DEVOLUTION L2- Semester 2

THE DEVOLVED ASSEMBLIES The Scottish Parliament has 129 members (MSPs) The National Assembly for Wales 60 (AMs) The Northern Ireland Assembly has 108 MLAs All three devolved parts of the UK are still represented in the UK Parliament at Westminster as well:  Scotland has 59 Westminster MPs Wales 40 Northern Ireland 18.

AN ASYMMETRIC SYSTEM The UK Parliament remains sovereign in law and can still legislate, in theory and in fact, for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.  By convention (the Sewel convention), it does not do so for devolved matters without the consent of the devolved legislature concerned. For England there is only one Parliament: the UK Parliament   English Votes for English Laws (the West Lothian Question) The nature of devolved powers varies between Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Devolved (S & W) /Transferred (NI)(regional assembly’s full legislative powers): housing, education, transport... ≠ Wales, by contrast, has much more limited legislative power Reserved (S & W)/Excepted (NI) (Her Majesty’s government retains responsibility for matters of national importance) : Defence & national security, Foreign policy, Nationality, Energy, Immigration … Reserved (NI) = (legislative authority generally rests with Westminster but the Northern Ireland Assembly can legislate with the consent of the Secretary of State) ex: the prerogative of mercy in terrorism cases, parades … The devolved institutions are at present funded very largely by a block grant from the UK Government: They raise only a small part of their own spending indirectly through their control of local taxation

The Conquest and early rebellions 1169: Invasion of Ireland by Norman barons (Henry II) 1542: Henry VIII proclaimed himself King of Ireland + tried to introduce the English Reformation, which failed. 1610: Articles of Plantation: Loyalists to the Crown confiscated land from the native Irish (the rich land), while the native Irish were driven to the rocky hinterlands, or into servitude. 1690, the new English monarch, William of Orange, defeated the Irish rebels at the Battle of the Boyne. Loyalists (Orangemen) still celebrate this victory by marching every year on July 12th. 1695: Penal Laws: Catholics, (85% of Ireland's population) were banned from the Irish Parliament. 1798: United Irishmen Rebellion against British rule (influenced by the ideas of the American and French revolutions)

Plantations in Ireland 1550-1610

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland 1800: Abolishion of the Irish Parliament and creation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland under the Acts of Union. 1829: Catholic Emancipation Act (members of the Catholic Church could sit in the parliament at Westminster) 1845-1852: Great Irish Famine 1848 and 1867: Armed rebellions to achieve Irish independence (Irish Republican Brotherhood) 1869: Disestablishment of the Anglican Church of Ireland

HOME RULE and INDEPENDENCE 1880: Irish Parliamentary Party (the Irish Party or the Home Rule Party) led by Charles Stewart Parnell 1886 and 1893: Passage of Home Rule Bills 1912: UK Parliament passed the Third Home Rule Act to establish self-government for Ireland Irish Volunteers Movement ≠ Ulster Volunteers 1916: Easter Rising, a nationalist insurrection in Dublin to declare an Irish Republic  execution of its leaders  support of/sympathy for the rebels Dec 1918: Sinn Fein won ¾ of the votes in the General Elections (77/105 seats)  Sinn Féin MPs refused to sit in the House of Commons and instead formed Dáil Éireann (the Irish Parliament) 1919-1921: War of Independence: Irish Republican Army ≠ the police and British Army 1920: Government of Ireland Act : partitioned Ireland into 2 regions: 6 counties in the North/26 in the South 1921:Creation of the Irish Free State = a Dominion of the British Commonwealth 1922-1923: Irish Civil War between supporters of the free state and Republicans who who wanted an Irish Republic 1937: Left the Commonwealth and became EIRE 1949: became the Republic of Ireland

Northern Ireland riots : The Troubles 1969-1998 3500 deaths in an area whose population is only about 1.6 m Many arrests without charges or trial, torture on suspected IRA members 1960s: Civil Rights movement to demand equal rights for Catholics (fair housing, fair employment, fair education, fair treatment before the law) + Emergence of the IRA (Irish Republican Army) and UVF (Ulster Volunteer Force) 1969: Presence of British troops in Northern Ireland January 1972: Bloody Sunday (14 unarmed Catholic protesters killed by British paratroopers) March 1972 :Reintroduction of Direct Rule (for Unionists = Ulster an integral part of the UK/ Nationalists believed that politicians in London are less hostile to Northern Ireland's Catholic community than a government elected by the local Protestant majority).

Devolution 1993: Downing Street Declaration 1998: Good Friday Agreement: the Irish government removed its claim to own Northern Ireland Parties would use exclusively democratic means In exchange for the release within two years of their prisoners the paramilitaries would decommission their weapons, a British-Irish Intergovernmental Conference to encourage bilateral cooperation, a NI assembly with devolved powers and a power-sharing executive. 108 democratically elected MLAs (Members of the Legislative Assembly) The First Minister is chosen by the largest party The Deputy First Minister by the second largest party

Northern Ireland’s political parties Unionist parties: The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP)= PETER ROBINSON the FIRST MINISTER The Ulster Unionist Party Republican/nationalist parties: Sinn Féin (left-wing, committed to espousing an all-Ireland republic, the urban Catholic working-class)= Martin McGuinness is Northern Ireland's deputy First Minister. The Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP): a social democratic party, middle-class base, support Irish Reunification, but reject utterly the use of violence as a means to that end Cross-community parties : The Alliance Party (close to the Lib- Dem) and the Green Party.

Districts of Northern Ireland by predominant religion at the 2011 census. Blue is Catholic and red is Protestant.

RELIGIOUS EVOLUTION Religions 1961 1991 2001 2011 Roman Catholic 34.9% 38.4% 40.3% 40.8% Presbyterian (Protestant) 29.0% 21.4% 20.7% 19.1% Church of Ireland (Prot) 24.2% 17.7% 15.3% 13.7%

National identity: IRISH (GREEN) VS BRITISH (BLUE)

NATIONAL IDENTITY Nal Identity All Catholic Protestants British 48.4% 12.9% 81.6% Irish 28.4% 57.2% 3.9% Northern Irish 29.4% 30.7% 26.9% 73% support remaining part of the United Kingdom via devolved government or direct rule 16% support leaving the UK and forming a political United Ireland

NORTHERN IRELAND'S CURRENT CRISIS Political First Minister Peter Robinson (of the Democratic Unionist Party) and Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness (of Sinn Fein) do not get along Sectarian politics : 5 political parties make it difficult to settle agreements - On important or controversial matters, the Assembly votes by the special threshold of cross-community support, which is defined (in the Agreement and in the 1998 Act) as either: - parallel consent – an overall majority plus a majority of unionists and a majority of nationalists (sometimes called ‘50:50:50’); or - weighted majority – an overall majority of 60% plus at least 40% of the designated Nationalists voting and 40% of the designated Unionists voting.

Economic Spending crisis/bankrupcy of the NI government Need to cut down on expenses/David Cameron’s Big society = welfare reform (vetoed by Sinn Fein) Reduction in the money it receives from the UK Increased demands from the department of justice and health Fines from the British Treasury + loan that will be deducted from next year’s budget British taxpayer doesn’t want to pay for Northern Ireland Twelve government departments serve 1.8m residents, whereas Scotland makes do with six departments for a population nearly three times as big. from the 1970s British governments poured in cash in an attempt to abate the violence. Agreement last December: Welfare reform will be implemented this year and the number of departments reduced.

Economic discrepancies in the four regions