Northern Ireland and the European Parliament

Members of the European Parliament have been directly elected since 1979. The whole of Northern Ireland forms a three-member constituency, and elections take place every five years by proportional representation (using the Single Transferable Vote) as for local councils and most regional-level elections. The first five elections produced very similar results, with the DUP (Ian Paisley Sr), SDLP (John Hume) and UUP (John Taylor, now Lord Kilclooney, in 1979 and 1984, Jim Nicholson in 1989, 1994 and 1999) taking one seat each at every election. In 2004, Paisley was replaced on the DUP ticket by Jim Allister, and Hume was replaced on the SDLP ticket by Martin Morgan; the seat, however, was lost to Bairbre de Brún of Sinn Féin. Allister left the DUP in 2007, and lost his seat in 2009 to Diane Dodds of his former party. Bairbre de Brún of Sinn Féin resigned on health grounds in 2012 and was replaced by her party colleague Martina Anderson. In 2019, Jim Nicholson of the UUP retired, and his seat was gained by Naomi Long of the Alliance Party.

The 2019 European Elections

I was fortunate enough to get this photograph of the three winners at the count - left to right, Diane Dodds (DUP), Martina Anderson (SF) and Naomi Long (Alliance).

The first of several extraordinary things about this election was that it happened at all. After the UK voted to leave the EU in the June 2016 referendum, the day set for Brexit was 29 March 2019. However, that date was delayed by the House of Commons several times, and the UK was compelled to hold European Parliament elections on 23 May.

First Preference Votes

Martina Anderson (Sinn Féin) 126,951 (22.2%, -3.3%)
Diane Dodds (DUP) 124,991 (21.8%, +0.9%)
Naomi Long (Alliance) 105,928 (18.5%, +11.4%) – best ever Alliance Party result
Colum Eastwood (SDLP) 78,589 (13.7%, +0.7%)
Jim Allister (TUV) 62,021 (10.8%, -1.3%)
Danny Kennedy (UUP) 53,052 (9.3%, -4.0%) – worst ever UUP result
Clare Bailey (Green) 12,471 (2.2%, +0.5%)
Robert Hill (UKIP) 5,115 (0.9%, -3.0%)
Jane Morrice (Independent) 1,719 (0.3%)
Neil McCann (Independent) 948 (0.2%)
Amandeep Singh Bhogal (Conservative) 662 (0.1%, -0.6%)

Total poll 577,275 (45%, down from 51% last time); invalid votes 4,649 (0.81%); total valid votes 572,447; quota 143,112

Second Count

The 20,915 votes of the last five candidates transferred as follows:

Anderson (SF) + 1,166 (5.6%) = 128,117
Dodds (DUP) + 2,300 (11.0%) = 127,291
Long (Alliance) + 9,399 (44.9%) = 115,327
Eastwood (SDLP) + 2,360 (11.3%) = 80,949
Allister (TUV) + 1,851 (8.9%) = 63,872
Kennedy (UUP) + 1,684 (8.1%) = 54,736

2,155 votes (10.3%) were non-transferable.

Third Count

In a miserable result for the Ulster Unionist Party, Kennedy was the next to be eliminated, the first time this had happened for the UUP in a European Parliament election since 1979 (when they had two candidates). His votes transferred as follows, electing Dodds (DUP).

Dodds (DUP) + 28,131 (51.4%) = 155,422
Anderson (SF) + 73 (0.1%) = 128,190
Long (Alliance) + 6,936 (12.7%) = 122,263
Eastwood (SDLP) + 1,152 (2.1%) = 82,101
Allister (TUV) + 15,668 (28.6%) = 79,540

2,776 votes (5.1%) were non-transferable.

Fourth Count

Dodds' surplus of 12,310 votes was now distributed, taking votes from the 28,131 she had received from Kennedy. (Percentages are of the ballots from that packet.)

Anderson (SF) + 10.5 (0.1%) =  128,200.5
Long (Alliance) + 1654.0 (11.8%) =  123,917.0
Allister (TUV) + 10314.0 (73.3%) =  89,854.0
Eastwood (SDLP) + 312.5 (2.2%) =  82,413.5

The non-transferable vote recorded is 19, but in fact there were 3,549 non-transferable ballots in the Kennedy/Dodds packet (12.6%).

Fifth Count

Eastwood was now eliminated - the first time this had ever happened for the SDLP in a European election, though in fact his percentage share was slightly higher than the party had achieved in 2014. From the numbers, it looks like only his first preference votes were redistributed, this being enough to secure the result, so I am using 78,589 rather than 82,413.5 as the base for the percentages below.

Eastwood's transfers comfortably elected Anderson and Long.

Long (Alliance) + 46453.0 (59.1%) =  170,370.0
Anderson (SF) + 24232.0 (30.8%) =  152,432.5
Allister (TUV) + 225.0 (0.3%) =  90,079.0

7,679 (9.8%) of Eastwood's first preferences were non-transferable, my understanding is that the other 3,824.5 votes that he had received in later counts were examined. I suspect they would have shown a similar distribution.

Parliamentary Groups

Diane Dodds sits as a non-inscrite, as Jim Allister and Ian Paisley were before her.

Naomi Long sits with the Renew group, composed of the liberal ALDE party.

Past elections

Notes:

• The figure for Alliance in 2004 is in fact the vote share of John Gilliland, who stood as an independent candidate. As well as Alliance, his candidacy was supported by the Workers Party, the Conservatives, Labour groups and other independents.
• Three candidates stood in 1994 supporting independence for NI (though all on slightly different platforms). The most successful was the Rev Hugh Ross who got 1.1%.
• The Workers Party were known as Republican Clubs in 1979.
• The Labour vote given in 1979 is for Paddy Devlin - although David Bleakley, who was also a candidate in that year, is best known as a Labour activist he did not describe himself as such in 1979. In 1989 there were two vying Labour candidates, Mark Langhammer and Brian Caul.
• The Peace Coalition candidate in 1994 was supported by the Greens and Democratic Left.
• The Greens were still the Ecology Party in 1984.

See also:

Other sites based at ARK: ORB (Online Research Bank) | CAIN (Conflict Archive on the INternet) | Northern Ireland Life and Times Survey

Your comments, please! Send an email to me at nicholas.whyte@gmail.com.

Nicholas Whyte, 11 May 2014