Newton Emerson: Some republicans very cynical on same-sex marriage and abortion

In the end the social policy border will have lasted four years and two months. That will be the length of time between the legalisation of same-sex marriage in the Republic in November 2015, and its scheduled legalisation in Northern Ireland in January 2020.

The same Westminster intervention will see abortion decriminalised in Northern Ireland this October, 10 months after it was legalised in the Republic, with new laws to follow next March. The North is likely to end up with a more liberal abortion regime than the South.

This is happening despite unionism and, for some in Westminster, to spite unionism. The DUP is preparing to concede on same-sex marriage but is portraying change as regrettable. It is planning to go down fighting on abortion, or at least to give that impression.

In the prickly honour culture of Northern Ireland, heroic refusal to surrender is still not recognised as the worst kind of defeat. Clever politics calls for cynical pragmatism – a quick U-turn and ownership of the new position. The DUP knows this, yet remains incapable of it where a biblical injunction might be involved. It is a failing that leaves unionism bizarrely adrift in the political mainstream.

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Newton Emerson: Time for DUP to accept defeat on gay marriage and abortion

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This is well known, however, and has been written about extensively. As the social border melts away, the abiding impression I am left with as a unionist is the excessive cynicism of some nationalists and republicans.

Stormont might have passed same-sex marriage had it been functioning over the past 2½ years

It is only seven months since Northern Ireland last had a more liberal abortion regime than the Republic, as was the case for the proceeding 80 years. The regime was still highly conservative compared to Britain, but this was understood to be an enduring point of cross-community agreement, with abortion being most controversial among Catholics and its imposition from Westminster seen as particularly unacceptable to nationalists.

All that has been suddenly turned around and portrayed as unionist oppression. Northern Ireland has been derided as a failed state, with a united Ireland held up as the only solution. This has occurred while both main nationalist parties have remained carefully ambivalent about abortion, not that this has stopped them criticising the DUP. It has been a ridiculous spectacle, confirming every unionist suspicion of nationalist opportunism and hypocrisy.

United Ireland

Exploitation of same-sex marriage has been similar. Northern Ireland had civil partnerships six years before the Republic, again thanks to a Westminster intervention. During those six years there were, of course, no calls for the Republic to rejoin the UK. Yet as soon as a social policy border opened up in the opposite direction we were apparently in the midst of a rights and equality crisis, to which the only answer was a united Ireland.

SDLP leader Colum Eastwood deserves credit for reminding a republican unification conference earlier this year that North and South have identical rights and equality laws. It was a call for perspective that fell on deaf ears.

Same-sex marriage campaigners within Northern Ireland have stayed carefully above constitutional arguments. Their umbrella group, Love Equality NI, was quite optimistic about getting legislation through Stormont by persuading the DUP not to use its assembly veto, saving the party’s pride by still allowing it to vote against.

Love Equality NI also engaged with the churches to assure them it sought reform of civil marriage only. This is now helping the DUP to cover its retreat. It would be wrong to deny external pressure was vital to the campaign but there was no space in the “failed state” hysteria to recognise Northern Ireland was working towards its own solution. Stormont might have passed same-sex marriage had it been functioning over the past 2½ years.

There is plenty of blame to go around for the absence of devolution. The DUP has been largely responsible since February last year, when it walked away from a draft deal with Sinn Féin, which tellingly included nothing on same-sex marriage and abortion.

Conditions

If republicans were prepared to return to Stormont under those conditions, while claiming the deal delivered rights and equality, how much of a Northern nirvana is in prospect with same-sex marriage and abortion introduced over Stormont’s head?

There is still the outstanding matter of an Irish Language Act, portrayed as a rights issue, although, as with same-sex marriage and abortion, it is debatable if any statutory rights are at stake. The main purpose of an Act is deciding how to provide translations of government publications – translations that can already be provided. Is this to be the new measure of an Orange dystopia?

If a language Act is imposed by Westminster, as seems increasingly possible, would that not solve everything?

Or would complaints about Northern Ireland’s dysfunctionality refocus around Brexit and on some of the Border, rights and citizenship fears that have not turned out – so far – to be groundless?

Nationalism has its own problem dealing with the worst kind of defeat, which is getting what you duplicitously claim to want.