There is little quite as satisfying as seeing a long-standing wrong put right. The years of arguing, lobbying and complaining fade as the prospect of long-overdue corrective action looms. I refer to the possibility – no more than that at this stage – that the Labour Party may finally (and grudgingly) admit people living in Northern Ireland to membership. And not before time.
I have lost count of the number of occasions I've argued with Labour bigwigs – usually at meeting of the British-Irish Association or Irish Embassy receptions – that the ban on membership was wrong and illogical and unjust. Why, for example, should somebody living in the Republic, or further afield in Spain or South Africa, be eligible for overseas membership, when those within 12 or so miles of the rest of the United Kingdom (at Northern Ireland's nearest point to Scotland) are advised to make their home in the SDLP?
Why should somebody who has paid taxes spent by a government which has been in power for more than six years be prevented from entering a view at the ballot box over how those taxes should be spent? There is no logical answer, no reasonable defence to those charges and the Labour Party has long known it.
What made the anomaly even more galling was that the Tories DID organise here. You may argue that this was no more than a manifestation of that party's loopy "Integrationist Tendency" to push its unrealisable agenda and there's some truth in that. But the fact remains that whatever the strategic aim, you could – if you so wished – vote for a Conservative candidate.
As a former (and I mean very former) member of the Labour Party, that really got up my nose. So things may change – Labour's September conference may, at last, bite on the bullet and see its candidates take their electoral chances along with the rest of the Parliamentary, Assembly and Council hopefuls. As they should.
This is not about the merits of the parties and their policies as such – it goes deeper. It is about freedom of choice. Opponents of the plan will also argue that since there are so few Labour voters here and that since politics is run, in the main, on tribal rather than class lines, it is a waste of time and effort trying to set up a party organisation. Try running that argument past those rare political animals, like the Tory in Abergavenny or the Labour supporter in rural North Yorkshire and see what answer you get! They may be almost unquantifiably tiny minorities in their local political scene but does that mean they should be disregarded or denied the chance to put their cross where they want on the ballot paper? Of course not.
Nor is the "national argument" relevant, despite warnings from former Labour Shadow Northern Ireland Secretary Kevin McNamara that he sees the party being dragged into the "maelstrom of Northern Ireland politics" and "plunged into opposition with the SDLP". Get real Kevin. The "national argument" is on the back burner for the foreseeable future. If, as and when it is resolved and a united Ireland emerges, that will be time enough for a Labour withdrawal from the scene. Until then, anything less than full Labour Party membership here, for those that want it, is only fair.
