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Saturday, 06 February 2010

Durkan slams SF in last leader speech

SDLP leader Mark Durkan MP makes his final speech at the SDLP Annual Party Conference in Newcastle.

Mark Durkan has hit out at Sinn Fein in his last speech as leader of the SDLP at a conference in Newcastle.

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He said they have failed to protect his parties right to being given the role as justice minister once powers are devolved from Westminster.

"Sinn Fein have connived with the DUP to circumvent D'hondt," according to Mr Durkan.

"They pretend that they will support an SDLP nominee for the justice ministry, when they handed the DUP the very veto that would frustrate that rightful nomination."

The former finance minister in the Stormont Executive, MP and MLA for Foyle is quitting after a decade at the top, to concentrate on his role at Westminster.

The outcome of a leadership battle between Social Development Minister Margaret Ritchie and South Belfast MP Alasdair McDonnell will be known on Sunday.

Mr Durkan who is 49 is a life-long politician and former student union leader with a commitment to social justice and tackling inequality.

His last day as leader coincided with the announcement of a deal on the devolution of policing and justice powers from London to Belfast.

'Sinister agenda'

"We want to confound the sinister agenda of so-called dissidents, so-called republicans," he said.

"We want to make sure that devolution works a lot better than it has been doing."

The youngest of seven children, he was reared by his mother Isobel after his father Brendan, a Royal Ulster Constabulary inspector, was killed in a road accident.

The relatively youthful Mr Durkan draws inspiration from the black civil rights activist Martin Luther King, whose portrait is displayed in his office in Foyle.

He has also worked closely with late US Senator Ted Kennedy having served an internship with the leading Democrat in Washington in 1985.

Known for his easy sense of humour, Mr Durkan quipped that he was the only politician to get in trouble for sleeping with his wife after his expenses for a hotel night in London were queried by the Westminster authorities.

He is also a keen Manchester United supporter.

He lives in Derry and helped regenerate the Irish nationalist party after the end of Nobel Laureate John Hume's period as leader.

When Mr Durkan took over the leadership he was the only contender and his coronation followed the devastating 2001 election which saw Sinn Fein overtake the SDLP, winning Westminster seats in West Tyrone and Fermanagh-South Tyrone.

However, in 2005 he held the Foyle MP's seat against a strong challenge from the rival nationalist party and saw South Belfast MP Alasdair McDonnell returned against the odds in a largely unionist area.

Now he takes a back seat and waits to see who will be his successor amid an executive coming to terms with its new security responsibilities and a whole raft of fresh issues on the horizon.

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4 Comments

At 21:54 on 06 February 2010, doirecormac wrote:

I agree with Joe. The SDLP brought the Sinners in from the cold and they have spent the time since undermining and destroying the democratic process (bad as it was). The Sinners most recent 'victory' for their 'equality agenda' is as Mark Durkan has said to ignore the SDLP's right to the Justice Ministry and hand it to the Alliance party in order to appease the DUP.

At 21:30 on 06 February 2010, Chris wrote:

In January 2009 Mark Durkan MP said in his key-note address to the SDLP “Deep in me is a belief in this party and the people in it. We have it in us to recapture lost votes and recover lost ground”...then collapse. Mark Durkan had his head in the clouds. He was speaking to a party on the road to collapse with no political direction. What kind of a leader steps down at a cross-roads for its party when it is slowly splintering? A weak one. A strong leader would have taken the party beyond the cross-roads then allowed them to build their own future with continued support. Was he pushed? “If it was a matter of being forced out I offered my resignation a couple of years ago and it was refused, declined,” he said. This doesn’t seem to me as someone who has a “deep belief in this party and the people in it”. The SDLP are finished as a political party. Is there only viable option a merger with Fianna Fail and becoming an all-island party and lose their own identity? This would be an obvious desperate attempt to try and claw back some credibility with Nationalist voters on the question of a united Ireland. and in truth, would Fianna Fail want them?, other than to use them as a stepping stone into all Ireland politics, personally I can’t see any benefits in adopting that” lame-duck”. Bye-bye SDLP...

At 19:46 on 06 February 2010, Joe wrote:

I've no particular loyalty to the SDLP but while they may be a spent force now it is important to remember the critical role they played in moving this little corner of hell forward. Not everything goes on forever and whether they have a future or not, they should be congratulated and thanked for the work they did in building a path to progress.

At 17:42 on 06 February 2010, Conall wrote:

And so the history of the SDLP comes to a slow, uneventful end. Ritchie to win: SDLP to go out of existence by 2016/17 at the very latest. Don't rule out some sensible Stoops jumping ship and joining the Soldiers of Destiny's crusade in the North! They're a sad bunch - clearly contributed so much to the peace process, but are now viewed as insignificant and hopeless.