Eight Per Cent After Forty Years: Why Non-Sectarian Education Needs More Political Push..

El Cavador is a Slugger reader from Belfast.

Peter Shirlow’s border poll analysis, recently serialised by Slugger, offers insights that reach beyond the usual constitutional considerations. The most significant discussions emerging from this issue concern not only the more obvious practical considerations but also the increasingly prominent ‘Other’ category—a segment of voters who choose not to identify as either unionist or nationalist. They are presented with nothing but a binary political framework that fails to accommodate their perspectives. Education presents a comparable dilemma.

El Cavador highlighted a transformation in how Northern Irish families identify themselves: 47.4% of pupils in Controlled primary schools now identify as ‘Other’; ‘No Religion’ (22.2%) has become the second-largest category after Protestant. Nonetheless, the school governance framework—comprising four Transferor Representatives on BoGs, the Core Syllabus for Religious Education developed by historically dominant churches, and area planning administered by and for the two principal sectors—assumes a demographic that no longer exists.

The structural diagnosis is the same: a consociational system designed for two communities engaged in zero-sum competition is incapable of accommodating a third category that rejects the binary paradigm. Whether the inquiry concerns ‘what kind of school should my child attend?’ or ‘what constitutional future do I want,’ the system lacks appropriate categories to encompass the actual responses of today’s society. This is categorical obsolescence: the framework’s categories are no longer suitable for the population it now governs.

The Alliance party’s own leadership has articulated this structural problem. Writing in Fortnight magazine in 2022, Naomi Long posed the question directly: what happens when ‘Others’ constitute ‘a quarter, a third, or even a half’ of MLAs? She warned of ‘a crisis of legitimacy at the heart of our institutions’—the precise phenomenon documented throughout this series in educational governance.

This concluding article asks a simple question: if the system can’t reform itself, who can provide the necessary political leadership?

The Structural Incapacity

The academic literature on consociational governance identifies a generic problem: reforms that cut across communal lines face systematic resistance because the mechanisms of change are controlled by those who benefit from the status quo. Education in Northern Ireland exemplifies this perfectly. Consider the party positions as documented in their most recent Assembly election manifestos:

The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) has historically regarded integrated education as a threat. Ian Paisley characterised it as ‘a direct attack on Protestant schools’ and opposed ‘aspects of the curriculum which would suggest a coming-together of the two traditions.’ The DUP’s 2022 manifesto supports ‘shared education’—schools collaborating while maintaining institutional separation—but explicitly rejects preferential treatment of integrated education: ‘We don’t believe that one sector deserves more funding than another.’ Minister Givan’s September 2025 statement regarding ‘reasonable numbers’ further constrains the process of transformation by insisting on a Protestant/Catholic balance, thereby rendering the growing ‘Other’ demographic structurally invisible.

Sinn Féin (SF) has regarded integrated schools as ‘propagandistic: to support the British Government’s presentation internationally of the problem [of Northern Ireland] as a religious one.’ Their 2022 manifesto links integrated education with Irish-medium Education as matters of ‘parental choice’—treating integration as one option among many rather than a systemic goal. SF’s strategic interest in preserving the Catholic sector as part of Irish cultural infrastructure remains clear.

The Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) explicitly opposed the Alliance Party’s Integrated Education Act, asserting that ‘the controlled sector is accessible to all and demonstrates genuine integration at various levels,’ while the integrated and Irish-medium sectors are accorded increased protections and promotion.

This results in the structural incapacity documented throughout this series: reform requires consent from those whose institutional positions depend on the existing arrangements. The DUP advocates for Protestant Transferor interests; SF supports Catholic Maintained infrastructure; both parties perceive integration as a threat to their respective sectoral bases. Consequently, this leads to policy paralysis despite compelling evidence of demographic transformation, parental demand, and, following JR87, legal obligation.

The Case for Alliance Leadership

The Alliance Party is the only party that demonstrates ideological commitment, an established legislative record, and electoral incentive to lead educational reform.

Their 2022 manifesto explicitly states: ‘Alliance believes children should be educated together through a single, integrated education system that delivers equality of opportunity so that every child can develop their unique ability, personality, and potential.’ Unlike other political parties, Alliance conceptualises integration not as merely one ‘choice’ among many, but as the normative objective: ‘Sharing must be a first step towards integration, rather than an end point in itself.’

