2014 Northern Ireland local elections
← 2011 22 May 2014 2019 →
All 462 council seats
  First party Second party Third party
 
Leader Peter Robinson Martin McGuinness Mike Nesbitt
Party DUP Sinn Féin UUP
Seats won 130 105 88
Seat change Decrease15 Decrease10 Increase11
Popular vote 144,928 151,137 101,385
Percentage 23.1% 24.1% 16.1%
Swing Decrease4.1% Decrease0.7% Increase0.9%
  Fourth party Fifth party Sixth party
 
Leader Alasdair McDonnell David Ford Jim Allister
Party SDLP Alliance TUV
Seats won 66 32 13
Seat change Decrease1 Decrease2 Increase10
Popular vote 85,237 41,769 28,310
Percentage 13.6% 6.7% 4.5%
Swing Decrease1.4% Decrease0.7% Increase 2.5%
Colours denote which party won the most seats in each council

Local elections were held in Northern Ireland on Thursday 22 May 2014, contesting 462 seats in all, as part of the wider local elections across the United Kingdom. The election took place on the same day as the European Parliament election.[1] 1,243,649 people aged 18 and over were eligible to vote, and 51.3% of the electorate turned out.[2]

Voter eligibility

All voters were required to present one piece of photographic ID in order to cast a vote at the polling station. Accepted forms of ID were an electoral identity card, an EEA photographic driving licence, a European Union member-state passport, a Translink 60+ SmartPass, a Translink Senior SmartPass, a Translink Blind Person's SmartPass or a Translink War Disabled SmartPass.[3] Voters lacking an accepted type of photographic ID had until 9 May 2014 to apply for an electoral identity card from the Electoral Office.[4]

Background

The elections represented a milestone in the reform of local government in Northern Ireland, as councillors were elected to 11 new councils.[5] These operated in shadow form until Wednesday 1 April 2015, with the current 26 councils existing in parallel until then.[1]

The 11 new councils, with links to the official lists of candidates standing ("statements of persons nominated"),[6] are:

  1. Belfast City Council (Candidates)
  2. North Down and Ards District Council (Candidates)
  3. Antrim and Newtownabbey District Council (Candidates)
  4. Lisburn and Castlereagh District Council (Candidates)
  5. Newry, Mourne and Down District Council (Candidates[permanent dead link])
  6. Armagh, Banbridge and Craigavon District Council (Candidates)
  7. Mid and East Antrim District Council (Candidates)
  8. Causeway Coast and Glens District Council (Candidates)
  9. Mid-Ulster District Council (Candidates)
  10. Derry and Strabane District Council (Candidates)
  11. Fermanagh and Omagh District Council (Candidates)

The local government reorganisation and electoral administration was mandated by the Local Government Act (Northern Ireland) 2014. Nominations of election candidates closed on 29 April 2014.[7]

The 2014 election heralds 26 councils being reduced to 11 in April 2015.
The 26 old local government districts
The 11 new local government districts

Results

Because these elections were contested with new electoral boundaries, the results are not directly comparable with those of the last election. However, psephologist Nicholas Whyte has calculated a baseline by which to judge the parties' relative performance.[8] This baseline is used in the following tables.

