Ian Paisley founded the DUP in 1971 as the political wing of the Free Presbyterian Church, the religious sect he had founded, and as a vehicle for driving the principles of his sect.
That included resisting any concessions to ‘Romanism’ and ecumenism, and opposition to all liberalised societal changes introduced in Britain during the sixties.
Naturally his sect was dominant in his party and indeed for many members the religious principles Paisley advocated were the chief reason they joined.
Twenty years ago, when the DUP became the majority unionist party, most of its MLAs were Free Presbyterians so, extraordinarily, despite the fact that his sect never grew above 1% of northern Protestants, his tiny fundamentalist sect dominated unionist politics.
None of this is true today. Only about 30% of DUP members are Free Presbyterians and it’s only the older MLAs who are likely to be adherents.
New members didn’t join the party as a vehicle to advance their religious principles. They joined because they support the DUP’s political views on matters like Brexit, relations with the British and Irish governments and devolution.
In all these positions, as initially in opposition to the Good Friday Agreement, the DUP have accumulated support from former UUP members. Until 2017 they prospered.
As a result of the follies and fiascos of the last seven years, the big question now, as the academic expert on the DUP, Jon Tonge, asked in July, is: “Are the glory days over for the DUP?”
There’s no need to rehearse the catalogue of mistakes, missteps and miscalculations under the disastrous leaderships of Foster and Donaldson. The effects are obvious and undeniable.
Conned and duped by Johnson, conned and duped by Sunak, the DUP has ended up with the worst of all worlds.
To top it all their party leader Donaldson was dramatically arrested on Maundy Thursday and charged with historical sex offences. The party is still reeling from that and the reverberations will rumble on as Donaldson’s trial proceeds in 2025.
The July general election delivered a huge shock with the loss of three seats and two alarmingly close calls: Gregory Campbell and Sammy Wilson.
The DUP share of the vote was down a whopping 8.5% on the 2019 election, while ominously the share of the extremist TUV was up 6.2%.
- The Alliance Party may be irrelevant in some ways but it’s crucial in others - Brian FeeneyOpens in new window
- Feeney on Friday: SDLP’s delusions of grandeur don’t fit with the reality of its insignificanceOpens in new window
- Feeney on Friday: It doesn’t matter who replaces Doug Beattie - like the SDLP, the UUP is irrelevantOpens in new window
- Feeney on Friday: TUV and People Before Profit have one thing in common: they are both blasts from the pastOpens in new window
The most recent opinion poll shows the DUP down 3%. So far the response from the party’s new leader has been to emulate the former UUP leader Dim Jim Molyneaux who engaged in what was called, with no sense of irony, ‘masterly inactivity’.
Given the series of blows, electoral and otherwise, that have struck the DUP since Donaldson’s arrest, it’s perhaps unsurprising that both the new leader and the Stormont leader have been dumbfounded.
Whatever the reason, neither has offered a solution to the party’s woes. Both exude charisn’tma, but you can provide leadership without charisma – look at Starmer – and it hasn’t been forthcoming.
Are they inhibited because both Robinson and Little-Pengelly aided and abetted Donaldson in buying and overselling the British government’s shockingly dishonest con job to the DUP in January?
Whatever the reason for their silence, the DUP is cowering stupidly from Allister and the TUV.
The biggest mistake they could make would be to follow the traditional unionist response when reactionaries challenge: tack to the right in a futile attempt to out-TUV the TUV.
The TUV owns narrow fanaticism, and if the DUP heads back in that direction the party will lose even more votes, not to the TUV, but to unionists joining the growing ranks of those abstaining at elections.
The party increased its vote under Peter Robinson by attracting UUP voters and moderate young unionists. If it doesn’t follow that progress towards the 21st century, glacial though that has been, then the glory days are truly over.
Their only source of growth is abstentionist unionist voters and If they can’t attract them, rancorous division and decline beckon.
