Northern Ireland: The Protestants and the ceasefire

After a year of ceasefires, Ulster Unionists are displaying a mixture of emotions which include apprehension about their political future, mistrust of the British government, suspicion about the IRA and Sinn Fein, and fear of any prospect of Irish unity.

This is unsurprising, given that such have been the Protestant preoccupations for more than a century. But overlaying those traditional concerns are new feelings: hope for the future, a tentative willingness to think of new departures, a readiness on the part of at least some to contemplate compromise. Above all, there is huge, palpable relief that the troubles seem to be over.

But the traditional wariness is being tempered with new hope. The IRA may still be out there, but the awful procession of funerals no longer dominates the nightly news. The peace is greatly appreciated, even though Unionist politicians have yet to provide a coherent picture of how it came about, and how they should now react to it.

The Rev Ian Paisley maintains that the IRA cessation is a trap and that Protestants now face "the worst crisis in Ulster's history," while the Ulster Unionist party regularly predicts that the IRA is itching to go back on the offensive.

But the consensus in the Protestant community as a whole is that the situation is one of opportunity rather than peril, with the past 12 months offering much evidence that the grassroots are much more upbeat than their political representatives.

One obvious sign of this lies within the loyalist paramilitary community, where newly-emerged spokesmen such as David Ervine and Billy Hutchinson have taken a strikingly more conciliatory and open line than mainstream Unionist politicians.

One freshly-painted mural on Belfast's loyalist Shankill Road features the traditional man with a gun, but today he stands under a slogan: conflict or compromise. The underground loyalist groups still exist, but their ceasefire has, like the IRA's, been marked by a high degree of discipline.

The year brought a number of unwelcome developments for Unionists, including the international feting of Gerry Adams, but the protracted arms de-commissioning dispute between the government and Sinn Fein helped reassure many that the republicans are not getting everything their own way.

Another major setback came with publication of the Anglo-Irish framework documents in which London and Dublin set out a joint vision of the future which was far too green for Unionist tastes. But the documents brought no street protests.

Many sections of the Protestant community have been much more enthusiastic than their politicians. Businessmen, welcoming the new stability, are showing a pragmatic openness to new cross-border trading opportunities. Early unease among the largely Protestant members of the Royal Ulster Constabulary has been largely dispelled by assurances that job losses are not imminent.

Tough political negotiations lie in the future, but there is not, as yet, a particularly sharp apprehension about what they could produce. When they do arrive, the question is whether s ome Unionist de Klerk will emerge to attempt a historic new deal, or whether the traditional stonewall will again be deployed.

In recent years, the Protestant community has been in psychological retreat, alienated from the government, fearful of its long-term future and imbued with the sense that it was inexorably losing out. Many of the factors which generated that angst are still present, but the ceasefires have markedly lifted communal morale, raised possibilities for a new beginning and brought fresh cheer. This summer Protestants had two unwonted pleasures, the sun and the peace; and they have been basking and luxuriating in both. David McKittrick