Results by council

Map showing the party that received the most votes by district electoral area.
Map showing the party that received the most votes by district electoral area.
Council 1st party 2011 (notional)[9] 2nd party 2011 (notional)[9] 1st party 2014 2nd party 2014 Councillors
Belfast City[10] Sinn Féin (19) DUP (17) Sinn Féin (19) DUP (13) 60
North Down & Ards[11] DUP (19) Alliance (8) DUP (17) UUP (9) 40
Antrim & Newtownabbey[12] DUP (17) UUP (9) DUP (15) UUP (12) 40
Lisburn & Castlereagh[13] DUP (20) UUP (7) DUP (20) UUP (8) 40
Newry, Mourne & Down[14] Sinn Féin (16) SDLP (14) Sinn Féin (14) SDLP (14) 41
Armagh, Banbridge & Craigavon[15] DUP (13) UUP (12) DUP (13) UUP (12) 41
Mid & East Antrim[16] DUP (19) UUP (8) DUP (16) UUP (9) 40
Causeway Coast & Glens[17] DUP (15) Sinn Féin (9) DUP (11) UUP (10) 40
Mid-Ulster[18] Sinn Féin (17) DUP (9) Sinn Féin (18) DUP (8) 40
Derry & Strabane[19] Sinn Féin (16) SDLP (13) Sinn Féin (16) SDLP (10) 40
Fermanagh & Omagh[20] Sinn Féin (18) UUP (9) Sinn Féin (17) UUP (9) 40
All eleven councils[21] DUP (145) Sinn Féin (115) DUP (130) Sinn Féin (105) 462
Council Councillors Women[22] Alliance DUP Green NI21 PUP Sinn Féin SDLP TUV UKIP UUP Independents Other
Antrim & Newtownabbey 40 8 4 15 – – – 3 4 2 – 12 – –
Armagh, Banbridge & Craigavon 41 11 – 13 – – – 8 6 – 1 12 1 –
Belfast City 60 20 8 13 1 – 3 19 7 1 – 7 – 1
Causeway Coast & Glens 40 11 1 11 – – 1 7 6 3 – 10 1 –
Derry & Strabane 40 9 – 8 – – – 16 10 – – 2 4 –
Fermanagh & Omagh 40 10 – 5 – – – 17 8 – – 9 1 –
Lisburn & Castlereagh 40 9 7 20 – 1 – – 3 1 – 8 – –
Mid & East Antrim 40 12 3 16 – – – 3 1 5 1 9 2 –
Mid-Ulster 40 10 – 8 – – – 18 6 – – 7 1 –
Newry, Mourne & Down 41 9 2 4 – – – 14 14 – 1 3 3 –
North Down & Ards 40 7 7 17 3 – – – 1 1 – 9 2 –
All eleven councils 462 116 32 130 4 1 4 105 66 13 3 88 15 1
% of total 100 25.1 6.93 28.14 0.87 0.22 0.87 22.73 14.29 2.81 0.65 19.05 3.25 0.22

Belfast

This article is part of a series within UK politics on the
Politics of Northern Ireland
Executive

 a Lowercase "d" per here.

Assembly
Law
Northern Ireland in the UK
Local government

Main article: Belfast City Council election, 2014
Party Candidates Elected
Alliance 17 8
Democratic Unionist Party 21 13
Éirígí 2 0
Green Party (Northern Ireland) 5 1
Independents 4 0
Northern Ireland Conservatives 3 0
NI21 13 0
People before Profit Alliance 1 1
Progressive Unionist Party 9 3
Republican Network for Unity 2 0
Sinn Féin 24 19
Social Democratic & Labour Party 15 7
Socialist Party (Northern Ireland) 2 0
Traditional Unionist Voice 5 1
UK Independence Party 2 0
Ulster Unionist Party 10 7
The Workers Party 6 0

Results by party

Party Councillors % of councillors First preference votes % of FP votes
2011 (notional)[9] 2014 +/- 2011 (notional) 2014 +/- 2011[23] 2014[24] +/- 2011 2014 +/-
DUP 145 130 Decrease15 31.4% 28.1% Decrease3.3% 179,436 144,928 Decrease 27.2% 23.1% Decrease4.1%
Sinn Féin 115 105 Decrease10 24.9% 22.7% Decrease2.2% 163,712 151,137 Decrease 24.8% 24.1% Decrease0.7%
UUP 77 88 Increase11 16.7% 19.0% Increase2.3% 100,643 101,385 Increase 15.2% 16.1% Increase0.9%
SDLP 67 66 Decrease1 14.5% 14.2% Decrease0.3% 99,325 85,237 Decrease 15.0% 13.6% Decrease1.4%
Alliance 34 32 Decrease2 7.4% 6.9% Decrease0.5% 48,859 41,769 Decrease 7.4% 6.7% Decrease0.7%
TUV 3 13 Increase10 0.6% 2.8% Increase2.2% 13,079 28,310 Increase 2.0% 4.5% Increase2.5%
PUP 1 4 Increase3 0.2% 0.8% Increase0.6% 3,858 12,753 Increase 0.6% 2.0% Increase1.4%
Green (NI) 1 4 Increase3 0.2% 0.8% Increase0.6% 6,317 5,515 Decrease 1.0% 0.8% Decrease0.2%
UKIP 1 3 Increase2 0.2% 0.6% Increase0.4% 2,550 9,311 Increase 0.4% 1.4% Increase1.0%
NI21 0 1 Increase1 0.0% 0.2% Increase0.2% 0 11,495 Increase 0.0% 1.8% Increase1.8%
People Before Profit 0 1 Increase1 0.0% 0.2% Increase0.2% 1,721 1,923 Increase 0.3% 0.3% Increase0.0%
NI Conservatives 0 0 Steady 0.0% 0.0% Steady 1,321 2,527 Increase 0.2% 0.4% Increase0.2%
éirígí 0 0 Steady 0.0% 0.0% Steady 2,062 1,756 Decrease 0.3% 0.3% Decrease0.0%
Workers' Party 0 0 Steady 0.0% 0.0% Steady 760 985 Increase 0.1 0.2% Increase0.1%
Fermanagh Against Fracking 0 0 Steady 0.0% 0.0% Steady 0 555 Increase 0.0% 0.1% Increase0.1%
Republican Network for Unity 0 0 Steady 0.0% 0.0% Steady 0 502 Increase 0.0% 0.1% Increase0.1%
Community Partnership 0 0 Steady 0.0% 0.0% Steady 800 388 Decrease 0.1 0.1% Decrease0.0%
Socialist Party 0 0 Steady 0.0% 0.0% Steady 682 272 Decrease 0.1% 0.0% Decrease0.1%
BNP 0 0 Steady 0.0% 0.0% Steady 491 174 Decrease 0.1% 0.0% Decrease0.1%
Democracy First 0 0 Steady 0.0% 0.0% Steady 0 173 Increase 0.0% 0.0% Increase0.0%
Others 0 0 Steady 0.0% 0.0% Steady 2,142 0 Decrease 0.3% 0.0% Decrease0.3%
Independent 18 15 Decrease 3 3.9% 3.2% Decrease0.7% 32,151 26,682 Decrease 4.9% 4.2% Decrease0.7%
Total 462 462 Steady 100% 100% Steady 660,631 627,777 Decrease 100% 100% Steady

