United Labour Party

This was a 'democratic socialist' party launched in 1978. One of the founding members was Paddy Devlin who had been a member of the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP). On the question of the constitutional position of Northern Ireland, the party's policy was that it should only be changed if that was the will of the majority of the electorate and the change would further political accommodation. Devlin stood as a candidate in the 1979 European election and received 1.1 per cent of the first preference votes. Some of the people who had established the ULP went on to form the Labour Party of Northern Ireland (LPNI) in 1985.