Post by therealriga on Dec 22, 2023 12:52:22 GMT
Since its 1950 recreation, South Down has had four political incarnations. A safe Ulster Unionist (UUP) seat, a UUP-SDLP marginal, a safe SDLP seat and, in the last decade, a Sinn Féin – SDLP marginal.
South Down was first created in 1885, when the two-member Down constituency was split into four constituencies. It was significantly reduced in size for the 1918 election, when County Down received 5 county constituencies. For the 1922 election, the double-member Down constituency was revived. This was replaced by North Down and South Down for 1950. Like most Northern Ireland constituencies, it was deliberately oversized: taking in the southern half of the county, with its borders including its largest town, Banbridge, together with Moira and Saintfield. Successive revisions have reduced its size.
The current constituency is predominantly rural, with the largest town, Downpatrick, having a population of just over 10,000. Warrenpoint, Newcastle and Kilkeel are the next largest towns respectively, though none of them even make it to 9,000 people. When last drawn for 2010, it consisted of the 13 eastern wards of Newry & Mourne council, 4 wards of Banbridge council, and 17 of the 23 wards of Down council. Local government changes which took effect in 2014 mean that it currently consists of most of the eastern half of Newry, Mourne & Down council, plus a corner of Armagh, Banbridge & Craigavon council (Northern Ireland local government boundary commissioners have not distinguished themselves with their brevity.)
In general, the constituency is one of the youngest, with an average age of nearly 37 years at the time of the 2011 census: the fifth lowest figure in NI. 69.3% had a Catholic community background, the third highest. While South Down’s economic indicators are slightly ahead of the Northern Ireland average, it is not as rich as the other County Down constituencies (North Down and Strangford.) A plurality (34.1%) of people lived in households of social grade C2, the second highest in this category in Northern Ireland. One its 52 Super Output Areas, covering much of the Murlough ward of Newcastle was in the 10% most deprived in NI. Pockets of poverty are also found in Kilkeel, Warrenpoint and Downpatrick’s Flying Horse estate. In the 2016 Brexit referendum, the constituency appears to have split on nationalist (remain) – unionist (leave) lines, with 67.2% voting remain.
In its original incarnation, it was a safe nationalist seat, with a stable 55% nationalist – 45% unionist balance. The 1950 recreation covered a larger area, with a unionist vote of 55% always enough to see off various nationalist and republican challengers. In October 1974 the constituency came to national attention when the retiring UUP MP Lawrence Orr, who had served since 1950, was replaced by Enoch Powell, who had quit the Conservative Party earlier in the year. Like his predecessors, Powell received an absolute majority of the votes. Ironically, he was one of the major architects of his own downfall. Pursuing an integrationist approach, he persuaded the minority Labour government to accept an increase in Northern Ireland’s representation in return for occasional UUP support. This resulted in South Down being cut down from nearly 90,000 voters in 1979 to 66,000 for the 1983 election. The bulk of the territory removed in the north of the constituency consisted of predominantly unionist areas, such as the largest town of Banbridge, and the smaller Moira. The 1980 proposals would also have removed Dromore, but the UUP successfully argued for its retention. This gave Powell a short extension. In the 1983 election he was opposed by the DUP, who had little sympathy for his integrationist approach. However, the SDLP were also opposed by Sinn Féin and this allowed Powell to hold on by 548 votes. With the DUP withdrawing as part of the unionist pact, Powell increased his majority to 1,842 votes in the 1986 by-election. However, his political career, like all political careers, ended in failure the following year, when the SDLP candidate Eddie McGrady beat him by 731 votes.
McGrady was helped by the extremely low Sinn Féin (SF) vote, with the party losing its deposit in 1987 and polling just 3% in 1992. Unlike other nationalist-held constituencies, South Down had little of an Irish Republican tradition. While the British army’s biggest loss of life came in the 1979 ambush at Warrenpoint, this was the exception, with South Down largely escaping the worst of The Troubles. From 1989 until 1997 SF did not even have a single councillor in the constituency. This enabled McGrady to build up his majority: over 6,000 in 1992 and nearly 14,000 in 2001.
