Confidential report from Frederick H. Boland to Seán Nunan (Dublin)
'The Irish Vote in Britain'
(Secret)

Within the past year or so, the attitude of the section of the Labour Party which interests itself in the Partition problem has developed a new slant.

2. Previously, they relied mainly on the arguments we commonly use ourselves. These were effectively presented in Geoffrey Bing’s Tribune pamphlet ‘John Bull’s Other Ireland’, which had a very wide circulation among the rank and file of the Labour party. About the summer of last year, however, the attitude of the Labour Anti-Partitionists started to focus itself on a new argument the essence of which is that since the Six Counties have a parliament of their own, they have no right to have representatives in the British House of Commons at all, and that the only purpose which the Ulster Unionist members serve in the House is to buttress up the otherwise feeble Tory majority and thereby falsify the balance of British political life.
3. This argument was first used by Mr. Aneurin Bevan – by no means a sincere anti-Partitionist – at a meeting in the East End of London in June last year. I understand that Mr. Bevan was encouraged in using it by Mr. Hugh Delargy, MP, who was with him on the occasion. Mr. Bevan returned to the point, somewhat more specifically, in a debate in the House of Commons on the 6th July, 1954, when he said:-

   ‘When I consider the deplorable level of parliamentary representation that Northern Ireland has in this House at the present time, when I consider their meagre contribution to debate, their old-fashioned arguments and the extent to which they are obviously under the influence of vested interests in Northern Ireland, it seems to me that the time has come that we ourselves ought no longer to be oppressed by their presence and have our legislative processes interfered with by their votes’.

   Earlier in the same debate, Mr. Leslie Hale, MP² – a close associate of Mr. Bevan and a good friend of ours – had hinted vaguely at the same point by saying: ‘I say quite seriously … that the time is coming when this House may have seriously to consider the whole question of Northern Ireland, and the whole question of legislation with regard to Northern Ireland’.

4. The argument is obviously not a wholly satisfactory one from our point of view. It completely leaves aside the merits of the Partition problem and reduces the whole thing to a question of political party tactics in Britain. Its proponents defend it, however, on the ground that it has a wide appeal in the Labour party, even among people who are ignorant of, or indifferent to, the Partition question itself. The argument certainly seems to be gaining some momentum among the rank and file of the Party and, as you probably know, the only resolution about Partition on the agenda of this year’s annual Labour Party conference bases itself specifically on this argument.
5. But if the Labour Party grudges the Conservatives the aid they get from the Ulster Unionist representation in the House, the Conservatives are starting to grudge the Labour Party the very substantial aid they get from the large number of Irish people in this country. This emerged very clearly in the course of a frank and revealing conversation I had with Mr. Geoffrey Lloyd,³ the Minister for Fuel and Power, the other day. Mr. Lloyd said that he represents a Birmingham constituency in which there is a tremendous number of Irish people. His agent had told him that, with the exception of some Irish priests who voted Conservative, all the Irish coming into the division were going into the Labour party. He knew that Conservative agents in other parts of the country had the same story. The fact was, indeed, that Irish immigration into this country, at the rate at which it is taking place, was proving quite a worry to the Conservative party.
6. I said that I knew very little about the party predilections of Irish people in this country or indeed whether they interested themselves very much in British party politics at all. I supposed it was only natural that many of them, being working people themselves, should tend towards the Labour party, but I wondered whether, if relatively few of them went into the Conservative party, it wasn’t the fault of the Conservative party itself. I had heard Irish people here say that as a rule Conservative candidates and local branches showed little or no interest in, or sympathy with, Irish points of view.
7. Mr. Lloyd said that he understood what I meant, but another idea was being mooted among Conservatives and he wondered whether I had heard of it. It was that, inasmuch as British people in Ireland hadn’t got the parliamentary franchise, Irish people living in this country shouldn’t have the parliamentary franchise either, at least not until they had been resident here for a period of years. He wondered what the attitude of the Irish government would be if legislation to that effect were to be passed in this country. I said I had never heard this suggestion before; it was an entirely new one to me, as I thought it would be to my government also. The only comment I could make was that the present rights enjoyed by the citizens of each country in the territory of the other were all part of the general arrangement made in 1948 when the External Relations Act was repealed, and I didn’t see how one particular aspect of the arrangement, such as that, could be changed without bringing the arrangement as a whole into question. For example, Irishmen here were regarded as being liable for military service; but obviously they couldn’t continue to be subject to that obligation if they were denied the right of the franchise. That was only one example of how the different aspects of the arrangement were inter-connected; I thought there would be plenty of others. Mr. Lloyd said that that was very much what he expected I would say and, in fact, he had said much the same thing himself to his agent. He added: ‘Of course, I am talking to you about this purely informally and personally. I expect I would get into an awful row if it were known I had mentioned the matter to you at all!’. On the whole, I think he was sincere in saying this.
8. In my view, there isn’t much danger of the Conservative government taking steps to deprive Irish people here of the franchise. The Labour government, of course, was by no means keen on the arrangement when it was made in 1948. It was more or less forced on them by the Commonwealth Governments, (principally by Dr. Evatt⁴ and Mr. Fraser⁵), and I know for a fact that it was strongly opposed by individual members of the Labour Cabinet at the time – including Mr. Aneurin Bevan – on the very ground that it would give the franchise to our people here while British people in Ireland would not have it. But that is all water under the bridges now; and if the Conservatives were to try to change the position at this stage, the Labour party, who are only too conscious of the value of the Irish vote to them in the present marginal situation of British politics, would almost certainly fight tooth and nail to preserve things as they are. The inevitable consequence would be one of the biggest internal crises which have shaken British political life for a long while. The whole Labour movement in this country would be thrown into a pro-Irish posture; the question of Six Country representation at Westminster would inevitably be brought into the controversy, and public opinion would be by no means certain to favour a Tory effort to alter an arrangement made at a Commonwealth conference simply in order to better their own electoral chances. It seems to me unlikely, therefore, that the Conservatives would take the risk.
9. If they did and if they succeeded, it would certainly be a bad thing for us. Up to 1930, most Irish emigrants went to the United States, and everyone knows what a tremendous influence the Irish element in the United States had on the course of Irish history. It is arguable whether the independence of the Twenty-Six counties could have been achieved without its help and influence. Since 1930, however, most Irish emigrants have been coming to this country, with the result that there are now more Irish-born people here than in the United States, and Irish people form a bigger percentage of the total population in Britain than in America. When he was here recently, the Minister saw some examples of how our people are gradually beginning to make their weight felt in British public life. Fresh evidence of this is constantly coming to our notice in the Embassy. So far, the political activity of our people here is largely confined to local politics and the local government sphere; but their influence is steadily increasing, and I can see the day coming when, with an increase in numbers and better organisation, the Irish element in this country will constitute a political factor of real significance and may come to exert an important influence in relation to Anglo-Irish affairs generally and the Partition problem in particular. The withdrawal of the parliamentary franchise from our people here would, of course, put an end to this prospect. As I say, however, I think any such development is rather unlikely. In the meantime, if there is one conclusion which can safely be drawn from what the Minister for Fuel and Power said to me, it is that the Conservative party is becoming more conscious of the political importance of the Irish vote.