Brian Feeney: UUP and SDLP will have years in wilderness with existential question

So the downward spiral continues. It continues because neither the UUP nor the SDLP accepts it faces an existential crisis, now acute after a generation.

Three elections in two years have accentuated their decline, culminating in the disappointment of July when the UUP failed to capitalise on the DUP’s division and disarray and the SDLP saw its share of the vote fall further, despite standing in every constituency to try to sustain its share.

Now they face the ignominy that no-one in their parties wants to be leader.

The UUP faces the ridiculous position of running on a re-tread. Of course as a former TV presenter, running a repeat will not be a new experience for Nesbitt.

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The most ecstatic response to the news came from the deputy leader, Robbie Butler: “A revised and refreshed leadership team of the UUP, led by Mike Nesbitt, is an exciting opportunity to not only embed the vision of a modern, ambitious and vibrant strand of unionism…” Blah, blah, blah.

Revised? Refreshed? Maybe that’s because Butler didn’t see the original programme? Nesbitt has given notice that he’s going to try what he failed to accomplish the first time.

Equally in the SDLP, the effusively prolix Claire Hanna waffled on in her lengthy statement about what needs to be done, repeating exactly what her four unsuccessful predecessors said, only at greater length.

When she wasn’t engaged in repetition she was regurgitating pre-1979 politics which even Tony Blair’s New Labour rejected 20 years ago. As Henry Ford said: “If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.” It applies to both.

The fact is that both parties are so last century. Their election manifestos for July are pre-Good Friday Agreement stuff.

OK, you didn’t read them. No-one does, apart from political nerds and commentators (same thing?).

Take a random selection. “SDLP MPs will use our voice and our influence at Westminster.” “Use our votes to ensure there is no Conservative government.”

Seriously? Two votes? Our voice and our influence? The SDLP has no influence at Westminster. It had in the last century when it was the majority nationalist voice in the north. No longer: there’s an executive and a Sinn Féin first minister. So the British government is going to disregard the majority vote here to pacify the SDLP? Catch yourself on.

As for the UUP, it obviously thinks it’s still governing the north. “We will maintain and enhance direct payments to farmers. We will cut bureaucracy… to reduce the administrative burden on farmers.” Has it told the British government? More to the point, has it told SF and the DUP?

Both the UUP and SDLP, sitting on between 8-10%, of the vote presented manifestos which only had an accidental connection with reality, if at all. Neither can do any of what they promised.

What both parties face is years in the wilderness and if they’re to survive they need to come to terms with that. The next assembly election is three years away. The next British general election is five years away.

Three years of opposition in Stormont is an awful prospect. You propose a resolution in one of your opposition days. SF and the DUP leave two sentries in the chamber. You talk to yourself. SF and DUP walk back in and defeat your resolution, again, and again and again, for years.

Or, you’re the sole UUP minister. You bring your plan to the executive, or maybe SF and DUP don’t allow you to table it until they’re ready. Then they amend it or reject it. Meanwhile, Sinn Féin and DUP make all the announcements of new projects, plans, allocation of money.

Now, what will happen in these years in the wilderness is that both the UUP and SDLP either find a purpose which isn’t pretending to be mainstream parties, say, like Colum Eastwood’s New Ireland Commission with some flesh on it, even if it has no backbone, or they will surely wither on the vine.

They need to start looking at the answer to the simple question: why would anyone vote for their parties, let alone join? What have they got to offer?

Here’s what the answer isn’t: ‘a modern, ambitious and vibrant strand of unionism’, or ‘make our values real for people and sell them relentlessly door to door,’ presumably driving a De Lorean to emphasise back to the future. Meaningless claptrap in both cases. Unattainable. Pie in the sky when you die.

If these two leaders – both faute de mieux, remember – can’t find an answer, it’s quite likely they are the last leaders of the north’s successful parties of last century.