In the north, Sinn Féin entered government promising change. Michelle O'Neill spoke of being a First Minister for all. Yet the party ends its first full legislative term at the head of the Northern Ireland (sic) Executive with little tangible evidence that it has delivered any of the transformation promised to workers, families or the communities that have formed the backbone of its electoral support.
The explanation now being offered as an election approaches is familiar: delivery was blocked by the British Government and/or the DUP. Power-sharing does impose real constraints, but that is only part of the story. As Samuel Johnson observed, "What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure." The same might be said of political promises. Many of Sinn Féin's manifesto commitments were neither distinctive nor achievable. The adaptation of Johnson's other observation comes to mind, what was good was not original, and what was original was not good.
None of this should have come as a surprise to the Party. The institutional vetoes that were negotiated by Sinn Féin at St Andrews in 2006 ensured that fundamental change would always depend upon unionist consent. Those who warned at the time that these arrangements would constrain any future Sinn Féin First Minister were dismissed as cynics. Events have proven otherwise. Equally significant was the DUP's strategic decision to forgo the Finance and Economy portfolios in favour of Communities and Education. It was a calculated judgement about where their political influence would be greatest, and one that has left Sinn Féin struggling to explain why many of its flagship ambitions remain unrealised. The consequences of those decisions are now becoming impossible to ignore.
The much-publicised Good Jobs Employment Rights Bill, presented as a flagship commitment of the party of change after Sinn Féin assumed responsibility for the Department for the Economy, will not be enacted during this Assembly mandate. For legislation heralded as a defining reform, its progress was remarkably slow. The Bill remained with the Sinn Fein Minister for years before finally reaching the Assembly, leaving limited time for meaningful consultation, democratic scrutiny and legislative passage before the end of the mandate.
Even then, the legislation fell well short of the rhetoric that accompanied it. Much of what was proposed would simply have extended to workers in the north employment protections already available elsewhere in the United Kingdom, rather than creating a new or distinctive set of rights.
The lack of attention given to drafting the Bill, became apparent almost immediately. Within twenty-four hours of the Bill's introduction, the Sinn Fein Minister was forced to amend a central proposal following universal criticism of its practical implications. The DUP seized on the reversal, rightly claiming that the Economy Minister had been "forced into a screeching U-turn which recognises a major flaw in her original proposals." Whether one accepts that characterisation or not, the episode reinforced the impression of legislation that had been inadequately prepared despite the time available to develop it.
Upon becoming leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, Jon Burrows, a former RUC officer, remarked that when he first entered the Assembly, he could not decide whether Sinn Féin was attempting to undermine Northern Ireland's institutions or whether it was simply incompetent. Having observed the party in government, he said he had reached the latter conclusion.
It is not a harsh judgement, and one that has become increasingly difficult to dismiss. The handling of the Irish place names project, together with a succession of uncomfortable Assembly exchanges in which Sinn Féin ministers and senior representatives, including Gildernew, have struggled under sustained and pointed questioning from Timothy Gaston, Phillip Brett and Jonathan Buckley, has contributed to a growing perception that the party is less assured in government than it once appeared.
For a movement that built its reputation on discipline, strategic planning and political competence, such episodes matter. They do not simply provide ammunition for opponents, they raise legitimate questions among supporters about whether the party has adapted successfully from opposition and agitation to the demands of government.
After a full Assembly term leading the Northern Ireland Government, Sinn Féin ministers appear to have little political capital left to demonstrate that the promised era of change has materialised. Increasingly, ministerial announcements are dominated by photo opportunities around routine infrastructure projects, pothole repairs, road resurfacing and traffic management schemes, rather than the structural reforms that featured so prominently in the party's election campaign.
The party's defence has become equally familiar. Speaking after being promoted to a Senator, former Economy Minister Conor Murphy argued that Sinn Féin was trying hard to make the institutions and Northern Ireland work, but that progress was being frustrated by unionist resistance. There is, of course, an element of truth in that claim. The institutions were designed to require cross-community agreement on contentious issues. Yet that was not an unforeseen obstacle. It was the constitutional architecture to which Sinn Féin itself signed up, and which many critics warned would allow the DUP to frustrate significant change whenever it chose to do so.
To attribute the absence of delivery principally to unionist obstruction is therefore to overlook an uncomfortable reality, many of the constraints now cited as an explanation were negotiated, accepted and defended by Sinn Féin itself.
There is an unmistakable irony in a republican movement lamenting that unionism is preventing the institutions of Northern Ireland from functioning as intended. For decades, Sinn Féin's ambition was to challenge, disrupt and ultimately replace those institutions. Today, it finds itself defending them, explaining their limitations and appealing for their effective operation. In doing so, it has become increasingly difficult to distinguish the party from the constitutional order of the SDLP it once sought to overturn.
