the new South Belfast and mid-Down constituency there are significant opportunities for us to not only maintain Alliance representation at Westminster but to grow it further still.
And that’s not just my opinion – the pleas from the DUP Deputy Leader only yesterday for unionist unity to stave off Alliance growth and the increasingly desperate swipes at Alliance from the SDLP since Kate declared her candidacy are evidence that they believe we can win those seats, too.
However, Alliance fights elections not only to win but to work.
Analysis
Alliance have completed their first set of elections in a growth cycle and this year they are about to embark upon elections where they need to maintain the growth in their support. Going into Westminster, they are focusing on reform as their central message. Vote Alliance and get change in the institutions. Now that they are so firmly in the Executive, this approach contains more risks than it did in previous years.
The party aims to see its Deputy Leader returned to the House of Commons with some friends joining them from nearby constituencies. Alliance go into this election on a high level of support, maintaining that and outsing well-known incumbents in East Belfast, South Belfast and Lagan Valley will not be easy. The party must guard against overshooting the runway and being seen to have peaked should they fail to make any serious inroads.
The delegates in the room, are in good form and energised by recent success. Naomi Long’s remarks to former leader, Sean Neeson remind you about some of the low electoral positions that this party has been in the past. Now they are a central part of our political scene, firmly in third place. The challenge now is whether they will they stay there or produce a convincing second act from the first rendition of the Alliance surge.
David McCann holds a PhD in North-South relations from University of Ulster. You can follow him on twitter @dmcbfs
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