Election day is less than five months away so the latest LucidTalk/Belfast Telegraph poll will be pored over with great interest by every political party in Northern Ireland. Unfortunately for some, nothing much changed – a key point that some headlines seem to have missed.

No party moved by more than a single percentage point, which is well within the margin for error. The most important takeaway to note from this poll is the trend in the DUP’s level of support. They looked to be on a clear road to recovery after last August’s disastrous poll, but now seems to have plateaued. 

There isn’t much else to say about this poll, so instead let’s focus on where the various parties will be looking to make gains – and avoid losses.

Changes (and stability) over time

Below is a table summarising every poll on party support conducted in the last twelve months. We can place more emphasis on more recent polls. 

If these results are borne out in May, and assuming the distribution of seats looks similar, we are likely to enter a prolonged period of negotiations if the DUP refuses to enter government with Sinn Féin as the largest party. This will be hard to justify given that Sinn Féin have been the joint largest party in the Assembly since Alex Easton became an independent in July, and the First & deputy First Minister positions are essentially equal. 

It’s possible that the word ‘deputy’ will be dropped as it has always been redundant and the SDLP is already trying to do this through legislation at Westminster. However the DUP will likely push for further changes before accepting second place.

Sinn Féin: 25%

Sinn Féin’s level of support has remained steady for the past year and it looks increasingly likely that it will emerge as the largest party in May’s election. However its vote share looks set to be down from last time when it won several seats by tiny margins, so a small decline could see it suffer disproportionately big losses. 

It needs to defend seats in West Belfast, West Tyrone and Fermanagh-South Tyrone. A seat in Foyle is particularly at risk as Sinn Féin has cycled through Foyle MLAs like the DUP through leaders, leaving a big opening for the SDLP.

The party doesn’t really have serious chances of gaining new seats, largely because it won basically every marginal in 2017.

DUP: 17%

The DUP is in trouble, and has been for a couple of years. It had as many leaders in 2021 as in the whole of the previous thirty. It championed Brexit which led to the Irish Sea border, saw same-sex marriage and abortion reform legislation passed by Westminster, one of its MLAs walked out (Alex Easton) and another with the whip suspended is refusing to stand down voluntarily (Jim Wells).

To top it off a proposal to bring back double-jobbing lasted just long enough to force almost everyone in the DUP to defend it, before it was betrayed, again, by Boris Johnson.

It’s unlikely to lose as many seats as you’d expect from a party dropping 11 points, as most TUV votes should come back to it on second preferences, along with a healthy chunk of UUP votes. It’s still likely to take a big hit though. 

It also has three further problems that it needs to solve very soon: 

  1. If Alex Easton holds his North Down seat as an independent the DUP will likely lose one.
  2. Jim Wells is trying to stand on the DUP ticket despite the party leadership apparently wanting him out. If he stands as an independent he could cost the party a marginal seat in South Down – or he could win as the DUP but still not be in the DUP’s Assembly group.
  3. Lagan Valley. The DUP has its leader, former leader and current First Minister in a constituency where winning two is really as much as it can hope for.

Key seats in Foyle, North Down, South Down, South Antrim, East Antrim, North Antrim, Upper Bann, South Belfast and Strangford need to be defended, although some are less at risk than others.

The party’s two hopes for gains are West Belfast and Lagan Valley, but on these numbers those aren’t likely.

Alliance: 14%

Alliance is on course for its best ever Assembly election and, possibly, to finish in third place. Its transfer-friendliness means that even a narrow loss to the UUP on first preferences should see it pull ahead on lower preferences.

Alliance has the huge benefit of not having to play defence anywhere. It’s all about those gains. North Belfast and Lagan Valley will be chief targets. Gains are possible in other traditional Alliance places like East Antrim, North Down and Upper Bann, with the SDLP among the likely losers. Alliance could even reach out to more exotic climes, with a win in West Tyrone being very much on the cards.

UUP: 14%

The UUP is in an awkward position, squeezed by Alliance to its left, plus a charging TUV and the DUP to its right. It’s unlikely to make big gains or suffer big losses. Even if it does lose its most marginal seat in East Antrim, it’ll likely make up for it elsewhere, like Newry & Armagh or in South Belfast where it’s made headlines by running Stephen McCarthy, a working-class Catholic, as its candidate.

