Talk:Vanguard Progressive Unionist Party
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
[edit] Vanguard versus DUP
I have left the point about the UUUC nomination strategy in as it is relevant however I removed the section about West Belfast being the strongest Nationalist seat in NI as at that point in time it was debatable (in the previous years assembly elections constituencies in the West had a higher Nationalist %) Additionally the following section in bold has been removed:
The party also obtained more seats in 1975 in the elections to the Northern Ireland Constitutional Convention than the DUP (in part due to that latter underestimating their support and not always putting up enough candidates in some areas of electoral strength) "in part due to that latter underestimating their support and not always putting up enough candidates in some areas of electoral strength"
This is untrue. The DUP had 1 candidate more than Vanguard overall and contested every seat (there was no VUPP candidate in West Belfast.) VUPP were also better at attracting transfers from the UUP and other Unionist candidates. The only seat in which nominations may have made a difference was in North Antrim and there I don't believe it did. It's true that DUP had 3 candidates and 4.2 quotas but this is attributable to the party leader Ian Paisley standing there. Many VUPP supporters voted for him then cast their second preference for VUPP as the transfer patterns show. Furthermore this was somewhat counterbalanced by the situation in the neighbouring Londonderry constituency where, if VUPP had balanced better, they would have won an extra seat at the expense of the DUP.
Valenciano 11:27, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
