The 1985 Local Government Elections

These elections were the first held under revised boundaries for the district electoral areas, reflecting population growth largely in the Belfast hinterland. More significantly, they were the first local goverrnment elections to be contested by Sinn Féin; although the 1981 contest had taken place in the midst of the hunger strikes, the party did not decide to contest elections until the 1982 Assembly came along. SF took 59 local government seats, a total they would not exceed until 1997. Most of their support came from sweeping up the votes of many independent Nationalist councillors and crushing the Irish Independence Party; in this election there was surprisingly little erosion of the SDLP vote. The UUP opened up a lead over the DUP, winning all five new seats in Lisburn and all four in North Down; Alliance slipped back a bit further from what was already a low point, and other minor groups popped up here and there. See spreadsheet archive.

Results by Party

Party 1985 Results 1985 Percentages 1985 Councillors
UUP 188,497 29.5% 188
SDLP 113,967 17.8% 102
DUP 155,297 24.3% 156
SF 75,686 11.8% 59
Alliance 45,038 7.0% 33
WP 10,415 1.6% 5
IIP 7,459 1.2% 3
PUP 3,612 0.6% 2
UPUP 3,139 0.5% 2
Prot U 2,970 0.5% 1
NILP 1,285 0.2% 1
LPNI 1,029 0.2% -
Newtownabbey Labour Party 792 0.1% 1
ULDP 782 0.1% -
Lab TU 556 0.09% -
Ind DU 429 0.07% -
Ecology Party 387 0.06% -
IRSP 276 0.04% -
CPI 245 0.04% -
All Night Party 235 0.04% -
Ind Rep 187 0.03% -
People's Democracy 131 0.02% -
Ind WP 113 0.02% -
Ulster Liberal Party 35 0.005% -
Ind Lab 30 0.005% -
Ind U* 8,780 1.3% 8
N/Ind N 7,597 1.2% 6
Ind 10,297 1.6% 9

* Ind U covers 5,363 votes cast for "Independent Unionists", of whom 4 were elected; 2,930 votes cast for candidates described simply as "Unionists", 3 of whom were elected; and 487 votes for a "United Unionist" elected in Cookstown.

Results by Council

Council UUP DUP SDLP SF Alliance WP IIP Others Seats
Antrim 8+ 5+ 4++ 1+ 1 0 0- 0 19++++
Ards 6+++ 8+ 0- 0 3 0 0 1 NILP, 1 UPUP, 1 Ind 20+++
Armagh 11+++ 3 7 1+ 0 0 0 0 22++
Ballymena 6+ 15++ 1+ 0 0 0 0 1 Ind 23++
Ballymoney 6+++ 6- 2 1+ 0- 0 0 1 Ind 16
Banbridge 8 3- 3+ 0 0 0 0 1 Ind 15
Belfast 14+ 11---- 6 7+++++++ 8+ 1+ 0 2 Ind U, 1 PUP, 1 Prot U 51
Carrickfergus 7++++ 3---- 0 0 3 0 0 1 PUP, 1 Ind 15
Castlereagh 8+++ 10+ 0 0 3- 0 0 0 21++
Coleraine 10++ 6 2 0 2+ 0 0 1 Ind 21+
Cookstown 3- 5++ 3-- 4++++ 0 0 0 1 "United Unionist" 16+
Craigavon 11++ 6- 5 2++ 0- 2 0 0 26+
Derry 5+ 5 14 5+++++ 0 0 1--- 0 30+++
Down 7+ 3 10++ 2++ 0- 1 0 0 23+++
Dungannon 8 3 5++ 4++++ 0 0 0- 2 Ind Nats 22++
Fermanagh 8 2 4 8++++++++ 0 0 1--- 0 23+++
Larne 6++ 6 0 0 2- 0 0 1 Ind Nat 15
Limavady 7+ 2 4- 2++ 0 0 0- 0 15
Lisburn 13+++++ 8-- 2 2++ 3+ 0 0 0 28+++++
Magherafelt 3+ 4 4- 4++++ 0 0 0- 0 15
Moyle 2-- 3+ 4- 2++ 0 0 0 2 Ind U's, 2 Inds 15
Newry and Mourne 7+ 2 14-- 5+++++ 0 0 1--- 1 Ind Nat 30
Newtownabbey 10+ 9++++ 0 0 2- 0 0 2 Ind U's, 1 Newtownabbey Labour, 1 Ind 25++++
North Down 8++++ 6+ 0 0 7+ 0 0 2 UPUP, 1 Ind U 24++++
Omagh 4 4 5 6++++++ 0-- 0 1---- 1 Ind 21+
Strabane 3 4 3- 3+++ 0 0 0 2 Ind Nats 15
Total 189 142 102 59 34 4 4 32 562

Parliamentary Constituencies


See also: The constituencies | Single Transferable Vote | The political parties | The NI Executive | Useful books and links

Results from 1983 to 1995 for each seat: East Belfast | North Belfast | South Belfast | West Belfast | East Antrim | North Antrim | South Antrim | North Down | South Down | Fermanagh and South Tyrone | Foyle | Lagan Valley | East Londonderry | Mid Ulster | Newry and Armagh | Strangford | Upper Bann

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.

This page has been developed with the support of a project grant from the New Initiatives Fund of the Electoral Commission. However, any views expressed on this page or, in particular, other pages of this website are those of the author and not necessarily shared by The Electoral Commission.
Tineke Vaes, 20 May 2003.


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