Perhaps the greatest political transformation of the peace process has not been the capture of the institutions by Sinn Féin, but the capture of Sinn Féin by the institutions. The movement that once promised to turn Stormont upside down now finds itself constrained by its procedures, dependent upon its survival and invested in its continuity. The revolutionary has become the custodian.
Casement Park is a case in point. It may be uncomfortable for some to acknowledge, but the principal reasons for the project's failure lie not with unionist opposition but with those who carried political responsibility for delivering it. The prolonged dispute with local residents, the collapse of the original planning approval, and the persistent failure to secure a fully funded and deliverable scheme cannot simply be attributed to unionist obstruction. The greatest responsibility rests with Sinn Féin, the SDLP and those charged with managing the project, not Gordon Lyons.
Had the objective remained the timely construction of a modern stadium for Antrim GAA, Casement Park could have been completed many years ago. Instead, the ambition, driven by Sinn Fein, evolved into something far more complex. The aspiration to develop a multi-purpose venue capable of hosting major commercial events fundamentally altered the scale, cost and controversy surrounding the project. Whether that mistake was well-intentioned or not, that change of course delayed rather than advanced the interests of Gaelic games in Antrim.
The greatest losers have not been politicians but Gaels. For more than a decade, Antrim footballers, hurlers and supporters have been denied the stadium they were promised while political parties traded blame and expectations repeatedly outstripped reality.
Casement Park will almost certainly be built. When it is, it should stand as a home for the GAA and the people of Antrim rather than an outdoor concert venue or a monument to avaricious political ambition.
Casement Park is only one example. More troubling is the apparent ease with which Sinn Féin has been able to attribute their political failure, whether in government or in opposition, to unionism or to the British Government. This manufactured narrative has proved remarkably resilient, often insulating the party from any scrutiny of its own decisions and responsibilities.
The willingness of many Sinn Fein supporters and the media to accept those explanations without demanding a more searching analysis has, for years, reinforced that dynamic. There are signs, however, that this may be changing. Recent elections in the Republic and opinion polling north and south suggest that the party's carefully cultivated image of competence coupled with perpetual victimhood is beginning to encounter greater public scepticism even within their own base. Whether that scepticism becomes the catalyst for political realignment remains to be seen, but the assumption that Sinn Féin can indefinitely externalise responsibility for its own policy and political failure appears less secure than it once did.
The leadership of the movement is not oblivious to these changing political realities. Across Ireland, poorly attended republican family meetings have been hosted as the leadership sought to reassure supporters that a border poll, and ultimately Irish unity, remains within reach. Yet the momentum that once appeared to surround the constitutional question has undoubtedly slowed. The certainty with which unity was presented as an approaching political reality has given way to a more cautious and qualified narrative.
The UK's latest Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, on entering office, made clear that constitutional change within the United Kingdom was not a priority for his government, continuing a position adopted by successive British administrations since 1922. His newly appointed Secretary of State for Northern Ireland has likewise indicated that a border poll is not under consideration. That position is not surprising. The electoral evidence has yet to even remotely demonstrate the sustained shift in public opinion that would justify the exercise of the British Secretary of State's discretion under the Good Friday Agreement.
The shift, in opinion is being reflected elsewhere. Sinn Féin's much-heralded Unity Bill failed to gain any meaningful political traction beyond the party's own ranks. Opinion polling across both jurisdictions continues to suggest that voters are more concerned with housing, healthcare, the cost of living and public services than with constitutional change. Performative politics, once one of Sinn Féin's greatest strengths, appear now, to have diminishing returns when measured against the everyday concerns of the Irish electorate north and south.
None of this is to suggest that Irish unity is impossible. Constitutional change remains a possibility. What has become increasingly difficult to sustain is the claim that it is either imminent or inevitable. The language of inevitability has collided with the real arithmetic of electoral politics and Government. For all the certainty with which it was once proclaimed, it is a destination that, in my judgement, lies beyond my generation.
I suspect Sinn Féin is fast approaching the political crossroads that many seasoned observers have long predicted. The strategic assumptions that served the party so well over the past two decades are beginning to encounter electoral and political realities that can no longer be ignored.
The choices facing the leadership are stark. In the Republic, difficult questions will inevitably arise about whether lame duck McDonald remains the person best placed to lead the party towards government. In the north, Sinn Féin faces a different but equally profound dilemma. Having invested so much political capital in the institutions established by the Good Friday and St Andrews Agreements, it can neither transform them in the manner once promised nor abandon them without accepting responsibility for the resulting instability.
That is the paradox of Sinn Féin's political journey. A movement that once fought to overturn the constitutional position of the north is now one of its principal custodians. It has become bound to institutions that make the achievement of Irish unity contingent upon the consent of others, yet from which it cannot easily withdraw. The once revolutionary movement has become the establishment, and in doing so has created challenges for itself that cannot readily be resolved.
They are, indeed, interesting times.
⏩Muiris Ó Súilleabháin was a member of the Republican Movement until he retired in 2006 after 20 years of service. Fiche bhliain ag fás.
No comments