Opposition to Brexit has propelled the leader of Northern Ireland’s Alliance party to a dramatic victory in the European elections.
Naomi Long, an outspoken advocate of a second referendum on the UK’s European Union membership, won a seat on Monday with 105,958 first preference votes after almost trebling support for her party compared with the 2014 election.
“I’m speechless for once,” she said at the count centre. “The people who voted for me came together from right across the community … to send a message. That message is: ‘We want to remain in the EU.’”
Diane Dodds of the Democratic Unionist party (DUP) and Martina Anderson of Sinn Féin both held their seats, as had been expected.
The most watched battle was over Northern Ireland’s third seat which was vacated by the Ulster Unionist party’s (UUP) Jim Nicholson, who retired.
Unionists traditionally hold two of the three seats but Long, whose cross-community party is neither nationalist nor unionist, rode a wave of antipathy to Brexit.
“I was really clear when I went out campaigning what I wanted the vote to stand for – it’s a vote to remain, it’s a vote to have a people’s vote,” she said.
In the 2016 referendum Northern Ireland voted 55.7% to remain. On a turnout of 45% in last Friday’s election, some 57% of voters chose pro-remain candidates.
Victory for Anderson and Long means that two of Northern Ireland’s three MEPs are remainers. Dodds, like her DUP MP husband Nigel, is an ardent leaver.
Anderson topped the poll with 22.2% first preference share, followed by Dodds with 21.8%.
For the third seat Long fought off Colum Eastwood, the leader of the SDLP, a moderate nationalist party that opposes Brexit, and several unionist candidates. She won 18.5% of the first preference share and passed the threshold with transfers from eliminated candidates.
The Alliance leader attributed part of her success to unionist remainers left “homeless” by unionist parties all embracing Brexit.
Business and farming leaders as well as civil servants have warned that a no-deal exit from the EU could devastate Northern Ireland’s economy.
The Alliance, which strives to cut across constitutional lines and avoid green or orange labels, has long been the smallest of Northern Ireland’s five main parties.
Sinn Féin and the DUP continue to dominate but the UUP and SDLP have withered, prompting claims by some Alliance members that they are now the third-biggest party.