Alliance has already demonstrated its capacity to deliver. The Integrated Education Act (Northern Ireland) 2022 is recognised as ‘the first transformative piece of legislation for Integrated Education in the Assembly’s history.’ Despite opposition from various parties within the Assembly, the Act obligates the DE to ‘support, not merely encourage and facilitate’ integrated education, mandates the proper auditing of demand, and allocates funding for the sector.

But honesty requires acknowledging all the evidence. Integrated education has existed since the inauguration of Lagan College in 1981. After 45 years—during which Alliance has consistently championed it politically—the integrated sector still only accounts for approximately 8% of total school enrolment. The Integrated Education Act 2022 has been described as ‘transformative’; however, the DE’s Section 10 Report reveals a mere 0.4 percentage-point increase between 2016/17 and 2019/20. At this rate of progress, the realisation of universal integration would take almost 700 years.

In any other policy domain, this would be judged an unmitigated failure. If an employment programme or a housing initiative delivered such a return, we wouldn’t celebrate the legislation that enabled it—we’d ask why successive generations of advocates failed to convert political support into meaningful structural change.

Belfast East offers the sharpest illustration. Of Northern Ireland’s eighteen Assembly Areas, integrated education has established a foothold in sixteen. Belfast East is one of only two exceptions—and it is precisely the constituency in which the Alliance enjoys exceptional political strength. At Westminster, Alliance secured 40.3% of the vote in July 2024, narrowly behind the DUP’s 46.6%. At Stormont, two of five MLAs are Alliance; at the Belfast Council level, Alliance holds three of seven seats in Ormiston DEA and two in Titanic DEA. This is not a constituency in which the Alliance lacks political capital.

Yet Belfast East has no established integrated school. The presence of Scoil na Seolta—an Irish-medium integrated primary school that began enrolling pupils in September 2024—demonstrates that innovative approaches can gain traction even in historically unionist areas. Cross-boundary catchment design, transport planning to widen intake areas, and clustered transformation proposals: these are precisely the mechanisms that advocates with political capital should advance. After decades of Alliance representation, Belfast East remains without an established integrated school, raising uncomfortable questions about political priorities. Strangford, with similar Alliance representation, has eight integrated schools; East Londonderry, which has no Alliance MLAs, has four.

The demand already exists: the School Census records parental designations annually, and ‘Other’ is by far the fastest-growing category in Controlled schools. No political party has yet treated this data as a mandate for action.

The other Assembly Area without an integrated provision is Belfast West, where the political advocacy is absent. With no Alliance representation at any level, the constituency returns four Sinn Féin MLAs and one People Before Profit MLA; integrated education has no institutional champion. In Belfast East, the political will ostensibly exists but has not translated into provision. In Belfast West, political will is absent, as is provision. Neither outcome is acceptable—but the Belfast East case is the more damning. Political strength without delivery is not advocacy; it is performance.

The IEA imposed a duty to ‘support, not merely encourage and facilitate’—yet Minister Givan’s September 2025 guidance effectively nullifies this. Where is the Alliance challenge? Long’s 2022 manifesto pledged that Alliance would ‘ensure our children are no longer educated apart.’ That pledge demands a response that Alliance has yet to provide.

Notably, the electoral support base of the Alliance party aligns with the demographic transformation documented in this series. The Shirlow polling indicates that Alliance voters constitute the ‘Other’ constituency: 48% pro-UK, 27.3% pro-UI, 24.7% undecided. These figures correspond precisely to families whose children are recorded as ‘Other’ in school census data—families whose choices aren’t acknowledged by the current system. Long herself has framed this in terms of democratic equality, arguing that the current system treats those who don’t identify as unionist or nationalist as ‘second-class citizens without equal voice or equal vote.’ The same disenfranchisement operates in education: families who designate their children as ‘Other’ find their choices systematically discounted by governance frameworks premised on Protestant/Catholic balance. When Alliance advocates for integrated education, it represents the interests of its constituents’ children.

A Policy Programme

What should Alliance—or any party serious about reform—actually do?

Immediate: JR87 Compliance. The Supreme Court’s November 2025 ruling is unambiguous: Religious Education in Controlled schools must be delivered ‘objectively, critically and pluralistically.’ A JR87 Implementation Bill should require the DE to bring RE provision into compliance by September 2026. A new syllabus must be developed with input from minority faiths, non-religious groups, and educational experts—not exclusively by the four churches whose monopoly has been found unlawful.

