ULSTER UNIONISTS meet this evening in Belfast to elect a leader to replace Sir Reg Empey. The two candidates offer starkly differing prospects for the once mighty party that dominated Northern politics for more than 70 years.
Sir Reg, elected successor to David – now Lord – Trimble five years ago, became the party’s 13th leader as it marked its centenary. He promised to revitalise the party, which then firmly believed its rightful position was as the leading unionist body and the natural party of government.
Then, as now, the party was struggling with the fallout from a disastrous election. In 2005, it lost all but one of its Westminster seats as it withered before the dramatic rise of the DUP.
The party has suffered yet further reverses and now, courtesy of the May general election, has no MPs for the first time in its history.
When Sir Reg took the top job, the DUP and the Rev Ian Paisley had yet to sign up to a deal with Sinn Féin over sharing power at Stormont.
The UUP sensed it could build a new role for itself by attacking the DUP with well-aimed allegations of a U-turn on the Belfast Agreement that Mr Trimble had negotiated.
It failed and the DUP subsequently swamped the unionist benches in the Assembly as Dr Paisley and then Peter Robinson confirmed their ascendancy.
In response, Sir Reg’s grand idea – that of a link-up with the Conservatives in Britain – was supposed to offer “ordinary decent unionists” a place at the top table of UK politics and an escape route from the sectarian political enclave of Northern Ireland.
That failed too, and prompted resignations and yet more soul-searching. The Ulster Conservatives and Unionists – New Force (UCUNF) platform remains, but there is no love for it.
The party’s somewhat wonky internal structures have been improved somewhat, but remain suspect. One party source estimated the electorate empowered to vote in tonight’s leadership poll as “several hundred, give or take a thousand”.
In response to the serious electoral reverses of the past decade, the party now faces a crunch decision, with two radically different candidates offering diametrically different options.
Tom Elliott from Fermanagh is one of just three Assembly members the party has west of the Bann. The favourite of the bulk of his Assembly colleagues, he is broadly in favour of “traditional unionism”, closer links short of merger with the DUP, the maintenance of the close association with the loyal orders and right-of-centre policies on social issues.
Opposing him is Lagan Valley Assembly member Basil McCrea, a media-friendly figure from Lisburn, Co Antrim, who proposes more radical options. He defines himself as the liberal candidate the party requires to break out of its decline and has set himself firmly against closer co-operation with the DUP.
That issue alone, rather than the clear divisions between them on Orange Order membership and social issues, could define the election between the two.
Mr Elliott was central to the (ultimately unsuccessful) running of a single unionist candidate in Fermanagh-South Tyrone in May. Mr McCrea argues forcefully that the party’s target should be the estimated 100,000 unionists who no longer turn out to vote at all. As an east-of-the-Bann, modernising unionist, he believes he is the figure best placed to encourage them back into the party fold. Mr Elliott would simply accelerate the trend, his supporters argue.
Pundits and the bookies have placed him well behind Mr Elliott, but the odds on an easy victory by the Fermanagh candidate have closed in recent days. He has more support from the party’s Assembly group, including many who sat at Sir Reg’s top table.
Mr McCrea, on the other hand has denounced the party’s elite as “a cabal” and suggesting – but without spelling it out – that they are key to the party’s electoral slump.
The ability of that “cabal” to swing the bulk of voters tonight behind Mr Elliott will prove the deciding factor.
BASIL McCREA BACKGROUND
BASIL McCREA (51) is Assembly member for Lagan Valley.
He rose to prominence as a Lisburn city councillor who became the party candidate in the 2005 Westminster election running against former UUP member Jeffrey Donaldson.
He won his Stormont seat in 2007.
He is party spokesman on education and is also a member of the policing board which oversees the PSNI.
He holds a chemical engineering degree and a computing technology degree.
His interests include golf – he is a member of Royal Portrush – hillwalking and history.
He is not a member of the Loyal Orders.
A former spokesman for the Northern Ireland Manufacturing Group, he has a background in business and headed an internet company before opting for representative politics.
He is married with two daughters.
TOM ELLIOTT BACKGROUND
TOM ELLIOTT (47) is an Assembly member for Fermanagh South Tyrone and has a background in farming.
He has risen through the UUP ranks in his native Fermanagh, becoming a key party organiser, local councillor and ultimately a Stormont Assembly member in November 2003.
He describes himself as a "dedicated member" of both the Orange Order and the Royal Black Preceptory.
He served part-time in both the Ulster Defence Regiment and the Royal Irish Regiment of the British army for 18 years during the Troubles, joining in 1982 as a teenager.
At Stormont he is the party spokesman on agriculture.
Among his interests are his local Church of Ireland parish at Magheracross.
He is also a "passionate supporter" of Ballinamallard United Football Club.
He is married with one son and one daughter.