UUP leadership election: Elliott’s easy victory

Tom Elliott once patrolled the lightless fields of Fermanagh but is now firmly in the Stormont spotlight. Peter Cheney watched the UUP leadership poll unfold.

Ulster Unionists united behind Tom Elliott on his first night as their leader but he faces an uphill struggle to reverse their electoral fortunes.

The leadership election’s turnout, 938 out of around 2,000 members, made it the largest UUP gathering in years and a major occasion as Northern Ireland political events go. With 693 votes, Elliott had a two-to-one edge over McCrea’s 294. Registering delegates and counting their votes, though, made for a long night. Elliott joked he was “hoping it’s soon over” as the result neared.

Two sources indicated that Elliott and McCrea had complementary skills, the former as a thinker and the latter as a communicator. McCrea had also run “a good get out the vote operation” but was outdone by the seven coaches of Fermanagh members. Elliott was also helped by three, possibly four, standing ovations during his speech.

Rural delegates who talked to agendaNi warmed to Elliott’s conservatism and found McCrea too liberal. However, McCrea supporters thought Elliott could be “given the run around” by other parties and considered their man more analytical. The party, one of them commented, had held its rural base but lost 100,000 mainly urban voters.

Both candidates chatted on the stage as the declaration approached. A handshake followed and the two final speeches were geared towards closing any rifts between their camps.

“I cannot lead this party of ours alone. I will be the leader but I cannot do everything myself,” Elliott remarked, as he emphasised the unity of this “broad church”. It would not, he concluded, be a “cold house” for McCrea and his supporters.

Those words will help to undo any damage caused by arguments on the campaign trail. Challenged again about the GAA, Elliott modestly asked journalists to talk to clubs he had quietly assisted in his home county. He quipped that an unnamed Fine Gael politician had left him a supportive voicemail.

Officials were keen to point out that this, the first contest where all members could vote, was a campaign not a coronation. However, the real work for Elliott will not be unifying his party but stirring voters’ interest “tomorrow and thereafter”. Against a determined DUP and a rising Alliance Party, his plans to bring the UUP back to the top seem optimistic at this point.