CONSTITUENCY PROFILE: NEWRY AND ARMAGH:THIS IS safe electoral territory for Sinn Féin and for Regional Development Minister Conor Murphy.
Seamus Mallon’s retirement in 2005 saw significant proportions of the former SDLP deputy leader’s vote simply transfer to Sinn Féin and Mr Murphy won it easily last time, with a majority of more than 8,000.
While the seat is highly unlikely to change hands at this election, the interest will lie in observing the relative strengths of the parties on either side of the constitutional divide.
In a sense, there are two elections – one nationalist and one unionist – taking place in parallel.
Mr Murphy defends his seat from a position of strength. He is a high-profile Minister, he has a healthy majority and an effective party machine which helped to send three Assembly members to Stormont.
The SDLP candidate is, again, Dominic Bradley, who is a Newry-based Assembly member. The party narrowly lost out at the last Assembly election in its bid to regain a second seat and Mr Bradley clearly has not lost all hope of some form of revival in SDLP fortunes in the area.
However, Sinn Féin’s ability in Newry and Armagh to maintain its position of strength is formidable. At the last Assembly election, it presented a radically altered party ticket and still won three of the six seats.
The holding of just one Assembly seat by the SDLP in a constituency that was synonymous with Mr Mallon just five years ago illustrates the scale of the challenge that the party faces in Newry and Armagh.
Across the political divide on the unionist side, the Ulster Conservatives and Unionists-New Force are running UUP deputy leader Danny Kennedy in opposition to the DUP’s local Assembly member, William Irwin.
Things are nip-and-tuck between the two big unionist parties, with both of them sitting on about 13 per cent support.
From his Bessbrook base, Danny Kennedy gained a little at the DUP’s expense at the last Westminster election in 2005 only to see his main unionist rivals recover that territory in the 2007 Assembly poll.
How the new electoral arrangement with the British Conservatives will play for the UUP is the big question here.
Within his party, Mr Kennedy’s star is on the rise. Were party leader Sir Reg Empey’s bold push for election in South Antrim – well away from his east Belfast home – to fail, then no doubt some in the party would support a Kennedy leadership bid.
Mr Irwin’s successes at local government level proved to the DUP leadership that the party can gain votes from its main unionist rival in an area where it once dominated.
William Frazer, who heads victims’ pressure group Fair, is again standing on an Independent ticket.
Mr Frazer also did so in the 2007 Assembly election, voicing opposition to the St Andrews Agreement which facilitated the agreement between Sinn Féin and the DUP to share power at Stormont.
However, Mr Frazer polled poorly then and he believes that there is greater momentum behind his cause this time.
Alliance, in keeping with its policy in this election of running candidates in every constituency, is standing Andrew Muir.
The North Down-based candidate used to be a member of the SDLP in that constituency before defecting two years ago.
The party did not stand in 2005 and is hoping to improve on its tiny vote gained in the 2007 Assembly poll.