1981 Ards Borough Council election explained

See main article: Northern Ireland local elections, 1981.

Election Name:	1981 Ards Borough Council election
Type:	parliamentary
Ongoing:	no
Previous Election:	1977 Ards Borough Council election
Previous Year:	1977
Next Election:	1985 Ards Borough Council election
Next Year:	1985
Seats For Election:	All 17 seats to Ards Borough Council
Majority Seats:	9
Party1:	Democratic Unionist Party
Seats1:	7
Seat Change1:	4
Party2:	Ulster Unionist Party
Seats2:	3
Seat Change2:	3
Party3:	Alliance Party of Northern Ireland
Seats3:	3
Seat Change3:	2
Party4:	Ulster Popular Unionist Party
Seats4:	2
Seat Change4:	2
Party5:	Northern Ireland Labour Party
Seats5:	1
Seat Change5:	0
Party6:	Social Democratic and Labour Party
Seats6:	1
Seat Change6:	0
Party7:	Independent (politician)
Seats7:	0
Seat Change7:	1

Elections to Ards Borough Council were held on 20 May 1981 on the same day as the other Northern Irish local government elections. The election used three district electoral areas to elect a total of 17 councillors.

Election results

Note: "Votes" are the first preference votes.

Districts summary

|- class="unsortable" align="centre"!rowspan=2 align="left"|Ward! %
!Cllrs
! %
!Cllrs
! %
!Cllrs
! %
!Cllrs
! %
!Cllrs
! %
!Cllrs
! %
!Cllrs
!rowspan=2|Total
Cllrs
|- class="unsortable" align="center"!colspan=2 bgcolor="" | DUP!colspan=2 bgcolor="" | UUP!colspan=2 bgcolor="" | Alliance!colspan=2 bgcolor="" | UPUP!colspan=2 bgcolor="" | NILP!colspan=2 bgcolor="" | SDLP!colspan=2 bgcolor="white"|

Others|-|align="left"|Area A|bgcolor="#D46A4C"|32.0|bgcolor="#D46A4C"|2|24.7|2|9.6|1|14.3|1|0.0|0|11.9|1|7.5|0|7|-|align="left"|Area B|bgcolor="#D46A4C"|40.2|bgcolor="#D46A4C"|3|14.1|0|12.6|1|16.0|1|17.1|1|0.0|0|0.0|0|6|-|align="left"|Area C|bgcolor="#D46A4C"|39.5|bgcolor="#D46A4C"|2|28.8|1|15.5|1|6.1|0|0.0|0|0.0|0|10.1|0|4|-|- class="unsortable" class="sortbottom" style="background:#C9C9C9"|align="left"| Total|37.1|7|21.7|3|12.3|3|12.9|2|6.5|1|4.3|1|5.2|0|17|-|}

Districts results

Area A

1977: 3 x UUP, 2 x Alliance, 1 x DUP, 1 x SDLP
1981: 2 x DUP, 2 x UUP, 1 x UPUP, 1 x SDLP, 1 x Alliance
1977-1981 Change: DUP and UPUP gain from UUP and Alliance

Area B

1977: 2 x UUP, 2 x Alliance, 1 x NILP, 1 x DUP
1981: 3 x DUP, 1 x NILP, 1 x UPUP, 1 x Alliance
1977-1981 Change: DUP (two seats) and UPUP gain from UUP (two seats) and Alliance

Area C

1977: 1 x UUP, 1 x Alliance, 1 x DUP, 1 x Independent Unionist
1981: 2 x DUP, 1 x UUP, 1 x Alliance
1977-1981 Change: DUP gain from Independent Unionist