Irish Party stage dramatic walkout of Parliament

Westminster, 8 March 1917 - The Irish Parliamentary Party today walked out of the House of Commons in London in the course of a debate on Home Rule and Ireland.

The move was criticised inside the house, by Tim Healy, as ‘play-acting’ and in the English press as a ‘pre-arranged piece of melodrama’.

Prologue to walkout
Preceding the John Redmond-led walkout, T.P. O’Connor MP had made an impassioned speech about Ireland’s Home Rule journey, putting forward the following motion:

“That with a view to strengthening the hands of the Allies in achieving the recognition of the equal rights of small nations and the principles of nationality against the opposite German principle of military domination and government without the assent of the governed, it is essential, without further delay, to confer upon Ireland the free institutions long promised to her.”

Major Willie Redmond spoke in favour of the motion and urged Carson to let the past be forgotten and to allow for Home Rule for Ireland.

The motion was put by T.P. O'Connor (left) and supported by Willie Redmond (right) (Images: Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA)

Lloyd George’s response
The British Prime Minister David Lloyd George said any proposal that would be acceptable to the Irish people as a whole would be considered, but said he was not prepared to enact Home Rule when there were people in Ireland unwilling to accept it.

Mr Lloyd George said that he was prepared to introduce Home Rule now across those parts of Ireland where it would be welcomed and that he ‘believed Ulster would come in at no distant date.’

John Redmond, in reply, said that the only straightforward course of action open to the government was to put the Home Rule Act at once into operation. He said that Mr Lloyd George had had months to consider the matter of Home Rule but when they asked him for action he gave them professions.

At this point, Mr Redmond called on his MPs to let the House of Commons do what it wishes in terms of the motion in respect of Home Rule and to withdraw from the chamber with him.

The entire Irish Parliamentary Party then left the debating chamber amid ‘great commotion.’

[Editor's note: This is an article from Century Ireland, a fortnightly online newspaper, written from the perspective of a journalist 100 years ago, based on news reports of the time.]