Theresa May can’t have it both ways on devolution

Just let that sink in for a moment.

I am, of course, talking about her response on Monday to the latest campaign to impose direct rule from Westminster on Northern Ireland and reverse their draconian abortion laws, in line with the rest of the UK. This renewed effort towards progress came as a reflection of the seismic shift in the Republic after last week’s overwhelming Yes vote.

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Several of the Prime Minister’s high-profile female MPs, like Penny Mordaunt and Nicky Morgan, support legislative reform on abortion in the North alongside Labour’s Stella Creasy and Dawn Butler, plus another 126-odd MPs. That’s a significant number and with more revolt on the horizon, May doesn’t have her troubles to seek – as the Irish would say.

Especially when her new friends in the DUP, who, despite Arlene Foster’s manifestly hollow description of Unionism as a force for citizenship and rights, are dead set against changing the legislation and addressing women’s rights.

But by imposing direct rule from Westminster on to Northern Ireland, the British Government would be taking democracy out of the equation and out of the hands of the Northern Irish people. One of the most important aspects of the referendum result in the South was that it was an evolution of consensus on the importance of women’s rights.

The Republic got there on their own merits, on their own terms. This opportunity for a referendum must also be afforded to the people of Northern Ireland. Debate and discussion is crucial on this matter so that all sides’ concerns and hopes are heard in order for the Northern Irish to come to their own agreement on where the law stands.

Now there is no denying that abortion is an emotive and important issue, whatever side of the debate you stand on. Even the UN has described Northern Ireland’s current stance on the illegality of abortion as a human rights violation. But if direct rule is imposed on them, then the Sewel Convention, which includes the convention that the UK Government should not normally interfere with devolved issues without consent, is nothing more than a scrap of paper to be scrunched up and tossed in the bin.

Which is exactly how it is being treated over the devolved and democratic wishes of the Scottish people by the same Prime Minister who has so quickly come to devolution’s defence in Northern Ireland.

Theresa May thinks nothing of running roughshod over Scotland’s devolved parliament in order to pursue her chaotic Brexit. Her party has even taken the Scottish Parliament to court over the EU Continuity Bill, an attempt to protect our devolved powers from a greedy Tory post-Brexit power grab, while also refusing to give their consent to a second independence referendum regardless of the “triple lock” and fully democratic mandate of the Scottish people.

As I’ve said before, with this Tory Government all roads lead back to Brexit. They simply don’t care that 62% of Scots voted to stay in the EU, that Scots were made promises of staying in the EU if they voted No in 2014, far less of vows on devo max. It looks like devolution can take on any meaning as long as the PM hangs on to her tenuous hold on the leaving of the EU and her equally fragile grip on power.

She isn’t even attempting to hide the hypocrisy of her stance on this matter. She desperately needs the support of the stoney-faced DUP to run her minority government. She paid them handsomely in Demgeld last year, and so has to live with their less than enlightened views on abortion and a whole host of other unpalatable attitudes that chime little with modern Britain. This means that their version of Northern Ireland gets special treatment, while to blazes with the other political parties in the North or indeed other devolved countries in the UK.

This kind of pick-and-mix attitude won’t wash with the Scottish or the Irish. You can’t protect one devolved government in the UK and not protect the other two. You can’t offer bespoke solutions for one country just because you’re beholden to one particular party, and not have the political decency to offer that to the other devolved countries that make up the UK.

However, as much as the DUP have May in a political armlock, there’s no denying the high level of support for change to abortion laws in Northern Ireland across age ranges, between women and men, and religious denominations, as witnessed by the demonstrations in Belfast this week. The DUP are simply out of marching order with a rapidly modernising Ireland in more ways than one, both in the South and the North. And they are definitely out of step with the rest of the UK. A referendum on abortion and women’s rights may well be followed quickly by one on equal marriage. On both subjects the DUP may find themselves in less than glorious isolation.

The problem remains that there is currently no Assembly at Stormont and the DUP and Sinn Fein are in deadlock over talks to reform their power-sharing deal. Could this wave of sentiment and passion in the country be the catalyst that forces the parties back together? The British government should be doing everything in their power to facilitate a breakthrough but it’s hard to seem impartial when you’re cosied up to one side.

In Scotland, it’s a different story. We have a fully functioning parliament, with cross-party support (except from the Scottish Tories) on protecting devolution via the EU Continuity Bill. And just like Northern Ireland, we voted to stay in the EU but are being forced out without our democratic consent and with next to no say on how this disastrous divorce proceeds.

Theresa May can’t have it both ways. Decisions to respect devolution should not be founded on a compromised alliance with the DUP. The UK Government need to make their minds up. When it comes to devolution you can either have the bun or the penny but never both.