The surprising thing is that people are surprised when the Conservatives play the Orange card – that historic shorthand for British politicians using Irish unionism to further their own political agenda. We have been here before often enough, not least that episode from Irish history 100 years ago when the Tories decided the Orange card was the one to play to frustrate legitimate nationalist aspirations towards Home Rule.
The only thing odd about the card being played this time is that the aim is not to frustrate Home Rule – though it might have a knock-on effect on Stormont Rule – but to shore up the Conservative Party in Westminster.
Odder too is the hysterical reaction of many Labour supporters, journalists and voters on social media towards the DUP. That party's views on abortion and same-sex marriage does not please those who regard total compliance to the same as being the mark of civilised political discourse. However, those views are informed by the same religious views that were once common in Britain and that have not disappeared entirely. Not everyone in the Tory party was enamoured with former Conservative leader David Cameron's support for same-sex marriage and there were a range of views to be heard from Conservative MPs on the issue.
It would seem that many in Britain are as ignorant of the history of religion in their country as many of their counterparts in Ireland.
The leader of the DUP, Arlene Foster, is a member of the Church of Ireland while the leader of the Conservatives, Theresa May, a vicar's daughter, belongs to the Church of England. They say the same prayers. Indeed, there was an image of May leaving church on Sunday morning on the BBC. In that, she would have been no different to Foster. It was a strong image too. May, having been humbled by the electorate, humbled herself in turn before God. Many in the North, Protestant and Catholic, will have recognised her devotion.
The journey that has Foster running back to London to support May is one that began in the court of Henry VIII, his split with Rome and the formation of his Established Church. It was a political and religious movement that carried on in Britain and resulted in an Anglican Church eventually being joined by a dizzying array of other Protestant churches – Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians (subscribing and non-subscribing), Free Presbyterians, evangelicals and others. This is Britain’s faith journey, a journey that took many of them, through plantation, to Ireland.
Longer established
It is a religious and political tradition that is every bit a legitimate part of the British parliamentary history as Labour’s or the Liberals’. Indeed, it is longer established. This time of year, as union flags blossom on Northern lampposts, unionists remind themselves of that history while most everyone else in Britain ignores it.
Indeed, it has been almost comical to see the horrified reaction of Britain's left to the DUP. You can be quite sure that were Gerry Adams and Sinn Féin to drop their abstentionist policy and ride to support Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn that the British left would have no difficulty in forgetting those killed by the IRA – including their own soldiers and citizens.
Morality? Principle? Not in politics, that is for sure. Just look at the DUP for evidence of that. The party of "Never! Never! Never!" went into coalition with Sinn Féin. The late founder of that party, the Rev Ian Paisley, and the late IRA man, Martin McGuinness, morphed into the Chuckle Brothers. Let us not forget too that Arlene Foster left the Ulster Unionists because they were "soft" on Sinn Féin and ended up as a DUP First Minister with McGuinness. She attended his funeral Mass, a decision that won her much praise from many commentators. Now, a short time later, she is a unionist ogre again?
Yes, the DUP are so far beyond the Pale that Paisley ended up in a peer in the House of Lords. They are so far beyond the Pale that successive British and Irish governments – Labour, Tory, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael – pandered to them and bribed them into taking power in Stormont. That they should now be in a position of power in Westminster is just how the political cookie crumbles.
Perhaps had British and Irish politicians paid more attention to morality and principles while working in the North, they would not be hostages to the DUP’s good fortune. Now, the devastation on the British political landscape is, well, almost Biblical. I am sure there is a parable about doing the right thing somewhere in the Good Book.
Pól Ó Muirí is Irish language editor