Claire Hanna to be formally appointed SDLP leader
· BBC NewsBrendan Hughes
BBC News NI political reporter
Claire Hanna is to be formally ratified as the new leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) at its annual conference.
The MP for Belfast South and Mid Down was the only candidate when nominations closed last month to succeed Colum Eastwood.
He announced in August he was stepping down after more than eight years in the role, but he will continue as Foyle MP.
In her first speech as SDLP leader, Hanna is expected to say that Irish unity "means a new Northern Ireland along the way".
She will set out how she wants constitutional change "because of" her social democratic values, rather than an "either or" scenario.
Hanna is also expected to say people should not be "waiting for a border poll to start changing people's lives".
The SDLP is the official opposition in the Northern Ireland Assembly, which was restored in February after a two-year hiatus.
The party retained its two Westminster seats in July's general election.
SDLP not being 'negative'
But its vote share has been squeezed over the years, falling from Stormont's third-largest party in 2017 to its fifth largest in the 2022 assembly poll.
At the SDLP conference on Saturday in south Belfast, Hanna is expected to encourage the party to look towards the future rather than its past.
On its role in opposition, she is due to say the SDLP is not being "negative" by holding the four-party devolved government to account.
She is expected to say that some Stormont challenges are due to a "failure of imagination and leadership" rather than a lack of funding from the UK government.
Hanna was re-elected in July as MP for Belfast South and Mid Down with a majority of more than 12,000 votes.
Her family is steeped in SDLP history.
Her father is a former general secretary of the party and her mother served in the Stormont executive.
During the SDLP conference, Colum Eastwood is due to make his final speech as party leader.
When he announced his decision in August, the Foyle MP said stepping down as SDLP leader would "give someone else a chance" and re-energise the party.
Former Taoiseach Leo Varadkar is also expected to attend the SDLP conference.
You can watch Claire Hanna's speech at the SDLP annual conference and follow live coverage on the BBC News NI website from 15:00 BST.