The Vice Chairman of the Conservatives in Northern Ireland, Jeffrey Peele has resigned from the Joint Committee formed to advance the promotion of the UUP/Conservative alliance and the selection of candidates for forthcoming elections.
Jeffrey Peel has sent full details of his resignation in an email to Mick Fealty of Slugger O’Toole. He also expressed his views this morning on Talkback. Having read the email, I am concerned and saddened by this development.
It is very hard to see how the agreement between the Conservatives and the Ulster Unionist Party can survive this crisis. The last paragraph of his email recommends a break with the UUP link.
“I would encourage the Party to seek a mandate to govern every part of the United Kingdom without entering into deals with other political parties”
Filed under: Conservative Party, Conservative Party Policy, David Cameron, European Elections, General Election, Normal Politics, Northern ireland, Northern Ireland politics, ulster unionist party, UUP Tagged: | Conservative Party, Conservative Party Policy, David Cameron, European Elections, General Election, Normal Politics, Northern ireland, Northern Ireland politics, tories, Tory-UUP linkup, ulster unionist party, Unionism, UUP
That’s terrible news. I’ve been rather sceptical about this deal all along although willing to give it a shot for the sake of normal politics.
But what Jeff Peel has revealed today has completely changed my mind – clearly the UUP has no intention of committing to non-sectarian, Conservative values.
The UUP are also clearly not serious about normal, non-sectarian, national politics as they’ve been trying to sabotage this new partnership while the ink was barely dry.
There’s a lot of very personalised anti-Conservative venom being spouted by UUP members all over Slugger and other blogs. It’s very depressing.
As an NI Conservative voter I believe we should put this failed deal behind us now, lets forget about dealing with the UUP or any of the other sectarian parties and focus on building up the Conservative Party as a successful national party that can deliver real non-sectarian change to the people of Northern Ireland.
We have a great future ahead of us, of that I’m sure – and we don’t need to depend on others to get there.
Seymour,
The Conservatives have tried seeking a mandate in NI in several elections, and failed misreably. Clearly they need a base to build from, which the UUP can provide, and the UUP needs to present a radical vision where people in NI can participate in national politics, which the Conservatives can provide.
To abandon a chance to really reform politics here because of the word Ulster and the Union flag is bizarre.
If this is true then it’s a sad day for democracy that Mr Peel feels he was forced out of the alliance by the Unionist’s attitude and them going back on their word.As a Tory supporter I believe they( The Unionists) should have accepted the same logo as is normal in the rest of the UK. If anything they should have bought Welsh Tory Nick Bourne and Scottish Tory Annabel Goldie in to whip the Unionists into shape.Good luck Mr Peel and don’t let them get you down!
I have kept relatively silent on these comments so far. I wrote a follow up to this on Saturday after measuring the mood on Friday night. In a sense it was artificial because many members had not at that point properly digested the news.
Jeffrey sent a more detailed email last friday night to all the Conservative members with email addresses. He has done this, knowing that he would immediately lose his position as Vice Chairman of the regional party.
That was a very big sacrifice to make and indicates the strength of his feeling. His points deserve to be debated before we can move on.