Tag Archives: Union

The Belfast/Good Friday Agreement at 25: what does the future hold for the Agreement?

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As the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement reaches its 25th anniversary, a new report for the Unit by Alan Whysall, Honorary Senior Research Associate, asks whether this is a time for constitutional change, and assesses its future.

The Agreement at 25 builds on two earlier Constitution Unit texts: the Report of the Working Group on Unification Referendums on the Island of Ireland of May 2021, and a Unit discussion paper on Northern Ireland’s Political Future, of May 2022.

At the Agreement’s quarter-centenary, its principal political institutions have been in suspension for a year, leaving Northern Ireland effectively without government. Political discourse has polarised, notably over Brexit and the Northern Ireland Protocol. And the debate on constitutional issues, whether Northern Ireland remains in the UK or joins a united Ireland, has sharply intensified.

The report focuses first on the debate on the Union versus Irish unity; but concludes that early constitutional change is unlikely, and in any event not calculated to resolve Northern Ireland’s key current problems. The report urges that serious and committed efforts are necessary, not least from London, to revive the Agreement and the promise it once offered. Otherwise much of the progress we have seen under the Agreement may be in danger.

Union or unity?

The Agreement is clear: whether Northern Ireland remains in the United Kingdom, or joins a united Irish state, is a matter for consent (by simple majorities) in each part of the island, and no one else.

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Can muscular unionism save the Union?

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Several UK politicians have been described as embracing a ‘muscular’ form of unionism, which includes taking a hard line against the possibility of constituent parts of the UK leaving the Union. As Iain McLean warns, muscular unionism can look like ‘know your place unionism’ and history has shown that such a muscular approach can backfire and hasten the very secession it seeks to prevent.

The phrase ‘muscular unionism’ is new but the concept is not. As Prime Minister, Boris Johnson called Scottish devolution ‘a disaster north of the border’. Liz Truss said while campaigning for the Conservative leadership that she would ‘ignore’ the ‘attention seeker’, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon. She was true to her word, never contacting Sturgeon or Mark Drakeford, First Minister of Wales, during her premiership. Lord (David) Frost, who served as a member of Johnson’s Cabinet, recently wrote:

The Scottish “government” is not the government of a state in confederation with England. It is a subordinate entity within the UK, with powers granted to it by the UK government and Parliament, and ultimately subject to the supremacy of that Parliament.

It does indeed sound muscular, but it ended in tears and self-contradiction last time, and there is no reason to expect differently this time. The UK government would be well advised to become a little weedier than PMs Johnson or Truss. Rishi Sunak contacted Sturgeon and Drakeford on his first full day in office as Prime Minister. Is this a hopeful sign?

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Monitor 81. Johnson falls; what’s next for the constitution?

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Today, the Unit published the 81st edition of Monitor, which provides analysis of the key constitutional news of the past four months. In this post, which also serves as the issue’s lead article, Meg Russell and Alan Renwick reflect on the collapse of Boris Johnson’s government, increasing concerns about ministerial and parliamentary standards, and continuing doubts about the future of the Union.

The preoccupying question in UK politics over recent months increasingly became when – rather than whether – the Prime Minister would be forced from office. In April, Boris Johnson was fined for breaching restrictions on social gatherings during lockdown, and the Commons referred him to its Privileges Committee for allegedly misleading parliament. In May, the Conservatives suffered steep losses in the local elections, and Sue Gray’s official report into ‘partygate’ was finally published, concluding that the ‘senior leadership at the centre, both political and official, must bear responsibility’ for the culture of disregard for the rules that had emerged. In June, Johnson survived a vote of no confidence among his MPs and the loss of two parliamentary by-elections, followed by the resignation of the Conservative Party Co-Chair, Oliver Dowden. But the resignation of Deputy Chief Whip Chris Pincher in early July, and Number 10’s bungled reaction to it, finally brought the Prime Minister down.

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Northern Ireland: how can power-sharing be revived?

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Alan Whysall was a panellist in the session on Northern Ireland at the Unit’s State of the Constitution conference on 23 June. This revision of his talk draws on his paper for the Unit on Northern Ireland’s Political Future, and its accompanying blogpost. He argues that stable power-sharing can only return through good faith inclusive negotiation – which is not a part of London’s current approach – and a reinforcement of the foundations of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement.

It is essential to bring all the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement institutions back as soon as possible: that unlocks the potential for political progress. Without the institutions, polarisation grows; the longer they are away, the harder ultimately the Agreement settlement is to sustain. And there is no alternative as a framework for the stable government of Northern Ireland.

Devolution still has wide popular support and the political class has a strong self-interest in restoring the institutions, if only because paying them not to undertake government is becoming unpopular. But there are big questions about how.

The government’s approach

Can the institutions be stably restored the government’s way? Setting aside for now judgements about the government’s approach, its integrity, or the extraordinary contents (breach of international obligations, vast delegation of powers to ministers) of the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill, this seems to me to be doubtful.

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