South Down has its say in Westminster poll

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FOR the third consecutive general election, South Down has returned Chris Hazzard as its MP.

The Sinn Féin representative first claimed the local seat in 2017 and retained it two years later, and made it three in a row when he was declared the winner of last week’s poll in the early hours of Friday morning.

It was 4.45am in Craigavon’s South Lake Leisure Centre when the declaration for this constituency was finally made – the count centre’s three other results (Lagan Valley, Upper Bann, and Newry and Armagh) had already been declared – and, whilst it was unsurprising to see Mr Hazzard win again, the degree to which his majority increased will have surprised some.

South Down had been talked up in some pre-election broadcasts as ‘one to watch’ and a constituency that could offer up ‘the shock of the night’, with the SDLP’s Colin McGrath – contesting his first general election – stated to be the likely beneficiary; however, it ultimately proved to be a humdrum contest with the incumbent easing out the eight other candidates.

Mr Hazzard took 19,698 votes to Mr McGrath’s 10,418, which signified a majority of 9,280 and a marked increase on the 2019 majority of 1,620, when the Sinn Féin MP defeated the SDLP’s Michael Savage by 16,137 votes to 14,517.

On claiming the seat for his party for the first time in 2017, Mr Hazzard outpolled the previous MP, Margaret Ritchie (SDLP), by 20,328 votes – his highest single tally in the last three elections – to 17,882, resulting in a majority of 2,446.

Diane Forsythe (DUP) came third overall last week with 7,349 votes, which was a slight decrease on the 7,619 votes taken for the party by Glyn Hanna five years ago and over 1,500 votes less than the 8,867 she polled in 2017; however, the latter two elections featured only two unionist candidates.

Andrew McMurray (Alliance) took 3,187 votes to finish fourth in the race, and, whilst this was significantly more than the 1,814 he received in 2017, it constituted a pronounced drop on his former party colleague Patrick Brown’s 2019 tally of 6,916.

In the TUV’s first Westminster outing in the constituency in 14 years, Jim Wells received 1,893 votes, securing him fifth spot.

Ivor McConnell took 1,506 votes for the party in the 2010 poll, which, incidentally, Mr Wells contested for the DUP and got 3,645 votes.

First-time election candidate Michael O’Loan (UUP) finished sixth on 1,411 votes.

In 2017 and 2019, Harold McKee and Jill Macauley respectively polled 2,002 and 3,307 votes for the party.

In Aontú’s second ever general election, Rosemary McGlone received 797 votes, which was 469 less than the 1,266 Paul Brady polled five years ago, and finished seventh.

This was also the first general election for the Green Party in South Down since 2010 – in which Cadogan Enright received 901 votes – and Declan Walsh got 444 votes to come eighth.

Finishing last, and with the lowest tally of any candidate in Northern Ireland’s 18 constituencies with 46 votes, was Hannah Westropp (Conservative).

In 2015, the last time the Tories contested a general election in South Down, Felicity Buchan’s tally was 318 votes.

In last week’s poll, Sinn Féin’s vote share was 43.5 per cent, the SDLP’s was 23 per cent, the DUP’s was 16.2 per cent, Alliance’s was seven per cent, the TUV’s was 4.2 per cent, the UUP’s was 3.1 per cent, Aontú’s was 1.8, the Green Party’s was one per cent, and the Conservative Party’s was 0.1 per cent.

In a post-election statement released on Monday, Mr Hazzard said that he was “honoured to once again be elected to serve the people of South Down as MP”.

“I want to thank everyone who came out in South Down and put their trust in me, and voted to get behind our positive vision for a better future in a new Ireland,” he stated.

“No matter what background or community people come from, Sinn Féin MPs will work hard every day to deliver on the things that matter to workers, families and businesses in every community.”

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