It’s Not About The Protocol, Stupid!

By AM Saturday, September 18, 2021

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S.J. Wilson ✒ Back in 1992, James Carville, who was Special Advisor to Presidential candidate Bill Clinton, (the Americans call them Aids), was tasked with creating the potential strapline slogans for the campaign, and coined the neologism that would become a phrasal template: “It’s the Economy, stupid”.

Now my interpretation that Sir Jeffery Donaldson’s threat to collapse the N Ireland Assembly “it’s not about the Protocol, stupid” will never become a snowclone classic in the Carville genre, but it will hopefully alert the readers to what can be discerned as a DUP response to their slump in opinion poll support from a buoyant 23% to the current 13%, reducing them potentially to the minority or fringe unionist party behind the more civic liberal UUP and harder line (Old Paisley) TUV.

Of course, opinion polls are seldom re-enacted at the ballot box, but two elements rattled the new DUP – third one this year – leader. First, a 10% drop goes way beyond opinion poll inaccuracy, and secondly, it was compounded by mounting anecdotal evidence from the constituencies.

The latter was best illustrated by the fact that South Antrim TUV Constituency Branch could host their annual barbecue in the grounds of Burnside Orange Hall with Jim Allister and Baroness Hoey as “after burger” speakers. Apart from the fact that previously the branch could have been accommodated in a phone box, the Burnside hosts have a reputation for collective high energy and opinion making in the Protestant plebian community. Small wonder Paul Girvan’s mobile was red hot.

The reasons for the decline in DUP popularity are not monocausal. It began with Peter Robinson’s defeat in East Belfast in 2010. Robinson (a pertinent footnote should ask why he has not been elevated to the House of Lords?), endorsed the DUP’s “cunning plan” to recover the prestigious seat. Sufficient to say the plan aimed at discrediting the unionist credentials of the Alliance Party, but incurred the unfortunate corollary of the flag protest that left many young loyalists with a criminal record for protest and disorder. But it worked. Gavin Robinson – he made it very clear he was no relation - recovered the seat. Sometimes in pursuit of real politick Northern Irish style a party can - once in a while - ride the tiger.

The DUP have been in power since 2008. There is a feeling that amongst the unionist demographic that such longevity can fester arrogance and even corruption. The party appeared to be Teflon proof against the allegations of Red Sky and Nama misdoings, but the Renewable Heating Incentive scandal shook it to the core.

Ulster Protestants have always subscribed to the ethics of hard work, fair play and above all, honesty. We can recall how Harold Wilson’s jibe about being “spongers”, effectively empowered the 1974 UWC strike. For years they had thrown stones that Charlie Haughey’s Free State and its brown paper envelopes. Now they had to recognise that their own political establishment was built of glass.

These factors, and the weak style of Foster’s leadership prompted a harkening back to the good old days when the party could claim could to a righteous people, blessed by God and a string of election victories celebrated with a lusty rendition of Psalm 100. For Edwin Poots it was not political opportunity. It was a spiritual calling.

The ensuing leadership battle revealed the deep tactical dichotomy that has rent the DUP asunder. Around the Poots camp are those who believe that their Reformed fundamentalist beliefs should shape their political policies and that they should legislate their brand of morality of everyone.

The Donaldson camp takes a slightly more liberal view: that whilst the majority of these beliefs can be held at personal level, the reality is that the majority of the unionist electorate perceive themselves as “cultural Protestants.” God fearing Ulster has, post-Troubles succumbed to the secularisation paradigm. Indeed, I would argue that the high levels of church attendance/religion practice during the Troubles was not primarily testimony to faith but rather, a form of political expression. (Wilson, 2009).

To the voters who normally support the DUP, this very public schism was accentuated by Donaldson’s initial – howbeit guarded – acceptance of the Northern Ireland Protocol. This gave Jim Allister space to attack it as a major threat to the Union, and for Doug Beattie to construct a protocol pragmatism that explores agreed innovative solutions. This qualified position probably chimes with the bulk of moderate unionist electorate, and puts the UUP in a good position in its contest with Alliance whose Europhilia looks increasingly naïve. (Emerson, 2021). Hell, it will even attract Catholics who are unionist with a small pragmatic “u”!

So, when the opinion polls forecast a DUP disaster, the party backroom boys looked for a tiger with a potential saddle. They found it in constructing a last ditch stand against the Protocol.

Thus, Sir Jeffrey’s speech on the Protocol had as its Primary Target Audience (PTA), not the UK and Irish governments or even the EU negotiators. No, it was unionism, loyalism, the Orange Order, the Loyalist Community Council (which has representation from elements of the paramilitary groupings who refuse to leave the stage), and one emerging key player, the younger loyalist band demographic who have provided the boots on the ground behind a series of anti-protocol protests over the past few months. (Kane, 2021).

With their fundraising parade season over, this demographic is vulnerable to dog whistle politics and radicalisation as was demonstrated a decade ago in the flags protest when they were sacrificed as water cannon fodder. (Glendinning & Wilson, 2014).

Donaldson’s prime mission now is to ride the Protocol tiger, save the DUP and restore it to the top dog position within unionism. His personal views on the Protocol matter less than the need to tap into the unsettled voter bases that have been nudging towards Jim Allister’s TUV; a party which opposes GFA power sharing and is happy to see the collapse of the Assembly as acceptable collateral damage in the campaign to dump the Protocol. (Kane, ibid).

If Donaldson can use the tiger to round up that scattered unionist flock, herd them away from the TUV pen and scare the older more traditional base of the UUP the gamble will have paid off. However, this unsettled voter base has now been exposed to the broader platform of TUV manifesto dogma; total opposition to the Achtna Gaeilge and the refusal to nominate a Deputy First minister should Sinn Fein secure the primary post. Pulling down the Executive is a way for the DUP to avoid taking a more moderate stance on these contentions issues and thus check further TUV bound slippage. (Feeney, 2021).

One thing we can say. Only uncertainty about the Protocol and being able to weaponize it keeps the iron hot for the DUP. A resolution based on the Shirlow-Sheridan initiative removes the perceived threat and kills the tiger.

Finally, there is a question of collusion by HMG in the DUP threat. Will Frost and Co present the collapse or even imminent collapse of the Assembly as a clear and present danger to the Peace Process and the Good Friday Agreement? Will they use it as an argument for a legitimate triggering of Article 16? And all at a time when the EU is growing visibly weary of the Protocol squabble. As they say in Tyrone, “it's a breaking ball, but for it to end in a goal it will needs one hell of a Hail Mary.”


Bibliography

The Death Of God In Ulster, S.J. Wilson (University of Edinburgh, 2009)

Empty Stormont threats over protocol, Newton Emerson, (Sunday Times, September 12)

Flagging it up: a case study of the flags protest, (W.Glendinning & S J Wilson, CRC, 2014)

Falling support forces Donaldson’s hand, Alex Kane, (Irish Times September 9th )

If Donaldson pulls down Stormont, Brian Feeney (Irish News, September 15th, 2021)

⏩S.J. Wilson is a scundered unionist, ex-combatant, trade unionist, retired academic & Pound Shop Alex Kane.