07th May 2008
The SDLP’s future
This is an expanded version of an article I have written for this month’s edition of Fortnight Magazine.
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The SDLP is at a cross roads, there is no doubt about that. Many perceived Good Friday 1998 as the fulfilment of its historic mission, yet there is as great a need for strategic leadership on this island today as at any point in the last century.
The Agreement was a decade ago and in the years since the SDLP can rightly claim to feel more than a little shafted by the British and Irish Governments and damaged by the retirement of the entire leadership in the space of two years. The governments played a dangerous game with the SDLP. The party ‘with no guns’ to quote Tony Blair was served up to Sinn Fein as the prize if they cooperated. That never bothered New Labour – they were never going to face them in an election and whilst Fianna Fail were happy to flirt with SF north of the border they played an opposite game in the South, crucifying Gerry Adams and his fellow travellers at the last election.
This is all for the record. The fact is the SDLP is still at the cross roads and little does it matter now how it got there. What does matter is that politicking and side deals aside, the institutions that are being shared in Northern Ireland are SDLP creations - the product of true vision and persistent argument.
Yes, the SDLP is poorly organised in many parts of the North, many MLAs are due an MoT they may or may not pass, and whilst there are enough young faces competing in the succession stakes, the party gives the appearance of treading water. It’s a pity because there is plenty to oppose: from Catriona Ruane’s gambling with our children’s future to a right wing, pay more get less, budget with SF endorsement and the politicking around victims and parades. Never mind the failure to secure a lower corporation tax for our businesses.
The SDLP review group is meeting against this backdrop. Made up of senior members it has been asked to report back on future options for the party. The group isn’t working in a vacuum; it has an important document which informs its members as they consider the party’s future. ‘A United Ireland and the Agreement’, states clearly that “The SDLP also believes that in the context of unity there would be a realignment of politics, with parties of the left – and right – joining together across the island.”
For as long as I can remember, there has always been a group within the party, who publicly present themselves as FF-SDLP. Based on support for their motions at conference I reckon they make up about 20% of members. You might expect the rest of the party to be a loose coalition of FG-SDLP, Lab-SDLP, Green-SDLP or even PD-SDLP. Not so. Outside the FF group, the vast majority of members consider themselves to be SDLP, full stop. They are progressive people who believe in unity through agreement and reject sectarianism and its political mouthpieces. They are more than just nationalists. They campaign for and believe in equality and social justice. They are social democrats and new Irelanders in the true sense of the word and if recent internal party meetings are anything to go by they are willing to continue fighting for their beliefs and the party they love. Not surprising that they would overwhelmingly adopt a document clearly stating that realignment should take place along ideological lines.
These people are smart and highly political. They are keen to enter discussions with other parties in the South and in the North about the future of this small island. They see much to be done in the North and much that would need to change in the South if their ambition of an agreed Ireland is to be achieved.
So where to now? The SDLP has three options; do nothing, continue alone or lead the way in shaping 21st century Ireland. Options one and two are already off the table, the tide waits for no man and the sea is rising all around the SDLP. Nationalism is moving on from the conflict and progressive unionism in increasingly interested in exploring new relationships. This is something the party itself recognises. Hence the interest in exploring new alliances, both sides of the border, in order to build a new agreed Ireland.
Speaking to Fianna Fail, Labour, Fine Gael, the UUP and others is an important step on this journey. I know very few SDLP people who would be against the idea of discussions in principle. In fact the vast majority of SDLP people I know would be very keen to talk to other parties about how progressive politics can play the lead role on this island. Social Democrats are always interested in power. They are not parties of protest but parties of change. No surprise that the Review Group has been given such clear policy guidance then.
The SDLP is a member of the Party of European Socialists and the Socialist International alongside many of the world’s most successful parties. If the SDLP were ever to give up this membership they would be surrendering the right to call themselves progressives. They would also be handing Sinn Fein the keys to one of the most influential and powerful political groups in the world. For be under no illusion, SF would apply to join the PES and SI the day after the SDLP left. Gerry Adam’s may sully social democracy on the campaign trail but such statements are about as credible as his denials of ever being in the IRA.
All very well I hear you say. With a decreasing vote and poor organisation it is all fairly academic and now is the time for action not long term strategy. In my mind these are compatible courses of action, not mutually exclusive ones. Many who advocate immediate merger with FF come from some of the most poorly organised parts of the SDLP, many more are not even members of the SDLP. Fianna Fail is all about organisation. It could well turn out that those who want change most could well become its first casualties.
It may be that many of the MLAs, have lost the ability to organise and are searching for a quick fix. On the other hand it may be that they realise just how much they still have, the huge job of work that still needs to be done and the need to get on with it. There will be change. However, nobody surrenders an inch with making another one somewhere else. And some things, like social democracy and the ‘New Ireland’ agenda simply cannot be for sale.
There is a big opportunity for progressive politics on this island. In the commercial world brands change but they never give up their core proposition. My own view is that the SDLP’s social democracy and membership of the PES is more attractive to other parties on this island than many in the party recognise. The big future for the party is to realise its ambition for a new Ireland without surrendering the core values that delivered peace to this island.
This is as good an assessent of where the SDLP are at that I have read recently. Are the FF group as small as 20%?
Surely the cause of the current malaise is all down to organisation? For years the SDLP appeared to be a presidential support group, and once he (Hume) moved on, there was nothing substantial left. All the leadership as you say moved on over a 2 year period because they were all too old to keep going! Hardly anyone from the post-Civil Rights generation had been given any position of responsibility where they might contribute and learn. Sure when John Hume was straddling the world like a political colossus what did the SDLP need policies or organisation for?
The key questions for the SDLP are (as they are for Labour in the south) 1. Do we have the members willing to go toe to toe with other political parties on the doorsteps? 2. Are we willing to give young talent real opportunities to become candidates in winnable seats or will we stick to the oul lads who’ve ’served their time’ and who wont be a ‘threat’ to sitting MLAs? 3. Who are our potential voters - first timers, those who defected to SF once they put away the guns, those who are disillusioned now with SF in government, and/or those from the unionist community who are Social Democratic on social and economic issues and would sooner see an SDLP candidate elected rather than a DUP or a SF.
Finally, I think anyone expecting FF to arrive like the cavalry over the hill is deluding themselves. Why on earth would FF, who so recently stomped all over SFs dreams in the south, now hand them the opportunity to outpoll FF north of the border?
If the party really wants to defend social democracy then they would do well to point out the great deficits that SF shows every time it makes horrible compromises and decisions that are against the will and benefit of the working class, and to truly oppose those policies, and be clear that their aim is a fairer, more prosperous, socialist Ireland.
Conall,
I have followed the debate on the future for a while now and was saddened to see increasing support for any tie-up with FF - including from old colleagues who once were, apparently, solid Irish Labour supporters.
One question for the SDLP: why spend all these years using the PES-ECOSY and SI labels if you can so easily think about dumping them? Was it a ploy - something to act as a differentiator in the NI arena?
As an observer surely in the new evolving NI situation why not let the FF supporters walk out and then get on with the game: continue to offer the local electorate a social democratic vehicle at council, assembly, westminister & euro elections.
Start the north’s long overdue political realignment now - from within!
PS: The PUP will have an interest in the PES too, I recall discussing it at length with the late David Ervine and also with other PUP Executive members many years back……….