Leader will focus on 'shared future' agenda in address to party meeting

KEYNOTE SPEECH:DUP LEADER and First Minister Peter Robinson is expected to place particular focus on the shared future agenda when he delivers his keynote speech to his party's annual conference in the La Mon Hotel on the outskirts of east Belfast today.

Mr Robinson is also likely to emphasise the success of the Northern Executive in agreeing a programme for government over the next four years against the difficult backdrop of the global recession and a cutback in funding of £4 billion (€4.7 billion) from Westminster to Northern Ireland.

He is expected to expand on speeches he had made over the past two years on developing the concept of “shared education”, and also to address the issue of tackling sectarianism.

The DUP Minister for Health Edwin Poots, meanwhile, told the conference, which opened yesterday, that significant change was about to happen in the British National Health Service (NHS) in Northern Ireland. “Let no one be under any illusion: change is coming,” he said.

“Much will be welcomed. Other aspects will no doubt not be, by some. Indeed there will be times when some in this room, our own elected representatives, will have reservations. But that is the nature of government. For too long, decisions were ducked in my department. Those days are over. I won’t run away from the challenges that lie ahead,” he added.

“I am not interested in managing continuing decline. The ‘do nothing’ era is over. We must aim for excellence rather than just plain ordinary. The task of placing the NHS in Northern Ireland back on a firm footing has begun,” said Mr Poots.

Nelson McCausland, DUP Minister for Social Development, told delegates a social welfare system must be developed that protects the vulnerable but encourages people to seek work.

“We have a situation now, across the United Kingdom, where many people are trapped within the benefits system, and to get out of it would mean additional financial hardship which they cannot afford,” he said.

“That is one of the flaws in the current system, and that is why we need a system that provides a suitable safety net for the most vulnerable, but one in which it is always better to be working,” he added.

“Having a welfare support programme is a good thing for society, but the need and the remit need to be clearly defined and established,” said Mr McCausland.

The Minister added: “At its inception in the 1940s the welfare state was designed to be a safety net to catch those most in need in our society and to work, where possible, in partnership with individuals to get them back into economic activity.

“Work is good for our well-being and so we must do all we can as regards creating jobs and supporting as many as possible of those who are unemployed to get back into work or perhaps into work for the first time.”

PAUL GIVAN

The Assembly chamber isn’t noted for its stirring oratory, but Lisburn MLA and chairman of the justice committee Paul Givan (29) has impressed observing political reporters and, much more importantly, some of the DUP hierarchy, with his sharp mind and even sharper delivery.

When Jeffrey Donaldson stood down from the Assembly in 2010 in favour of Westminster, Givan was co-opted to replace him, winning the Lagan Valley seat properly in the election of May this year.

His grandfather Herbie Givan was an important influence. He was in the Protestant Unionist Party and along with his brothers Cecil and Wallace played a part in the formation of the DUP. These brothers all lived in south Tyrone near Dungannon in tight and dangerous times.

“The lesson I learned from him is that you have to have a backbone.”

GAVIN ROBINSON

Gavin Robinson, who celebrated his 27th birthday on Tuesday, was headhunted by Peter Robinson (no relation) to become one of his special advisers at Stormont. That puts him in the political fast-track.

A Belfast city councillor and qualified barrister, he is viewed as a possible great DUP hope to take back the East Belfast Westminster seat Peter Robinson lost to Alliance’s Naomi Long last year.

When the opportunity came to work full time with Peter Robinson, it took Gavin Robinson barely a moment to decide to set aside the Bar for Stormont. “Politics is where my passion is.”

Married to Lindsay, Robinson comes from a fairly apolitical family, but was politicised at the time of the Belfast Agreement when he was just 13. “The freeing of the prisoners, the end of the RUC and mandatory government with Sinn Féin – that’s what I could not understand, and that’s what fuelled my interest in politics.”

SIMON HAMILTON

Strangford MLA Simon Hamilton (34), currently private secretary or “shadow” to the Minister for Finance Sammy Wilson, will be the next DUP minister of finance under the DUP’s job-sharing policy.

At meetings, Wilson describes Hamilton as his “apprentice”, prompting others to declare, à la Lord Sugar, “You’re fired.” It’s a joke that’s wearing thin but Hamilton endures its repetition, knowing that big challenges and opportunities lie ahead.

In the late 1990s Hamilton attended regular Ulster Unionist Council meetings, where Ulster Unionists tore themselves apart. He finally left to join the DUP.

Hamilton, a regular Presbyterian, confounds any lingering notion that you must be an evangelical Protestant to progress within the DUP.

It’s been clear for years that Robinson has high regard for him. Hamilton was first elected to the Assembly in 2007 and re-elected this year.

BRENDA HALE

New MLA Brenda Hale, now 42, was 17 when she met her husband Mark, also 17, in her home town of Bangor in 1985. “He said he was a fireman because in 1985 you didn’t say you were a British soldier on a first date.”

Two years ago Capt Hale went to the assistance of fellow soldiers caught in a “daisy chain” of exploding bombs in Afghanistan. He rescued three soldiers – two of whom survived – but was fatally injured in the blasts.

Hale’s eldest daughter, Tori (18) is in college in Bristol, while Alexandra (10) is in her final year in primary school. They talk a lot about Mark, who was of Jewish and Catholic background, “to build up the happy memories”.

Her husband’s death was the catalyst for Hale becoming involved in politics, pushing for the rights of British army widows and other army people who are bereaved, as well as doing general work for her constituents.

DANIEL KONIECZNY

Three years ago after joining the DUP, Daniel Konieczny (29), a “personal development coach”, attended his first party conference in Armagh. He heard delegates regularly using a phrase unfamiliar to him, so when he addressed the hall he used it too.

“Nie Poddamy Sie,” he declared. That’s “No Surrender” in Polish. And that’s how the DUP’s only publicly declared – as far as we know – Catholic member came to be warmly embraced by the DUP faithful.

When he first came to the North in 2004 he worked up to 20 hours a day, determined to follow advice given to him by compatriots: “Work hard, earn as much as you can and run out, because they’re gonna shoot you or burn your house or burn your car.”

But some racist incidents propelled him into community action to defuse tensions and build up relations – work that he has pursued since, and led him into the DUP.