It’s thanks to you Mrs Robinson as Tories turn their backs on DUP

IT is a sign of the times — and a tribute to the political deftness of Ireland’s man in London, David Cooney — that the embassy in Britain will hold its first reception at a Conservative party conference this autumn.

In times gone by, such a move would have been unthinkable: Tory equalled unionist equalled the enemy. The cause of Ireland was the cause of Labour, with or without a capital “L”.

But now everyone is united round the Good Friday agreement and Labour is 20 points behind in the polls it makes sense for the state-sponsored Guinness (and champagne, presumably) to flow in Tory Birmingham as well as in Labour-run Manchester where the comrades will gather to knife or bury the hapless Gordon Brown.

Besides, isn’t capital the real cause of Ireland these days? And it’s not just Ireland that has been contemplating the Conservatives lately; the Tories have been doing their own thinking about Ireland. Last week’s announcement of a working party to discuss the possible reunification of the Conservative and Ulster Unionist parties surprised many observers and visibly upset the DUP whose leader, First Minister Peter Robinson, had been having his own discussions with David Cameron’s party about the potential for collaboration.

Had Cameron lost his touch, some wondered? What was to be gained from a tie-up with unionism’s poor relation? Isn’t the DUP, with its potential to hold the balance of power at Westminster, the people to do business with? Didn’t it all go to prove that Cameron — and the Tories generally — are out of their depth when it comes to matters on the Celtic fringe? The Tories’ attitude to the national regions has gone pretty much full circle in the space of three years.

Acutely aware that the British government since 2005 has relied for its majority on Scottish Labour MPs who can vote on English-only legislation while Scottish-only legislation is the preserve of the Edinburgh parliament, the Tories toyed with separatist ideas. As they currently have just one Westminster MP from Scotland (to Labour’s 39), three from Wales (to Labour’s 29) and, of course, none in the north, it made sense to Cameron for Labour’s asymmetric devolution settlement to be made fairer, allowing the Conservatives’ strength in England to express itself. Recently, though, more unionist voices in Cameron’s inner circle have been raised.

George Osborne, the Tories’ finance spokesman and unofficial deputy leader, in particular, has been asking how it would look if the Conservatives were held responsible for the break-up of the UK, not least if the 1980s were to repeat themselves and the Tories were seen to provoke Scottish nationalist sentiment. Wouldn’t a partnership involving the whole UK (including the north), not just the whole of Great Britain, answer criticisms that the Tories are “the English party”? Furthermore, if the Conservatives were in government at Stormont with the nationalist party par excellence, Sinn Féin, wouldn’t that clear the way for new approaches in Edinburgh and silence doubts about the Tories’ commitment to devolution?

The question remains though: why have the Tories forsaken the more tempting deal with the DUP? Aren’t they supposed to be within the Pale these days now they are operating the Stormont institutions? The truth is that for all the testiness that characterises UUP-Tory relations, the DUP blew it. Many of today’s unionist politicians cut their teeth at the time of the Anglo-Irish agreement of 1985, Thatcher’s “betrayal” of their interests.

That disloyalty, as unionists saw it, was felt all the more acutely by those in the UUP who had previously supported the Conservatives, frequently against the class interests of many of their constituents. The DUP folk memory, meanwhile, contains no such sense of bitterness and, especially under their new leader, they crave respectability.

So what went wrong? In short, everything — and Peter Robinson and his wife are entirely to blame. The Tories could conceivably have understood the DUP wielding their parliamentary muscle over the issue of detention of terrorist suspects without charge, saving Gordon Brown’s skin in the process. His majority was just nine, precisely the number of seats the DUP hold.

After all, did anyone really expect the DUP — or the UUP — given their experience of terrorism, to take a libertarian line? But if, as has been alleged, the DUP actually didn’t like the 42-day measure but traded their votes on a big national question for a prime ministerial promise not to relax the abortion laws in the north, wasn’t that a bit unsporting, not to mention parochial? Tory perceptions were only hardened by Iris Robinson taunting their benches, holding up nine fingers. And then the First Minister’s wife did it again. Calling homosexuality an “abomination” might be biblical but it was hardly going to endear the DUP to a Tory shadow cabinet that includes two openly gay MPs and is desperate to appear in touch with modern, secular, multicultural Britain.

As if enough damage hadn’t been done, Mrs Robinson then claimed that “the government has a responsibility to uphold God’s laws”. Which God, Martin McGuinness asked, reasonably enough: the Protestant god, the Catholic god, the Hindu god(s), Allah, who? To cap it all, it was reported that Mrs Robinson had told a Commons committee “there can be no viler act, apart from homosexuality and sodomy, than sexually abusing children”. The so-called Notting Hill set — the well-heeled, right-on inhabitants of Torydom’s Dublin 4 — blanched. Who were these Neanderthals, they asked? Are they British at all? After these outbursts, the nice-but-dull UUP seemed reassuringly familiar and with the Tories perceived as the coming force across the water, opening discussions made sense to the UUP too.

Not only is there the opportunity to influence the non-devolved agenda — including the all-important allocation of funds to Stormont — and to hold ministerial office at Westminster, but a keen sense also that here might be a way of differentiating the UUP from the DUP. Who’s the more British now, they might ask their electorate? Supporters of a Fianna Fáil link-up within the SDLP would love to challenge Sinn Féin similarly on the question of Irishness.

THIS is far from a done deal. The UUP and the Orange Order might be separated — if not quite divorced — but adopting the fuzzy-wuzzy language of the “Cameroons” will still be a challenge. And then there is the “Sylvia issue”. Lady Hermon, currently the only UUP MP and something of an admirer of Tony Blair in his time, will have to be convinced that the new Tories really are as compassionate as they are conservative.

If the grassroots and the MP for North Down can be squared, though, and with the DUP structures atrophying as members express their disgust at the Sinn Féin partnership, it is just conceivable that the UUP can find a new life and purpose. One UUP by-election win in Co Down in the context of a split hardline ticket doesn’t make a summer but, for the first time in years, people are asking: has the DUP peaked? After recklessly burning its bridges over the last few weeks, the prospect of a Tory government — especially one that might include David Trimble in its ranks — must fill them with disgust and dread in roughly equal measure.