The ‘Other’ Recognition Amendment. The Integrated Education Act 2022 should be amended to require that ‘reasonable numbers’ assessments account for the ‘Other’ demographic. Minister Givan’s guidance requires a Protestant/Catholic balance for Transformation approval. When more than one-third of Controlled primary pupils identify as neither Protestant nor Catholic, this framework is obsolete.

Area Planning Reform. Area planning processes should be required to consider integrated options before approving new provision or significant capital investments in segregated schools. Currently, the two primary sectors plan independently, with integration treated as an afterthought.

Governance Transition Pathways. The ‘Other’-majority schools documented in this series face a democratic deficit: 71% of Belmont Primary pupils are designated as ‘Other’, yet four Board members represent the Transferor Churches. New pathways should facilitate schools’ transition to integrated governance without requiring full Transformation ballots. Schools are currently locked into models that parents would clearly choose to opt out of.

External Pressure

The comparative evidence from Bosnia-Herzegovina, Cyprus, and Lebanon demonstrates that consociational education systems can’t reform themselves from within. Court rulings prove necessary but insufficient; political systems structurally dependent on division find ways to circumvent or minimise compliance. This suggests that Stormont alone can’t deliver meaningful change.

The October 2025 judgment in In re JR 335 and JR 336 demonstrates this precisely. When parents challenged Minister Givan’s refusal to approve transformation proposals for Rathmore Primary School and Bangor Academy, the High Court dismissed both applications. Mr Justice McAlinden held that unmet demand in a catchment area doesn’t automatically satisfy the ‘reasonable numbers’ requirement if that demand comes ‘solely or overwhelmingly from the majority religion at the school.’ The court explicitly condemned ‘litigation strategies’ that bring ‘policy challenges’ before the courts ‘in the guise of a legal challenge.’ This effectively closes the judicial route as a primary mechanism for systemic change: courts will declare the status quo unlawful (JR87) but refuse to compel reform through the Transformation process. This distinction is crucial: courts adjudicate violations of rights but don’t mandate policy outcomes.

Westminster. The Good Friday Agreement references education on seven occasions—more than any other topic. Westminster retains reserve powers and possesses a legitimate interest in ensuring adherence to human rights standards. If Stormont fails to achieve JR87 compliance, Westminster may intervene. Historically, Direct Rule ministers promoted integration when local politicians couldn’t.

Dublin. The Irish Government’s Shared Island investments in Northern Ireland’s education sector could be contingent on progress toward integration. The Shared Island Initiative has already funded UU Magee and projects, including the RAISE Programme, aimed at educational underachievement and disadvantage. Similar investments could prioritise integrated or integrating schools.

Civil Society. All Children Together and groups such as Humanists UK provide external pressure that enables politicians to act. The JR87 case succeeded because determined parents pursued legal remedies that the political system would never have provided.

What About the Other Parties?

SF and the SDLP: JR87 addresses Controlled schools, but the principle—that confessional instruction without meaningful alternatives violates human rights—applies equally to Catholic maintained schools. A proactive approach toward ‘Religion and Worldviews Education’ across all sectors would safeguard Catholic schools while also evidencing a commitment to the ‘Other’ families increasingly represented within them.

DUP and UUP: Educational reform could be reframed not as ‘attacking Protestant schools’ but as making the Controlled sector genuinely welcoming to the growing ‘Other’ population—many of whom are culturally Protestant but religiously unaffiliated. A Controlled sector that can’t accommodate its own demographic reality isn’t sustainable. The question for unionist parties is whether they wish to preside over that sector’s slow erosion or lead its transformation into something that serves the community as it is today.

The Same Pathology, the Same Solution

Returning to the Shirlow discussion, the most revealing exchange concerned the Secretary of State’s criteria for calling a border poll. Hilary Benn refuses to specify thresholds, maintaining that the Agreement gives him discretion based on whether ‘it appears likely’ that a majority would vote for constitutional change. Critics note this means the goalposts can always move.

The parallel concerning education is clear. Minister Givan’s statement regarding ‘reasonable numbers’ establishes a criterion for approving transformations based on Protestant/Catholic balance. Educational institutions with ‘Other’ majorities—regardless of their size—can’t demonstrate the requisite balance because the framework doesn’t recognise their positions. As the High Court confirmed in October 2025, schools must demonstrate capacity to attract pupils from the ‘minority religion,’ a requirement that renders the ‘Other’ demographic structurally invisible.

