Talk:2nd Northern Ireland Assembly

Page contents not supported in other languages.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Untitled[edit]

1) Surely Berry should be listed as an Independent 2) Should Elieen Bell not be listed as Presiding Officer and not APNI? Traditional unionist 17:07, 28 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure how the Presiding Officer affects the member's listing - the opinion on Slugger O'Toole in response to my own question appears to be that they remain members of the party for the purposes of calculating allocations of posts on the Executive et al.
Similar given the way the Assembly operates I think a distinction should be drawn between Independents who designate as Unionists and Independents who designate as Others (and also from any Independent Nationalists). Berry's recent comments in the media have been clear that he is still a Unionist so how about listing him as an "Independent - Unionist" with Deeny as "Independent - Other? Timrollpickering 19:45, 28 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Whats going to happen in terms of d'Hondt calculations is anyones guess with Donaldson defection vs Berry resignation vs Bell's appointment. I'd be inclined to list Bell as Presiding Officer giving the Alliance 5 MLAs not 6.
Also I'd be inclined to list Berry and Deeny as independants with (Unionist) and (Other) appended to their names.
Traditional unionist 21:21, 28 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The calculations I've seen suggest that a) allocation of seats will be based on the numbers on the day so it will be DUP 32, UUP 24 (unless they can get one of the three other Unionists to join the assembly group), Sinn Fein 24 (Francie Molloy's back in), SDLP 18, Alliance 6 (I think we need to check just how the Presiding Officer works in the party balance rules before changing this one), PUP 1, UKUP 1, Independent (Other) 1, Independent Unionist (1).
In terms of ministerial posts this would have a split of DUP 3, Sinn Fein 3 (they tie with both the DUP and the UUP for the final place but the tie-breaker is the number of first preference votes in the last assembly elections divided by the number of positions + 1 already received), UUP 2 and SDLP 2. I think Alliance would have to wait until at least a 14th seat before qualifying, and if Bell's position as Presiding Officer removes her from the calculations then they would drop back at least four places.
If Berry had stayed in the DUP they would take the last place at Sinn Fein's expense, if any of the three detached Unionists join the UUP (which Berry might be tempted to do if he's serious in his comments about maximising Unionism as a whole) they get the last seat (or for that matter the seven Others - though I doubt any of them would do so, even if they personally would take a ministry such as Health for Deeny). For that matter if Molloy had still been suspended on the crucial day Sinn Fein would slip behind the UUP and all the horse trading becomes unnecessary. (If the Unionists and Nationalist were all counted in two blocks the split would be 6:4, as for that matter would virtually all calcuations before Berry went out.)
However Nick Whyte's site has a page covering the abortive nominations of 15 July 1999 which a) puts the Alliance in a position in the nomination order that suggests it was based on 6 seats not 5 but b) ignores the existance of the Nothern Ireland Unionist Party and seems to be assuming the UKUP had 5 members not 1 (its place is far ahead of the PUP 2 who don't appear at all). It seems not everyone was up to scratch on the rules either (as noted on the page Eddie McGrady declined to be nominated as Minister of Health, Social Services and Public Safety which should have meant the SDLP's right to nominate any more ceased!). Timrollpickering 02:58, 29 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]


This is something I've interested in since Donaldsons defection to the dark side. Sorry to name drop but I had a chat with McGimpsey on this about 18 months ago and he was insistant that it ran on the numbers each party when the members signed the book on taking their seats. This raises a number of questions. 1. What if Tom Hamilton had defected to the DUP prior to Tom Benson's death and signed in as a DUP member? 2. Did John Alderdice sign in as APNI and resign the whip subsequently? 2. Was this rule changed when the NIWC redesignated or was that in standing orders and this statutory? If its staturtoy does the 2006 bill currently before Parliament change that part of the 1998 act?

All of these questions lead me to believe that we should list Berry as Independant (Unionist) (Elected DUP) and Bell in the category Presiding Officer with (elected Alliance) appended to her name. I think that this gives the most accurate assesment of the current party strengths as we currently stand. It is my personal political judgement but I do not think that Berry would have the UUP, nor do I think that we would have him! What I believe he is actually doing is making futile cooing noises at Paisley.Traditional unionist 17:55, 29 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It seems you're getting David Ervine instead. BBC News story
The story suggests Ervine will remain PUP leader but take the UUP whip (mainly to give them one over on the numbers game - see above). So how do we list him?
At the risk of going off onto a tangent, how do you feel about a formal alliance with the leader of the political wing of a terrorist group? Timrollpickering 23:23, 13 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The PUP is the political wing of the UVF in name only.The Party is not sectarian and strongly supports the Good Friday Agreemnet.it's just a pity they've kept their 'special relationship' with a terrorist organisation who have killed 17 times more civilians than republican paramiltiariesDermo69 19:00, 5 June 2006


There was no concensus on Bell. I'd be minded to list her as Speaker and APNI as having 5 members.Traditional unionist 19:31, 26 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified[edit]

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Members of the 2nd Northern Ireland Assembly. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 18 January 2022).

  • If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
  • If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 07:31, 8 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified[edit]

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on List of members of the 2nd Northern Ireland Assembly. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 18 January 2022).

  • If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
  • If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 07:59, 11 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Move discussion in progress[edit]

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:List of members of the 1st Northern Ireland Assembly which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 13:31, 28 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:2nd_Northern_Ireland_Assembly&oldid=1197004127"