Northern Ireland was created to secure an in-built Protestant and unionist majority. When, in the early 1930s, the Ulster Unionist MP Basil Brooke told his constituents not to employ Catholics, Northern Ireland’s prime minister, James Craig, commented: “I would not ask him to withdraw one word he said.”
How times change. Last Saturday, Sinn Féin became the largest party of local government in Northern Ireland. The party now has 144 seats across local councils, as opposed to the Democratic Unionist party’s 122. This comes on the back of last year’s local assembly election when Michelle O’Neill, deputy leader of Sinn Féin, became Northern Ireland’s first minister-designate. The nationalist vote outpolled the unionist vote for the first time. Now, Belfast city council, a traditional unionist stronghold, has only 17 unionist councillors out of 60 seats. Historic is the only word for it.