The biggest threat to McGrady's tenure in this period came from the Boundary Commission in 1994. As part of a proposed radical redrawing of the 17 NI constituencies, South Down was to be abolished and split between new constituencies of Newry & Mourne and Mid Down. With all parties disadvantaged in various areas by this shake-up, a less radical set of changes were adopted, preserving the constituency for the 1997 election. The changes reduced the unionist minority still further. They removed 3 Down wards around Saintfield and the 4 Banbridge council wards around Dromore that the commission had wanted to remove in 1980. At this time, the lack of unionist opposition to this boundary change was a clear sign that they had given up the ghost.
The constituency’s history since the late 1990s has been marked by a surge in the SF vote. Two factors may account for this. Younger voters have generally been more likely to vote SF than SDLP. Secondly, the lack of the IRA bogeyman allowed voters who had previously shunned SF to vote for them. McGrady’s majority was reduced to 9,000 for the 2005 election, his last contest.
His successor, Margaret Ritchie, who would serve as SDLP leader from 2010 to 2011, saw her majority reduce at the next two general elections. However, it was still a surprise when the SF candidate, Chris Hazzard, ousted her at the 2017 election, with a 9% swing. The SDLP targeted the constituency for 2019, but while Hazzard’s vote share dropped by nearly 8%, they were unable to take advantage and had their biggest drop of the entire election here. Some votes seem to have gone to the anti-abortion Aontú, but the biggest loss was to the centrist Alliance Party, who had their best ever performance in the constituency, taking nearly 14%.
In the latest review South Down is, as usual, reduced in size. Loughbrickland and two and a half wards at the edge of Downpatrick are removed. The initial proposals added a more unionist-leaning ward on the edge of Dromore, but this was reversed in the final recommendations. Recent elections have seen reversals for the SDLP. In the 2023 locals Sinn Féin overtook them for the first time in Downpatrick, while in the 2022 Assembly elections Sinn Féin outpolled them by nearly 3 to 1. Part of the SDLP's decline is due to them losing votes to the Alliance Party, who won an Assembly seat for the first time. While it is too early to say, the next general election may confirm that South Down has entered a 5th incarnation: that of a safe Sinn Féin seat.
South Down was first created in 1885, when the two-member Down constituency was split into four constituencies. It was significantly reduced in size for the 1918 election, when County Down received 5 county constituencies. For the 1922 election, the double-member Down constituency was revived. This was replaced by North Down and South Down for 1950. Like most Northern Ireland constituencies, it was deliberately oversized: taking in the southern half of the county, with its borders including its largest town, Banbridge, together with Moira and Saintfield. Successive revisions have reduced its size.
The current constituency is predominantly rural, with the largest town, Downpatrick, having a population of just over 10,000. Warrenpoint, Newcastle and Kilkeel are the next largest towns respectively, though none of them even make it to 9,000 people. When last drawn for 2010, it consisted of the 13 eastern wards of Newry & Mourne council, 4 wards of Banbridge council, and 17 of the 23 wards of Down council. Local government changes which took effect in 2014 mean that it currently consists of most of the eastern half of Newry, Mourne & Down council, plus a corner of Armagh, Banbridge & Craigavon council (Northern Ireland local government boundary commissioners have not distinguished themselves with their brevity.)
In general, the constituency is one of the youngest, with an average age of nearly 37 years at the time of the 2011 census: the fifth lowest figure in NI. 69.3% had a Catholic community background, the third highest. While South Down’s economic indicators are slightly ahead of the Northern Ireland average, it is not as rich as the other County Down constituencies (North Down and Strangford.) A plurality (34.1%) of people lived in households of social grade C2, the second highest in this category in Northern Ireland. One its 52 Super Output Areas, covering much of the Murlough ward of Newcastle was in the 10% most deprived in NI. Pockets of poverty are also found in Kilkeel, Warrenpoint and Downpatrick’s Flying Horse estate. In the 2016 Brexit referendum, the constituency appears to have split on nationalist (remain) – unionist (leave) lines, with 67.2% voting remain.