This represents the same pathology. The current system resulted from competition between two communities over territory, resources, and recognition in a zero-sum context. It can’t accommodate a constituency that refuses a binary frame. The parallel extends to governance structures: just as the Assembly’s consociational design treats ‘Others’ as second-class citizens, Controlled school Boards of Governors—with Transferor Representatives from three Protestant churches—afford no representation to over one-third of Controlled primary pupils designated as neither Protestant nor Catholic. The legitimacy crisis Long warned about at Stormont is already apparent in school governance. The growth of Alliance illustrates both phenomena: it’s the political manifestation of a demographic for whom the system wasn’t originally conceived.

But pathology implies a cure. If the system can’t undergo self-reformation due to the predominance of beneficiaries over mechanisms, transformation requires external catalysts. JR87 exemplifies one such approach: dedicated litigants, receptive courts, and authoritative judgments that the political system must acknowledge.

Conclusion

This series has documented a system in crisis of legitimation. Parental choices supporting segregation receive institutional recognition and resource allocation. Parental choices supporting integration—through Transformation ballots, through ‘Other’ designations, through enrolment patterns—face systematic refusal. Courts identify human rights violations but defer remedies to a political process structurally incapable of delivering them.

Alliance appears best placed to provide leadership because its voters are the unrecognised ‘Other’, its ideology aligns with reform, and it has demonstrated legislative capacity. Nonetheless, effective leadership requires proactive measures beyond mere manifestos. Compliance with JR87 can’t be deferred until the next Assembly term. Guidance regarding ‘reasonable numbers’ must accurately reflect demographic realities. External pressure should be actively cultivated rather than passively anticipated.

The numbers are clear. The law is clear. The precedents show what happens when consociational systems refuse to adapt: temporary measures become permanent, and court rulings gather dust. At the same time, the electorate loses faith in institutions that can’t, or won’t, serve them.

Northern Ireland need not follow that path, but avoiding that outcome will require political leaders who are prepared to act in accordance with the evidence rather than to defend inherited positions. The question is no longer whether reform is necessary—JR87 has addressed that. The question is whether any party will provide the leadership to deliver it. Those who chose ‘Other’ are watching. They vote. And they’re not going away.

This is the final article in a series examining educational governance in Northern Ireland. Previous articles: ‘The Transformation Majority That Doesn’t Count’ (I); ‘It’s Not Just Protestant Schools’ (II); ‘Take Down the Hurdles’ (III); ‘The Irony of Integration’ (IV); ‘Time to Flip the Switch’ (V); ‘Beyond Indoctrination’ (VI).

Sources: Re JR87 [2025] UKSC 40; JR87, Application for Judicial Review [2024] NICA 34; Integrated Education Act (Northern Ireland) 2022; Department of Education, ‘Position Paper on Reasonable Numbers’ (September 2025); Shirlow, P. (2025) ‘Border Poll Reality Check: Demographics, Data, and Decades of Debate’, University of Liverpool/Slugger O’Toole; DUP Assembly Election Manifesto 2022; Sinn Féin Assembly Election Manifesto 2022; Alliance Party Assembly Election Manifesto 2022; TUV Assembly Election Manifesto 2022; Collins, G. (1992) ‘Political Attitudes to Integrated Education’; Roulston, S. and Hansson, U. (2021) ‘Integrated Education: Concepts, Policies and Contested Spaces in Northern Ireland’, in Education, Conflict and Globalisation; Gallagher, T. (2021) ‘Educational leadership in a divided society’, School Leadership & Management; Hughes, J. and Loader, R. (2023) ‘Shared Education and the Future of Schooling in Northern Ireland’, Queen’s University Belfast; Reimer, F. et al. (2021) ‘Lessons from Educational Reform in Post-Conflict Societies’; Moffat C. (2013) ‘The right to integrated education in Northern Ireland’ Shared Space; NICIE (2021) ‘Section 10 Report’; DENI Granular Religion Statistics 2024/25 (obtained via FOI by Parents for Inclusive Education NI); In re JR 335 and JR 336 (Integrated Education) [2025] NIKB (15 October 2025); Long, N. (2022) ‘Naomi Long’s Alliance’, Fortnight Magazine.