The reaction in portions of the Irish media would doubtless have vindicated the UUC grassroots in their choice – if, that is, any of them read southern newspapers. Dick Grogan, then Northern Editor of the Irish Times, stated that ‘he clearly regards compromise as a surrender, and that bodes ill for all-party talks … His quick temper and truculent manner will indeed bring a drastic change of image to the party leadership and align it more closely to the manner of political conduct favoured by the DUP.’27 But Trimble’s allies in the media were delighted. Ruth Dudley Edwards, writing an open letter to Trimble in the Dublin Sunday Independent on 17 September 1995, advised him to ‘learn from your enemies: Sinn Fein has much to teach you. First, its leaders have had the humility and good sense to learn painstakingly how to present themselves. We may laugh at their Armani suits, we may sneer about their use of image consultants but the fact remains that they leaped straight from enforced media silence to a mastery of the media. So please do what every other political party does and have your spokesmen take basic courses in television technique. And persuade them that it is not un-Protestant to smile or demonstrate that sense of humour they exhibit in private … one last tip: if the UUP is intent on modernising itself, isn’t it time it invested in an answering machine for your Glengall Street headquarters?’: one such device was soon acquired, and Trimble himself bought a mobile telephone. Significantly, she counselled Trimble against forming a pan-unionist front with the DUP, and urged him to surround himself not with ‘hardline friends’ but with liberals such as Ken Maginnis and Reg Empey; this, of course, is exactly what happened and may well be what Trimble wanted to happen all along anyhow (though it remains open to question how much influence she exerted towards that end). The Daily Telegraph also stated that despite his uncompromising line on decommissioning, ‘it would be wrong to conclude that his election necessarily represents a setback for the peace process … a strong Unionist voice is badly needed to redress the imbalance that has been allowed to develop within the peace process’.28 But it was not only instinctive Unionists who were pleased: Andrew Marr in his Independent column correctly predicted that despite the images of Drumcree, ‘the great Crustacean is shedding its shell. David Trimble’s election as leader of the UUP is only the first stage in what is likely to be a dramatic reshaping of Unionist politics … he is something rather new, a modernising but utterly committed Ulster Unionist. To bien pensant opinion that probably sounds about as likely as finding a vegetarian head hunter or a druid with a PhD. But it is real and fascinating and of great importance … I think he will be difficult, and sharp, and unfamiliar, and it is clear that these are exceptionally dangerous and sensitive times. But it seems a little odd to go on for years about stupid Unionists and then panic when you get a clever one. That’s part of the lesson of the past twelve months. This man has a conscience and a fast mind. And for the time being he is the future of Northern Ireland.’ Unsurprisingly, Marr was in regular contact in this period with No. 10, the NIO – and with Trimble’s friend, Ruth Dudley Edwards.29
Handling the press was, appropriately enough, Trimble’s first task after his victory. He held a one-and-a-half-hour press conference at Glengall Street the following morning. Trimble immediately acceded to this idea. But, as ever, Trimble’s approach was more complex than his pronouncements suggested. For although the new UUP leader understood the importance of the media better than anyone, his personal engagement with the press was much less ‘proactive’ than his election manifesto suggested: often, it had to be laid out on a plate for him. If rung by any journalist, he would certainly give very generously and courteously of his time. But as Matthew d’Ancona observes, Trimble never went out of his way to cultivate or even to contact somone as sympathetic as himself – an approach which d’Ancona characterises as ‘light years removed from the attitude of a New Labour Cabinet minister’.30 Charles Moore, erstwhile editor of The Daily Telegraph, and Michael Gove, assistant editor of The Times, likewise confirm that unless they contact Trimble, they would never hear from him from one year to the next; and although he is a long-time subscriber to The Spectator, Trimble never made much effort to contact successive editors. Nor did any of these mainland outlets receive many press releases from the UUP: their support for Unionism predated his arrival on the scene and subsequently owed little to Trimble’s own actions. Indeed, Trimble came to know key figures in the London print media in the early to mid-1990s largely through the agency of David Burnside, who wanted to build up Trimble as a putative deputy to John Taylor, in preparation for the post-Molyneaux era. Having come to know the London quality press, Trimble enjoys their company and values their good opinion. But to woo them would, in his world-view, have smacked too much of ‘brown-nosing’. In that sense, he started out as the most unconventional of British political leaders – and remains such to this day.
TWELVE The Establishment takes stock
AS Trimble and his supporters celebrated their victory, members of the British-Irish Association were enjoying their post-prandials in the very different surroundings of St John’s College Cambridge. Most of those who attended this annual conference of the great and the good fully expected that the winner would be the pragmatic John Taylor or perhaps even the liberal Ken Maginnis. But when Frank Millar, now the London editor of the Irish Times, conveyed the news in the bar, there was a general sense of horror.1 Many of the guests would have shared Marigold Johnson’s distaste for ‘that ghastly man Trimble’; now, they feared that the far right had taken over the UUP and that the victor of Drumcree would end the ‘peace process’.2 (She would later come to change her opinion of him for the better and believed he was the best choice of leader for that time.) The British and Irish states, though, could not afford such self-indulgence. Now, they had to work with him. Yes, there was apprehension – as always occurred with any ‘changing of the guard’ in the remarkably stable Northern Ireland party system. Indeed, one minister was reported as saying that ‘I choked on my Frosties’ when he read in a Times editorial that the newly elected UUP leader was a ‘moderate’.3 The minister in question was Michael Ancram, who now claims that he did so out of surprise rather than disgust.4
But when all was said and done, the British state’s private audit of Trimble’s election was more finely balanced than is commonly supposed. According to John Bruton’s contemporaneous note of a conversation with the British Prime Minister on 23 September 1995, ‘Major said David Trimble was a prickly man, into detail, not grand conceptions. Don’t reject his ideas too quickly…’ Woodrow Wyatt’s diary for 17 September 1995 records the British Prime Minister as observing that ‘there was nothing to worry about because he’s a clear thinker but it shows the IRA and Sinn Fein that he’s a tough customer. He said “He’s a lawyer and a very good one and, being on the right wing of the Ulster Unionists, he’ll be able to make them agree to things which his predecessor couldn’t.”’