What do parties in NI, Scotland & Wales have to offer secularists?

The 2024 General Election is next week. Following our analysis of the manifestos from the main nationwide parties, let's look at how the parties running exclusively in Northern Ireland, Scotland or Wales approach issues of importance to secularists.

We've looked at the manifestos of all parties which had at least one MP when the election was called: the Alliance Party, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), Sinn Féin and the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) for NI; ALBA and the Scottish National Party (SNP) for Scotland; and Plaid Cymru for Wales.

Bishops in the House of Lords

Every party would, as a bare minimum, reform the House of Lords in a way which would call into the question the 26 seats assigned as of right to Church of England bishops.

The DUP's policy is the softest: a smaller chamber with a distribution of seats that "strengthen representation for the devolved regions". The presence of 26 clerics exclusively from an English church would therefore have to be addressed.

However, the DUP also want the Lords to "reflect, and balance, both the values and traditions of communities from which its membership is drawn". Given the DUP's pro-religious leanings, this could mean more representatives from other denominations – which would likely make a bad situation even worse.

Alliance want a "directly elected" House of Lords, while Plaid Cymru and the SNP would abolish them entirely; either way, no more Lords Spiritual.

ALBA and Sinn Féin's focus on independence renders consideration of the House of Lords irrelevant from Scotland and NI's perspective.

There's no mention of the SDLP's position on the House of Lords, but their support of Irish reunification and further devolution of NI's powers suggests they are unlikely to support the status quo.

Education

The most encouraging manifestos on education for secularists are from Alliance and the SDLP. They both call for support of integrated schools, which aim to educate pupils from Catholic, Protestant and other religion and belief backgrounds together in an inclusive way. The NSS has long supported integrated education in NI.

The Alliance manifesto says: "We reject the notion of 'two communities' and instead believe a shared future will enable us to build a stronger Northern Ireland".

Human rights and equality

All parties apart from the DUP stress the importance they place on equality, with Alliance, Plaid Cymru and the SNP expressing support for the European Court of Human Rights.

Alliance would incorporate the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) into UK law, which could significantly help to protect children's rights including their freedom of religion or belief. Scotland is already in the process of incorporating the CRC into Scots law, and the SNP would demand the UK follows this approach "to take a maximalist approach to the protection of children's rights".

All parties apart from ALBA and the DUP refer to protecting LGBT people from discrimination, with Alliance, Plaid Cymru and SDLP specifically referring to a ban on 'conversion therapy'.

Freedom of expression and freedom of religion or belief

Free speech does not appear to be as important to the parties of NI, Scotland or Wales as it does to most of the nationwide parties.

Plaid Cymru's manifesto is perhaps the strongest, saying the party supports "the right of an individual to freedom of expression and assembly". The party would scrap the Conservatives' "anti-protest laws", as would Alliance, and "commit to protecting the human right to protest free of hindrance, crackdown or unfair restriction".

However, Plaid Cymru also promise to address "Islamophobia". Seeing as the party has adopted the contentious All-Party Parliamentary Group on British Muslims' 'Islamophobia' definition, which conflates anti-Muslim hate with criticism of Islam, this could pose free speech concerns.

The SDLP support "robust standalone hate crime legislation" as recommended by the Marrinan Review. While tackling hate crime is important, SDLP's approach may be a worry because Desmond Marrinan, who authored the review, said there should be "no express defences for freedom of expression in relation to religion" or other protected characteristics. In 2021 he implied 'abusing religion' should not be legal.

The DUP's manifesto has a whole section dedicated to "religious freedom", and says the party will "build on" its record in this area "to ensure that the rights of those of all faiths and none are protected across the United Kingdom". However, in practice the DUP's interpretation of "religious freedom" has tended to be narrow, with a primary focus on Christians (especially conservative Christians). The nonreligious and those with more liberal interpretations of religion are often overlooked in DUP policy.

Alliance say they will continue to "promote our unwavering commitment to freedom of and from religion across the world and oppose discrimination on the basis of religion or belief".

NI is the only UK country with blasphemy laws. It is thought legislation to repeal the blasphemy law is likely to face the most resistance from the DUP.

Healthcare

The only manifesto which mentions assisted dying is the DUP's, which says the party will "firmly oppose efforts to legalise assisted suicide". Assisted dying perhaps doesn't make it on to the manifestos of the Scottish parties because a bill to legalise assisted dying for the terminally ill has already been introduced in the Scottish Parliament.

The DUP are also clear they oppose women's reproductive rights. References to their "pro-life" stance appear in two separate sections of their manifesto, including (perhaps tellingly) on the same page as "religious freedom".

DUP members have opposed all efforts to bring NI's abortion laws and provision in line with the rest of the UK, and to include information about abortion in relationships and sex education. Their manifesto says they will continue with their anti-abortion policies and oppose restrictions on protests outside abortion clinics.

In contrast, Sinn Féin "want women to be able to access the safe and legal health services they are entitled to".

The SNP say they will protect reproductive healthcare and that women "should have access to abortion services in a timely and safe manner". They say the UK Government "should follow Scotland's lead in reviewing the law on abortion to ensure that abortion is first and foremost treated as a healthcare matter".

When it comes to secularism, we unsurprisingly get a diversity of approaches from all parties in the UK. But one thing's pretty consistent across almost all parties: apart from the Conservatives, all want the House of Lords reformed, or gone completely (either through abolition or national independence). With a change in administration looking increasingly likely, let's hope this leads to serious discussions about the bishops' bench.

One thing that's different this time is right now, across the Irish Sea, a bill to remove the voting powers of the CofE bishop in the Isle of Man's upper house is making progress. Hopefully this will prompt the next government to promote secular democracy in the UK, and properly challenge the unjustifiable privileges given to the bishops in the House of Lords.