References

  1. ^ a b "European Parliament and council polls on same day". Belfast Telegraph. Retrieved 22 August 2013.
  2. ^ "Local Council Elections - Turnout Statistics". Electoral Office for Northern Ireland. Retrieved 5 May 2019.
  3. ^ "Electoral Office for Northern Ireland: Electoral Identity Card FAQs". Retrieved 2014-04-11.
  4. ^ "Electoral Office for Northern Ireland: Electoral Identity Card, How to Apply". Retrieved 2014-04-11.
  5. ^ District and Ward Index Archived 2013-10-25 at the Wayback Machine DOENI
  6. ^ Vote 2014: Northern Ireland council candidates, BBC.
  7. ^ FAQs, Electoral Office of Northern Ireland.
  8. ^ McAdam, Noel (19 April 2013). "Unionists 'could control six new super councils'". Belfast Telegraph. Belfast. Retrieved 23 April 2014.
  9. ^ a b c Whyte, Nicholas (6 April 2014). "The 11 new district councils – projecting the 2011 votes". Slugger O'Toole. Retrieved 23 April 2014.
  10. ^ "Vote 2014: Belfast council candidates". 15 May 2014 – via www.bbc.co.uk.
  11. ^ "Vote 2014: North Down and Ards council candidates". 15 May 2014 – via www.bbc.co.uk.
  12. ^ "Vote 2014: Antrim and Newtownabbey council candidates". 15 May 2014 – via www.bbc.co.uk.
  13. ^ "Vote 2014: Lisburn and Castlereagh Council candidates". 15 May 2014 – via www.bbc.co.uk.
  14. ^ "Vote 2014: Newry, Mourne and Down council candidates". 15 May 2014 – via www.bbc.co.uk.
  15. ^ "Vote 2014: Armagh, Banbridge and Craigavon council candidates". 15 May 2014 – via www.bbc.co.uk.
  16. ^ "Vote 2014: Mid and East Antrim council candidates". 15 May 2014 – via www.bbc.co.uk.
  17. ^ "Vote 2014: Causeway Coast and Glens council candidates". 15 May 2014 – via www.bbc.co.uk.
  18. ^ "Vote 2014: Mid Ulster council candidates". 15 May 2014 – via www.bbc.co.uk.
  19. ^ "Vote 2014: Derry and Strabane council candidates". 15 May 2014 – via www.bbc.co.uk.
  20. ^ "Vote 2014: Fermanagh and Omagh council candidates". 15 May 2014 – via www.bbc.co.uk.
  21. ^ "Vote 2014 Election Results for Councils in Northern Ireland - BBC News". www.bbc.co.uk.
  22. ^ "BBC Northern Ireland council results". Retrieved 2014-06-16.
  23. ^ Vote 2011: Northern Ireland Council Elections, BBC News, 11 May 2011
  24. ^ Vote 2014: Northern Ireland Council Elections, BBC News, 25 May 2014
Categories