With the Burrows leadership coronation set for Saturday 31st January in a Belfast hotel, the strong perception is that the once supposedly middle of the road pro-Union UUP is set to shift to the right-wing and develop a much closer co-operation with both the DUP and TUV in time for the May 2027 Assembly and council elections.
Butler, a born again Christian, a former deacon in an Elim Pentecostal Church and a veteran of both the Prison Service and Fire Service, was somehow viewed as being from the liberal wing of the party conceived politically by the late David Trimble, one of the key UUP architects of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement.
Currently the UUP’s deputy leader, Butler was seen as a continuation of a team of radical moderate leaders, such as outgoing leader Mike Nesbitt, Steve Aiken of South Antrim, and South Antrim MP Robin Swann.
Butler and Co had recognised the significance of the electoral threat posed to the UUP by the rise of the Alliance Party, especially under the latter’s leadership of Naomi Long, the former East Belfast MP, and particularly when Long took the UUP’s European seat in 2019 in the aftermath of the Brexit referendum - a seat the UUP had held since 1979.
The perception is that the Burrows camp wants to expose Alliance 2026 for what it really is ideologically - a soft r republican party and a key component politically of the pan nationalist front along with Sinn Fein and the SDLP.
That perception is that Alliance is no longer the soft u Unionist party it was under the leadership of Presbyterian minister’s son Lord John Alderdice. The Burrows camp is taking the view that many in the moderate pro-Union community voted for Alliance because they mistakenly saw Alliance as a genuine middle of the road, centrist, liberal movement.
The Burrows strategy would be to build closer ties with other Unionist parties to conceive the ideological alternative to the pan nationalist front - namely a pan unionist front.
This could inevitably lead to a realignment within the pro-Union community party-wise into two movements - a socially conservative, right-wing organisation comprising the right-wing of the UUP, the DUP and TUV, and a liberal Unionist movement comprising pro-Union folk who had once voted Alliance plus the liberals within the existing UUP.
The right-wing shift in the current UUP grassroots is further emphasised by the inevitability that Butler will be replaced as deputy leader by co-opted Fermanagh and South Tyrone MLA Diana Armstrong, the daughter of former UUP leader and Fermanagh and South Tyrone Westminster MP the late Harry West.
In terms of membership, the border regions of Fermanagh and South Tyrone, which suffered terribly during the Troubles, boasts a handsome UUP contingent.
Indeed, anyone wanting to win the UUP leadership via a contest would more than likely need the vast bulk of the Fermanagh and South Tyrone membership to be assured of victory.
Such was the late Harry West’s influence in the UUP that a pressure group, known as the West Ulster Unionist Council, held as much political clout within the party as the right-wing pressure group, the Ulster Monday Club.
The so-called Burrows/Armstrong ‘dream team’ is the UUP grassroots’ high stakes gamble to revive the party’s electoral fortunes come May 2027.
But what about the tens of thousands of moderate Unionists who defected electorally to Alliance? How can they be won back into the UUP camp, especially among new first time voters and young people? And what about the tens of thousands of apathetic potential pro-Union voters who have abandoned the ballot box completely? How can they be energised to vote UUP?
Liberal moderate Unionism does not have an impressive track record electorally. In the Seventies, the pro-Assembly Unionists spearheaded by the late former Northern Ireland Prime Minister Brian Faulkner were consistently trounced at the ballot box by the combined strength of the UUP, DUP and Vanguard under the banner of the Unionist Coalition.
Faulkner then launched his own middle of the road party, the Unionist Party of Northern Ireland (UPNI), which was making slow but steady inroads into the centrist pro-Union voter base until Faulkner’s tragic and untimely death in 1977 in a horse riding incident.
While the current UUP is to the fore in promoting Diana Armstrong as a female deputy leader, it should not be forgotten that Mrs Anne Dickson replaced Faulkner as UPNI leader after his death.
Put bluntly, after the Burrows coronation later this month, could liberal Unionists like Butler and his ilk see the increasingly right-wing leaning direction of the UUP as too bitter a political pill to swallow and leave to form a new moderate pro-Union movement in any Unionist realignment?
The same could also be said of the Alliance Party between those who are middle of the road ideologically, but pro-Union constitutionally, and those in Alliance who are left-wing ideologically and would favour Irish Unity. If the former faction defected or split from Alliance and joined with the liberal UUP faction, could a rebirth of the UPNI be on the cards?
Skeptics may point to the fate of another liberal pro-Union experiment which crashed and burned electorally before it had even left the runway - the short-lived NI21 party formed by two former liberal UUP MLAs, Basil McCrea of Lagan Valley and John McCallister of South Down.
One criticism that was made of the late Lord Trimble in that whilst he was a tremendous political visionary in Unionism, he moved too far forward tactically without bringing Unionism’s grassroots with him. In the end, it was his undoing in the Upper Bann constituency as Westminster MP.
Since announcing his nomination for the UUP leadership, Burrows has been outlining his vision for Unionism. His challenge will be not to make the same mistake as Trimble. Burrows will need to carry the pro-Union grassroots with him as he develops his vision of Unionist co-operation.
But in doing so, he will have to bring middle of the road Unionists with him otherwise the UUP will see large scale voting, not for Alliance, but for a new look UPNI. However, the electoral clock is ticking. May 2027 will soon come around.
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| Follow Dr John Coulter on Twitter @JohnAHCoulter John is a Director for Belfast’s Christian radio station, Sunshine 1049 FM. |
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