There was a peculiar nervousness among the talks’ participants at Stormont on Monday 13th October when the famous handshake between Gerry Adams and Tony Blair took place behind closed doors. The media had been simmering in anticipation for days and when Blair emerged from the talks building, the reporters asked, almost in unison, “Well, did you shake his hand?”
Blair hesitated and as the silence grew, Mo Mowlam’s smile faded and she shot him a nervous glance. It was as if Blair had been stumped by the most obvious question he had ever had to face. When he did reply, Blair refused to confirm the handshake. Instead, he said that he had treated Gerry Adams as he would treat any human being.
If we ignore for the moment the implication that Adams ever deserved to be treated as less than human, Blair’s response showed that he has caught the language of the opening weeks of the talks. Most participants, with the exception of David Trimble’s unionists, speak of the need to “build trust” and to “interact” and “create a climate of respect”. It is the language of conflict resolution and Blair was quick to tap into the mood.
But the handshake also signalled that the talks have now moved beyond the symbols, posturing and language of conflict resolution and into the nitty gritty of negotiations. The warm-up is over, the shin-pads are secure and the ball is centred.
Blair launched the first attack on Monday by pointedly reiterating that “consent is a guiding principle” in the talks, before defining it as the “consent of the people of Northern Ireland”. In that way he pulled on a unionist jersey. That is not unexpected but it perhaps betrays that Blair, like so many others, has not thought too deeply about consent. He and his Government will have plenty of time to rectify that because consent will be central to the talks process. It is the issue around which everything will turn.
Both unionists and loyalists have been at pains, particularly in recent weeks, to wring from the British Government the guarantee that there will be no solution without the agreement of a majority of the unionist/loyalist parties and a majority of the people of the Six Counties. In other words, a unionist veto.
But consent is a two-edged sword. Blair and the unionists believe that the current negotiations process proposes that nationalist consent will not be required for the maintenance of the Union while unionist consent will be required for a United Ireland. Nationalists and republicans have other ideas. These talks represent an historic opportunity.
Northern nationalists were never asked for their consent to the partition of Ireland — it was imposed at the threat of terrible war. They were never asked whether they wanted to remain in the Union. Even now, with talk of democracy, consent, accommodation, consultation and negotiation, nationalist consent is still not being sought. Even worse, according to Tony Blair, unionist consent is presented as an over-arching issue and one that nationalists must accept in order to be perceived as democrats.
If nationalists are not entitled to say “No” to the Union then unionists oughtn’t to be entitled to say “No” to a United Ireland. We either have a system of dual consent or one of dual denial. What republicans cannot accept is the idea that there are two democratic rulebooks: one for unionists and the other for nationalists. As the talks progress this issue will rise to the top of the agenda. It will become the centre of debate. It should also be the centre of debate within the Labour Party. Next time Tony Blair visits the talks his language may shift accordingly.