BRITISH CONSERVATIVES and Ulster Unionists are "natural allies" who have similar views and philosophies about "UK-level issues", the Tory deputy leader has told The Irish Times.
Speaking before his address to the UUP conference in Belfast at the weekend, William Hague said it was only right that the two parties co-operate at the next Westminster election so that the Northern electorate would “be able to be part of [a] winning majority”.
UUP MPs could serve as ministers in a David Cameron-led government, he added. He denied that his party’s official ties with unionism meant an appeal was being made to one section of Northern Ireland society only.
“Let’s see if we can change politics to some extent,” he said. “That has got to be the aspiration. It’s certainly our aspiration. I think this will help in that regard because it helps to introduce other issues.” Voters might want to vote on issues such as tax, he suggested, “not on an old-fashioned sectarian basis”.
Mr Hague added he would not set the rules on who could stand as a Conservative and unionist candidate and would not be drawn on his stance on the selection of members of religious organisations such as the Orange Order.
“This new force will be a very positive influence . . . We have to conduct ourselves in the right way for it to be that influence . . . It is a very genuine attempt to say to people here’s one of the opportunities to move on . . . the people of Northern Ireland want representation. This is the only effective way we can bring that about.”
Asked about the position of the UUP’s sole MP, Lady Sylvia Hermon, who opposes the link with the Conservatives, Mr Hague said no one was being “shoe-horned” into the new partnership. “She will have to make her own decisions about the way forward.”
In his speech Mr Hague said religion and background were unimportant factors in choosing candidates. The only criterion which mattered as a Conservative and unionist Westminster candidate, he said, was the ability to do the job. “It’s not where you’ve come from that matters to us but what you can offer as together we seek to build a shared future for everybody in Northern Ireland,” he said.
The shadow foreign secretary also explicitly announced a future Conservative government in Britain would not permit Bloody Sunday-style public inquiries. Politicians elected in Northern Ireland would also have to decide between serving in Stormont or Westminster, he said, thus ending the practice of “double jobbing”.
Mr Hague denounced the British government’s stance on the Lisbon Treaty and pledged that a Tory administration would change the law to require future transfers of sovereignty to the EU to be put to a referendum in the UK.