Dean Godson – Himself Alone: David Trimble and the Ordeal Of Unionism (страница 32)
But in the immediate term, the majority which exercised the minds of everyone in this period was the shrinking Tory margin in the House of Commons. Although nationalist Ireland assumed that as a consequence of this arithmetic Molyneaux exercised vast influence, the UUP did not see it that way (indeed, if anything, the reverse was the case, precisely because the Tories did not want to be seen to be bending the knee to the UUP).21 Trimble believes that Molyneaux was wrongly accused at the time by his own tribe of not extracting enough from Major. But from his own subsequent experience as leader, Trimble concludes there was very little that could be extracted from the Tories, since although the British Government was generally weak, it was not weak in the affairs of Northern Ireland and could always call on Labour for bi-partisan support in a crisis. Trimble’s private criticism of Molyneaux, rather, centred around his habit of meeting the Prime Minister alone. His objections were two-fold, on both mechanical and on political grounds. First, it was often difficult both to conduct a negotiation and to take notes – particularly when there were differences in recollection over what had been agreed. This would then expose him to accusations within the UUP of having been gulled by another Tory Prime Minister. Second, such an accusation was harder to maintain when senior colleagues were roped into these discussions.22
These concerns were felt particularly keenly by the younger cadres in the UUP. They would increasingly look to Trimble as their standard-bearer in the coming months, as the contours of the two Governments’ detailed proposals for the future of the Province became apparent. These built upon the statement of principles in the DSD and were known as the Frameworks Documents – and, as in 1991–2, were based upon the three-stranded approach. Michael Ancram, assisted principally by the Political Director of the NIO, Quentin Thomas, had been working on them since early 1994 and Molyneaux had appointed Jeffrey Donaldson, Reg Empey and the party chairman, Jim Nicholson, as the UUP liaison. Once again, Trimble was on the periphery of his own party. Nonetheless, No. 10 thought it best to keep him sweet: Trimble was summoned to Major’s suite in the Highcliff Hotel, Bournemouth, in October 1994 for a conversation with the Prime Minister. Major asked him what would he do in his position – a stock ploy which often flattered his interlocutor.23 Trimble was taken aback – he was rather less experienced then in dealing with senior government figures – and informed Major that he would proceed in the same way but that he would test the Provisionals’ sincerity against events. Major, in turn, concurred. Major then added, ‘You know, I’m a Unionist.’ Trimble then replied: ‘I know that, I don’t think you’re going to sell us out in the sense of taking us into an Irish Republic. My concern is that you would see an opportunity for settling the problem and that would involve what would appear to you a minor concession but would to us be a vital interest.’24
The episode was curious for several reasons. Did Major already view Trimble, the youngest and most junior of the UUP MPs, as a potential leader – or perhaps as potential spoiler of the Government’s plans? Trimble himself is not sure. But Major says that he spotted Trimble as ‘able and ambitious. I thought it would be useful to get to know him. He was likely to be the voice of the grassroots.’25 This view was widely held in Whitehall by the officials, too, and they may well have drawn it to Major’s attention. Thus, Dame Pauline Neville-Jones, who chaired the Joint Intelligence Committee and later became Political Director of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, states that Trimble was already seen as a potential counterweight to Paisley – and a clever one, at that.26 If so, it was a rare instance during the post-ceasefire period when ministers actively cultivated and sought the views of Unionist MPs. For though they handled the UUP with great skill in the run-up to the DSD, Major’s whips’ office touch deserted him and his colleagues during the run-up to the Frameworks. Partly, this was because after the DSD and the first IRA ceasefire, their attention was mostly focused upon the political and ‘military’ intentions of the republican movement. Indeed, many Unionists believe to this day that the Irish Government showed a very ‘Green’ draft of the Frameworks Documents to Sinn Fein/IRA before its publication in order to secure an IRA ceasefire and to bind them into the process – though Irish officials still deny that this was the case. Whatever the truth of the matter, Trimble himself believes that in the attempt to draw republicans into conventional politics, they tacked so far in a nationalist direction that they forfeited the UUP’s acquiescence, for a short while at least. Thus, at the time of the IRA ceasefire Molyneaux – seeing that his three appointed representatives were no better informed of the two Governments’ plans – again offered to run an ‘Ulster eye’ over the Frameworks, as he had with the DSD. Mayhew wrote to Molyneaux to say that this would be very helpful but that the document was still very much at the drafting stage and that it would not quite be the done thing for the UUP leader to talk to civil servants.
In the eyes of the civil servants, there were sound, time-honoured reasons of Whitehall practice about this: the Frameworks were, they insist, a quite different kind of document from the DSD. First, Frameworks was a negotiating document, not a definitive statement of principle. It was a starting point, and therefore to prenegotiate it with any one party, especially one which almost held a balance of power in the Commons, would expose the British to accusations of adopting an uneven approach. Such pious formalism contrasted with rumours emanating from Dublin. Most worrying from a Unionist perspective were the claims made by the former Taoiseach Albert Reynolds (whose Fianna Fail-led Government had fallen in November 1994 following a scandal and had been replaced by a coalition led by the more instinctively anti-republican Fine Gael leader, John Bruton) that all-Ireland bodies with executive powers had been agreed between the British and Irish Governments. This, of course, would have been a reprise of the Council of Ireland which had proven so offensive to Unionists during the abortive Sunningdale experiment of 1973–4 – or worse. Trimble was also receiving his own warnings from his old Vanguard colleague on the UUP liaison committee with the NIO, Reg Empey. These indicated, he believed, that NIO civil servants had ‘run amok’.27 Molyneaux tried to engage Major in a ‘control’ exercise, but by the time Major was prepared to show him a draft it was too late. Indeed, Molyneaux remembers that when Major invited him into the Cabinet room to look at the draft version, the Prime Minister said he would leave him sitting at the Cabinet table whilst he went upstairs – and the UUP leader should ring the bell when he was finished. Major pushed the explosive paper across to the septuagenarian Ulsterman; the Ulsterman promptly shoved it back in the direction from whence it came. Molyneaux pointed out that he could not influence its basic direction and that by looking at it on Privy Council terms he would thus become acquiescent in its provisions.28
Such concerns soon ceased to be the preserve of the Unionist political classes and became dramatically clear to the Unionist population and to the world at large. In January 1995, David Burnside was shown a draft copy of the Frameworks Documents. Before he placed it in the press, Burnside went to see Molyneaux. ‘I have seen them and it is terrible and disastrous.’ ‘What do I do?’ asked Molyneaux, taken aback. ‘Go and see Robert Cranborne,’ said Burnside, referring to the most ardent Unionist in the Cabinet. ‘I don’t want to compromise his position in the Cabinet.’ Burnside flared up: ‘For Christ’s sake, this is the Unionist cause we’re talking about here.’ Burnside also told Trimble of its contents, though the latter never saw the document and thus was unable to evaluate any later changes that were made when the final paper was actually published.29 The extracts were then shown to a