SDLP: 11%

The good ship SDLP appears to be drifting along as usual. However it could end up being the party with the biggest churn on election day. Foyle, West Belfast, and Fermanagh-South Tyrone, could see gains from Sinn Féin. Seats held by the DUP in South Antrim and Strangford are other possible pick ups. However, seats in South Down, Upper Bann and Lagan Valley are possible losses – all likely to Alliance.

Its general transfer-friendliness should save it in some quarters, but even this line may not hold if the main opponent for the last seat is Alliance. If it gains all of these target seats and avoids all those losses, it would be the third largest party, but finishing fifth is more likely.

TUV: 12%

The party has named candidates in every constituency so it really does mean to maximise its numbers. TUV support has hovered around 10% for a year now, and if it’s averaging 10-12% across Northern Ireland then it must be a fair bit higher in some areas. If that is the case then the prospect of it winning multiple seats needs to be taken seriously.

The TUV and UKIP won 8.5% between them in East Antrim last time out. If the TUV can unify that and bring in 5 or 6% from the DUP, a seat from either the UUP or DUP will be in its hands. A second in North Antrim is possible, with the DUP the losers.

It could even spring a surprise elsewhere, with East Belfast, East Londonderry and South Antrim being outside bets.

Other parties

People Before Profit is in full defence mode in West Belfast, especially without Eamonn McCann in Foyle. 

Neither Green seat is especially safe, although on balance it’s likely to hold both. 

South Belfast is Northern Ireland’s most chaotic constituency with only Alliance and the SDLP seats looking safe. The Greens need to get ahead of one of the DUP, UUP or Sinn Féin in order to cling on. Agnew standing down could hurt the party in North Down, although it has more breathing space there.

As for the independents, Claire Sugden is practically safe in East Londonderry. Alex Easton, however, is more of an open question.

Opinion ratings and double jobbing

Boris Johnson continues to plumb new depths of unpopularity, at -82 he’s almost as unpopular as it’s possible to be and is still falling; he’s down a further 7 points from November. 6% of respondents think he’s doing a good job.

Doug Beattie is the only leader with a positive rating at +12. Naomi Long and Colum Eastwood aren’t too far beyond (-3 and -4, respectively). Jeffrey Donaldson is remarkably unpopular, not just overall where 70% of voters have a negative opinion of him, but even a majority of unionists think he’s doing a bad job (55%). 

One of January’s more surprising stories was a late addition to the LucidTalk questionnaire. The government announced it would bring back double jobbing without consulting anyone.

It was seen as an obvious backroom deal between the Conservatives and the DUP to avoid a potential by-election defeat for the DUP if Jeffrey Donaldson moves to Stormont in May. It was swiftly dubbed ‘Jeffreymandering’ and every other NI party opposed it. The government announced it would be dropping the idea before the release of this poll.

For the record, people weren’t supportive (76% were against, including 40% of DUP voters).

On polling

Over the next few months we can expect more polls to drop as other pollsters get involved in the run-up to the election. We can also expect at least one more quarterly LucidTalk poll. More polls from more sources using more methodologies will boost our understanding and polls should be more accurate as election day approaches as voters make up their minds. 

Party campaigns are gearing up, although the DUP and Sinn Féin are yet to declare all their candidates, which will likely have a major impact on the final outlook of the campaign Indeed, bear in mind that the local constituency context matters a great deal, while lower preferences will ultimately decide who wins a lot of seats. But, for now, the latest LucidTalk poll gives us a fairly clear snapshot of where parties stand in overall first preferences as we approach what’s set to be a competitive contest.

Technical details of the LucidTalk poll:

Polling was carried out online from 14 to 17 January 2022. The survey targeted the estab­lished Northern Ireland Lucid Talk online Opinion Panel. Data were weighted by age, sex, socio-economic group, previous voting patterns, constituency, constitutional position, party support, and religious affiliation, with a weighted sample of 1,292 used in the analysis.

All aggregate results are accurate to a margin of error of +/-2.3%, at 95% confidence.