When Gerry Adams, pictured left, announced back in December that he was stepping down as an MP and run as a candidate in the upcoming Irish general election, nothing more was really said since he never set foot in Westminster due to his party’s policy of refusing to take their seats in the House. But thanks to a rather bizarre constitutional oddity it was revealed this week that he was still a Member of Parliament.As I wrote about in a previous post (see here), in order to step down as an MP, Mr Adams had to have applied to the Chancellor of the Exchequer for an office of profit under the Crown, which if granted would have made him ineligible to sit in the Commons as stated in the 1701 Act of Settlement.
The Chancellor would either appoint him the Crown Steward and Bailiff of the Chiltern Hundreds or the Crown Steward and Bailiff of the Manor of Northstead – two ceremonial positions that exist to allow this to happen.
But the situation has flared up in light of this afternoon’s Prime Minister's Questions in which the PM David Cameron announced that Mr Adams was to be appointed as Crown Steward and Bailiff of the Manor of Northstead. It soon emerged that Mr Adams hasn't actually applied for the office; his party Sinn Fein have said the only thing that Adams has done is write to the Speaker telling him of his intention to resign his seat.
It appears because of the ceremonial nature of this procedure, his simple letter of resignation to the Speaker was automatically interpreted as an application for one of the two sinecures.
Consequently this afternoon the Treasury confirmed the appointment, which in light of Mr Adams hostility to serves a paid position for the Crown is unfortunate since he will officially hold the title of Crown Steward and Bailiff of the Manor of Northstead until another two MPs resign, which could be a while…