In its original incarnation, it was a safe nationalist seat, with a stable 55% nationalist – 45% unionist balance. The 1950 recreation covered a larger area, with a unionist vote of 55% always enough to see off various nationalist and republican challengers. In October 1974 the constituency came to national attention when the retiring UUP MP Lawrence Orr, who had served since 1950, was replaced by Enoch Powell, who had quit the Conservative Party earlier in the year. Like his predecessors, Powell received an absolute majority of the votes. Ironically, he was one of the major architects of his own downfall. Pursuing an integrationist approach, he persuaded the minority Labour government to accept an increase in Northern Ireland’s representation in return for occasional UUP support. This resulted in South Down being cut down from nearly 90,000 voters in 1979 to 66,000 for the 1983 election. The bulk of the territory removed in the north of the constituency consisted of predominantly unionist areas, such as the largest town of Banbridge, and the smaller Moira. The 1980 proposals would also have removed Dromore, but the UUP successfully argued for its retention. This gave Powell a short extension. In the 1983 election he was opposed by the DUP, who had little sympathy for his integrationist approach. However, the SDLP were also opposed by Sinn Féin and this allowed Powell to hold on by 548 votes. With the DUP withdrawing as part of the unionist pact, Powell increased his majority to 1,842 votes in the 1986 by-election. However, his political career, like all political careers, ended in failure the following year, when the SDLP candidate Eddie McGrady beat him by 731 votes.
McGrady was helped by the extremely low Sinn Féin (SF) vote, with the party losing its deposit in 1987 and polling just 3% in 1992. Unlike other nationalist-held constituencies, South Down had little of an Irish Republican tradition. While the British army’s biggest loss of life came in the 1979 ambush at Warrenpoint, this was the exception, with South Down largely escaping the worst of The Troubles. From 1989 until 1997 SF did not even have a single councillor in the constituency. This enabled McGrady to build up his majority: over 6,000 in 1992 and nearly 14,000 in 2001.
The biggest threat to McGrady's tenure in this period came from the Boundary Commission in 1994. As part of a proposed radical redrawing of the 17 NI constituencies, South Down was to be abolished and split between new constituencies of Newry & Mourne and Mid Down. With all parties disadvantaged in various areas by this shake-up, a less radical set of changes were adopted, preserving the constituency for the 1997 election. The changes reduced the unionist minority still further. They removed 3 Down wards around Saintfield and the 4 Banbridge council wards around Dromore that the commission had wanted to remove in 1980. At this time, the lack of unionist opposition to this boundary change was a clear sign that they had given up the ghost.
The constituency’s history since the late 1990s has been marked by a surge in the SF vote. Two factors may account for this. Younger voters have generally been more likely to vote SF than SDLP. Secondly, the lack of the IRA bogeyman allowed voters who had previously shunned SF to vote for them. McGrady’s majority was reduced to 9,000 for the 2005 election, his last contest.
His successor, Margaret Ritchie, who would serve as SDLP leader from 2010 to 2011, saw her majority reduce at the next two general elections. However, it was still a surprise when the SF candidate, Chris Hazzard, ousted her at the 2017 election, with a 9% swing. The SDLP targeted the constituency for 2019, but while Hazzard’s vote share dropped by nearly 8%, they were unable to take advantage and had their biggest drop of the entire election here. Some votes seem to have gone to the anti-abortion Aontú, but the biggest loss was to the centrist Alliance Party, who had their best ever performance in the constituency, taking nearly 14%.
In the latest review South Down is, as usual, reduced in size. Loughbrickland and two and a half wards at the edge of Downpatrick are removed. The initial proposals added a more unionist-leaning ward on the edge of Dromore, but this was reversed in the final recommendations. Recent elections have seen reversals for the SDLP. In the 2023 locals Sinn Féin overtook them for the first time in Downpatrick, while in the 2022 Assembly elections Sinn Féin outpolled them by nearly 3 to 1. Part of the SDLP's decline is due to them losing votes to the Alliance Party, who won an Assembly seat for the first time. While it is too early to say, the next general election may confirm that South Down has entered a 5th incarnation: that of a safe Sinn Féin seat.
