PRIME Minister David Cameron wants to completely merge the Ulster Unionist Party with the Conversatives, The Impartial Reporter has learned.If true, then another bizarre offer from Cameron. It might be he was jesting or attempting to push the UUP into a corner but... why bother?
Mr. Cameron made his ambitious proposal to new UUP leader Tom Elliott during talks between the two politicians on Tuesday.
But the plan has been angrily rejected by Mr. Elliott who says the UUP isn’t ready for such a merger, despite Mr. Cameron’s pleas to mend the ill-fated link-up between their two parties.
Speaking to The Impartial Reporter from the Tory Party Conference in Birmingham, the Fermanagh man revealed how he strongly disagreed with the Prime Minister’s proposal during the 25-minute-long discussion.
A couple of other strange things about this; the meeting (which included UUP Chairman David Campbell and Secretary of State Owen Paterson) lasted only 25 minutes despite also dealing with economy and the First Minister appointment process. Once the handshakes, tea and digestives were out of the way, that hardly would have left time for any kind of meaningful discussion.
Secondly, as Elliot himself says, both sides are "aware of the issues". Those issues haven't changed since the start of September and won't be changing in the future, so why haven't the options already been hammered out? Why are another "few" weeks required?
Perhaps Cameron is attempting to engineer a situation by which the UUP are the ones to walk away from the partnership, leaving the NI Conservatives free to hoover up any Civic Discontents. Maybe Tom was grandstanding to the folks back in Fermanagh, hoping to buy a bit more time before the real decisions need to be made.
Perhaps and maybe; or perhaps and maybe it simply was again evidence of a lack of professionalism and long-term strategical project management skills on the part of both the Conservative High Command and the UUP?
Update
Some Conservative grassroots' reaction here.
3 comments:
I think this shows Cameron has a detailed understanding of the situation here and that 'half-measures' simply wont work.
UUP leadership wanted some half way house and Cameron wouldnt hear of it and told they had 3 weeks to 'sh*t or get off the pot'
So here you have it in all its glory the Leader of the 'Unionist' party rejects the hand of the Conservative Party in offering the most pro Union move of our lifetimes - the political integration of NI into the UK mainstrem.
These same UUP 'leaders' are the same people that say 'oh what the Conservatives say in Opposition is never seen through, etc, etc'
This was the Prime Minister of the UK - who doesnt need their support at Westminster (not that they have any)who is likely to be in power for at least 4 years saying 'welcome'. He wanted to make a big Pro Union gesture and the UUP say NO
"UUP leadership wanted some half way house and Cameron wouldnt hear of it and told they had 3 weeks to 'sh*t or get off the pot'"
But as I said in my post, "why bother" with the three weeks, if that is indeed the case. Elliott said no to merger, end of story.
It would appear to recognise that Elliot had been in the job for a few days and needed to get his head around the seriousness of his position.
If the NI Tories get support from GB they will mop up a sizeable number of UUP votes and could cost the UUP several seats.
Elliot, rock and hard place in any order is where he appears to be.
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