The Future of Northern Ireland Politics: The Alliance Party Perspective

Northern Ireland’s governing institutions have been at a political impasse since the DUP collapsed Stormont in February 2022, and the Windsor Framework has, thus far, failed to bring about the restoration of the Assembly and Executive as both London and Brussels had hoped. Since the most recent collapse of Stormont, the Alliance Party has made electoral gains at both Assembly and local government level, and is now firmly established as the third largest party in Northern Irish politics. In her keynote address to the IIEA, Naomi Long, leader of the Alliance Party, discusses her party’s perspective on the Windsor Framework, the political stalemate at Stormont, and the need for reform of the structures set up in the Good Friday Agreement to allow parties designated “other” (neither unionist nor nationalist) to play a more equal role in Northern Irish politics. About the Speaker: Naomi Long MLA first joined Belfast City Council as an Alliance Party councillor in 2001 and was elected to the Northern Ireland Assembly in 2003. After serving as Lord Mayor of Belfast, she became the first Alliance MP elected to Westminster, as the MP for East Belfast in 2010. In 2016, Ms Long returned to the Northern Ireland Assembly as MLA for East Belfast and shortly afterwards she became Leader of Alliance. She has presided over Alliance’s most successful elections, with the 2022 Assembly election seeing the party’s representation more than double, and the 2019 European poll seeing her elected as Alliance’s first MEP. Following Brexit and the collapse of devolution, Ms Long returned to the Assembly in January 2020, serving as Justice Minister.