Fire aplenty, brimstone lite

As befits the son of a fearsome loyalist pastor, Ian Paisley Jr has no shortage of fire in his belly. The rhetoric may be less incendiary, but his father’s footsteps have led to Westminster.

It’s inescapable: you can only interview Ian Paisley Jr within the long shadow cast by his father. Ian Sr was the ‘big man’ of hardline Ulster unionism for over four decades before entering into a historic power-sharing deal with Sinn Fein in 2007.

“He broke the mould,” his son says, with obvious fondness. “Most political careers end in failure, but his ended on success. He got a pacemaker fitted a few weeks ago, just before his 85th birthday, and he believes he won’t need to get it changed until he is 100.” Following a long apprenticeship in Northern Irish politics, Ian Jr, who shares an obvious family likeness if a less towering frame, has taken on his father’s Westminster constituency of North Antrim. “My father said not to enter politics,” he smiles. “That isn’t to say that he isn’t proud that his children did, but he knew that it involved hard knocks.”

But growing up in the Paisleys’ Belfast home during the Troubles meant that his father was an unavoidable source of inspiration. “To me it was normal. We would talk about politics in the way that people would talk about football. It was just that our father was doing these amazing things. I grew up in a secure household, though when I was born he was in jail. People either had extreme admiration or extreme and unjustified hatred.” And while Paisley the Younger shares his father’s flair for controversy, he is a politician of a less violent era, and speaks a more temperate language than his father used at the same age.

“I have huge respect for people no matter what their religious and social background,” he insists. When asked about his earlier outspoken views on homosexuality, Paisley Jr now says: “I think I have grown up since then. I have strong Christian beliefs and moral viewpoints, but you have to realise that while sin is black and white, life is a lot of grey. You have to be mature about these things. I can strongly disagree with those viewpoints, but the point is how you disagree.”

Those last three words – how you disagree – could even be seen as the credo of modern-day Northern Irish politics. Since the build-up to the 1998 Assembly, when “you thought the talks could collapse every day ”, Paisley notes the “incredible normalisation” of Northern Irish politics now. “It was fast and furious back then, and I kind of miss that part of it, but boring politics is a good thing for Northern Ireland.” He deplores the recent killing of a Catholic policeman, insisting that Northern Ireland people “don’t want to fight: we want prosperity, opportunity and hope – the same things I want for my family. We don’t want this constant fear which permeates society.”

While language may have changed, the underlying drive is the same. Like his father, Paisley “cherishes the Union”, and he has fought passionately for its survival since he studied at Queen’s University, Belfast. “This was post-hunger strikes, and it was a cold place for Protestant students, even more so if your name was Paisley,” he recalls, and when Mairead Farrell, a student and IRA member, was shot by the SAS, Paisley opposed attempts to mark her death. “It would have brought us into complete disrepute. I had to organise a protest – a physical protest – because we wanted to make a stand for what we believed in.”

That campaign was followed by a successful fight to release three Ulster Defence Regiment soldiers previously convicted of murder, with Paisley realising that he had “the ability to change things – so I thought I should do that for the benefit of my community”. He began working for his father’s Democratic Unionist Party, with predictable consequences. “There was a lot of resentment and a lot of jealousy because of who my dad is, and I had to prove myself. If I had been called Richard Smith and risen to those heights, with the talents I had, then they probably would have accepted it more easily.”

In the following years, Paisley worked with his father to bring about a political settlement – the term ‘peace process’, he says, “doesn’t form part of my vocabulary” – and was involved in talks at both Leeds Castle and St Andrews, where he repeatedly demanded that Sinn Fein should make a public pledge on supporting the police force in Northern Ireland. “Tony Blair asked me to persuade my father against asking for this, but we held out.

That was when Sinn Fein crossed the Rubicon in their ideological beliefs. I don’t have a good opinion of Sinn Fein, don’t get me wrong, but once that happened we could treat them as equals.”

While it was “tough” to watch his father sharing a platform with Sinn Fein’s leadership, Paisley accepts that “in any process you have to get to the point where trust comes in: and if the Big Man says it must be right, then despite our problems, we shall go forward”.

Paisley’s own career, however, briefly stalled. In 2008 he faced allegations of improper business links with a property developer, accusations which led him to resign as an Assembly minister. Five ombudsman’s inquiries, “initiated by colleagues”, found the claims to be unsubstantiated. “It was nasty, driven by jealousy, and very tough on my wife and kids. People wanted to get the Big Man out of the way and get that job for others. But I handled it with grace and dignity, and I came back [at the 2010 Westminster election] with a massive majority of support from an electorate that stood by me.”

Having first been taken around Parliament by his father while a “wee lad” and deciding – he laughs, but I suspect he isn’t joking – to become an MP at six years old, Paisley Jr says he felt “at home” when he arrived at Westminster and immediately quit his seat at Stormont.

“Being a member of the Northern Irish Assembly was a beneficial part of my life, but I knew that I wanted to be in the 600-year-old Parliament as opposed to the six-year-old one,” he explains, making no attempt to mask his ambition. “Stormont is largely a grand county council – if you want to be vocal for Northern Ireland, influence national politics and things which affect us locally, then Westminster is the place to do that. It’s crucial, strategically, to be represented here.”

But the DUP, of course, no longer has its leader in London. Having succeeded Paisley Sr as party leader in what Paisley Jr calls “hurly burly” circumstances, Peter Robinson lost his parliamentary seat in 2010, with his wife Iris’ affair damaging the Robinson brand.

“It’s a disappointment, but we are where we are. The electorate made their choice and we have to listen,” reflects Paisley. “It has been a salient lesson to our leader and it affects how he has conducted himself, how he performs, and how he sees himself.”

Robinson bounced back though in last week’s Assembly election, and despite stories of deep-seated dynastic factionalism within the DUP, Paisley Jr insists he is happy with his own job. “There was a lot of jealousy because of a view that [the leadership] was my ambition, even though it never was,” he argues. “I’m in my mid- 40s: I have no desire for it.”

But after he alludes to jealousy once again, might following such a well-known father into politics have been harder than he expected? “I’m doing this because I want to, not to suck up to my parents – I know they love me anyway. I believe I have the talent, the votes, and the support. My dad told me to make sure you do what you do for the right reasons, and to enjoy every moment.” He pauses, then asks: “Do I look happy?”

His father’s footsteps are truly huge ones to follow, and there will surely be more jealousy to contend with. But Ian Paisley Jr’s broad smile answers his own question emphatically.

Have your say...

Please enter your comments below.

Name

Your e-mail address

Listen to audio version

Please type in the letters or numbers shown above (case sensitive)