Ulster Unionists last night withdrew an amendment to the Police (Northern Ireland) Bill seeking to retain the royal title in the new name of the police service. It was the first day of the Bill's committee stage in the House of Lords.
Despite the withdrawal of the amendment, the unionists will return to the issue again at report stage.
The amendment, proposed in the name of the UUP chairman, Lord Rogan, sought to have the body of constables known as the RUC "styled as The Royal Ulster Constabulary - Police Service of Northern Ireland". The royal title should also be retained with reference to the RUC Reserve, the unionists said.
Moving the amendment, Lord Rogan asked if people were to believe that Catholic Irishmen and women would not join the police force because of the royal prefix. The Irish Republic, he said, had many organisations with a royal prefix, such as the Royal College of Surgeons, and yet they experienced no problems with recruitment.
However, Lord Rogan withdrew the amendment after the British government spokesman in the Lords, Lord Falconer, insisted that in order to achieve a new beginning in policing in Northern Ireland, the name of the police force must change.
There was no government amendment defining the precise "operational purposes" of the new "Police Service of Northern Ireland" title, but Lord Falconer said incorporating the royal title on the face of the legislation made it "absolutely clear" that the RUC was not being disbanded.
The government would, however, "keep under review" concerns that the new title would not be widely used within the community in Northern Ireland. The Oversight Commissioner will be asked to look at the issue in his regular reports.
Government amendments at committee stage in the Lords, which will continue tomorrow, were primarily "clarifications" of issues raised in the Commons. Amendments clarifying 50-50 Protestant-Catholic recruitment are expected in the Lords tomorrow.
In a move that he acknowledged would anger sections of the nationalist community, the former SDLP leader, Lord Fitt, said he supported the retention of the RUC royal title. He said there were "very complex issues" involved in attitudes towards the police force; and there was "not total objection" among Catholics to the royal title.
"If I as a Catholic were to say I support, as I do, retention of the RUC title, I would be regarded as a traitor," Lord Fitt said.
Earlier, the former UUP leader Lord Molyneaux said the change in the RUC's name was quite unnecessary.