Civil liberties campaigners need to look at the bigger picture

The Convention on Modern Liberty has a packed agenda, and I hope it is an event which will lead to some real substantial action. Our liberties have been under attack like never before, yet so far the response has been woefully inadequate and timid, with a few notable exceptions.

But, the biggest problem is that everyone is busy fighting fires and few are standing back to wonder how the whole thing caught alight in the first place.

I’m the first to commend fellow campaigners for their extraordinary efforts, and my hat goes off to the campaigns against 42 days and, just recently, against the secrecy of MPs’ expenses (not strictly a ‘liberty’ issue, but a symptom of the same problem). However, there is no clear narrative being built up about what is really the problem.
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We should ditch the oath to the Queen

The Daily Mail today screams: “MPs want to ditch oath to the Queen“, quoting arch conservative Norman Tebbit as saying, in typically hyperbolic fashion: “This seems to be an attack on the state itself”.

Another Tory Geoffrey Cox argued that the oath should stay because: “The Queen is the centre of the British constitution.” Yes, she is. And this is why the principled objections to the oath matter and that is why the oath should, at the very least, be optional.

Republic was behind the parliamentary challenge to the oath, after launching the Challenge the Oath campaign back in April. As the website says, a legal requirement to swear an oath of allegiance to the Queen is discriminatory and unjust. We also believe it is objectionable in principle.
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