Assembly election, 20 October 1982 (seven seats)

* Elected to the 1975 Constitutional Convention

The DUP picked up the seat previously won by Vanguard, and the SDLP lost a seat to SF compared with 1975. The runner-up, Patrick Devine of the SDLP, finished on 5,986 votes, almost a thousand behind Gregory Campbell of the DUP who had 6,945.

Westminster Election, 3 May 1979 (one seat)

Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) majority: 12,407; Electorate: 94,770; Turnout: 67.6%

* sitting MP

Further consolidation of Ross's position. McAteer was the leader of the Irish Independence Party, which failed to make the breakthrough at this election. He was the son of Eddie McAteer, the former leader of the Nationalist Party, who was similarly defeated in the 1973 Assembly election.

Constitutional Convention election, 1 May 1975 (seven seats)

* Member of the 1973 Assembly

All seven members of the 1973 Assembly stood again in 1975, and all were re-elected apart from Leslie Morrell who lost his seat to the DUP's Jim McClure. McClure started with less than half a quota but benefited from UUP and Vanguard transfers to finish on 7,510, comfortably ahead of Alliance's Ivor Canavan who was the runner-up with 6,079.

Westminster election, 10 October 1974 (one seat)

Ulster Unionist Party (UUP - UUUC) majority: 9,020; Electorate: 93,207; Turnout: 71.3%

* sitting MP
@ Member of Assembly (which by this time had been prorogued)

Hume demonstrated his ability to claw into the centre vote, but Ross pulled out another 2,000 supporters as well.

Westminster Election, 28 February 1974 (one seat)

Ulster Unionist Party (UUP - UUUC) majority: 9,390; Electorate: 92,192; Turnout: (68.1%)

@ Member of Assembly

The incumbent Unionist MP, Robin Chichester-Clark, was the brother of the second-last Unionist Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, and had actually been a junior minister (Minister of State for Employment) in Edward Heath's government. He therefore stood no chance whatever of getting the Unionist nomination.

Assembly election, 28 June 1973 (seven seats)

Although Hume was the only member of the last Stormont House of Commons to stand here, McAteer had also been a member until his defeat by Hume in 1968, and was still the leader of what remained of the Nationalist Party, whose last election this was. The runner-up was Brian Brown of Alliance, who finished on 5,712 votes, well behind the anti-White Paper Unionist Shena Conn who had 8,085. (I am grateful to Brian Brown for helping me complete the presentation above by providing the full name of one of the other candidates.)

John Hume served as Minister of Commerce, and Leslie Morrell as Minister of Agriculture, in the power-sharing Executive.

Leslie Morrell, elected for the UUP in Londonderry, was a political ally of Brian Faulkner's who, however, refused to sign the pledge required by Faulkner of pro-White Paper candidates. He is listed by both Walker and Knight as pro-White Paper, but (with inaccurate shorthand) by Flackes and Elliott as anti. Bew and Gillespie's chronology states, not completely accurately, that he alone "changed sides" after the election from anti to pro. I have tallied him as pro. (Note added November 2005: I am very grateful to Mr Morrell for clarification on this point.)

See also:

Results from 1973 to 1982 for each seat: East Belfast | North Belfast | South Belfast | West Belfast | North Antrim | South Antrim | Armagh | North Down | South Down | Fermanagh and South Tyrone | Londonderry | Mid Ulster

Other sites based at ARK: ORB (Online Research Bank) | CAIN (Conflict Archive on the INternet) | Northern Ireland Life and Times Survey

Your comments, please! Send an email to me at nicholas.whyte@gmail.com.

Nicholas Whyte, 25 March 2003.