There have been
some suggestions recently that Sinn Féin’s MPs should take their seats in the
Westminster Parliament in order to change the balance of votes when it comes to
Brexit. In Ireland, the suggestion has
been made on the basis of protecting the interests of the whole of Ireland, a
basis which must surely hold at least some appeal to a party committed to a
united Ireland. The call
by the Taoiseach seems well-motivated, but unlikely to have much impact, given
the history and background of the issue.
In a rather
simplistic comment in the Guardian,
Polly Toynbee managed to reduce the whole history of abstentionism to a
reluctance to “mutter the loyal oath”,
bearing in mind that “they could always
rescind it later”. Things are much
more complex than that, but that’s a subject for another day. It made me wonder, though, why the loyal oath
is necessary in the first place.
Were they to
start ‘muttering’ it, Sinn Féin’s MPs wouldn’t be the only ones doing so
dishonestly, with their fingers figuratively crossed behind their backs. I’m certain that there are republicans in all
parties in the House of Commons who still take the loyal oath (wording here),
and in the National Assembly (which has a similar oath), even if some of them
are unwilling to admit it. All of them
have, before taking up their seats, been obliged to utter a meaningless form of
words with zero sincerity. For
understandable reasons, members of the Legislative Assembly in Northern Ireland
do not have to swear allegiance to the Crown, or take any other form of oath;
they merely have to sign the membership roll and pledge to observe a series of
rules concerning their conduct.
But if merely
signing in and agreeing to abide by the parliament’s rules is enough in one
part of the UK, why isn’t it enough elsewhere?
Why do we continue to demand that elected members solemnly lie (with or
without use of the bible) before they can do the job for which we elect
them? In one sense, it’s just a
throwback to a more deferential era; in another it’s a formal reaffirmation of
the constitutional fiction that power belongs to the monarch, not the people,
and that our elected members are there to serve the monarch not the people. Abolishing it is long overdue.
It wouldn’t be
enough to end the abstentionist position of a party which refuses to accept
that the UK Parliament has any rights to legislate for any part of the island
of Ireland, but it would be a step towards recognising that power, ultimately,
belongs to the people.
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