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TheSunningdale Agreement was an attempt to establish a power-sharingNorthern Ireland Executive and a cross-borderCouncil of Ireland. The agreement was signed by theBritish andIrish government inSunningdale,Berkshire, on 9 December 1973.^[1]Unionist opposition, violence and ageneral strike caused the collapse of the agreement in May 1974.

On 20 March 1973, theBritish government published awhite paper which proposed a 78-member Northern Ireland Assembly, to be elected byproportional representation. The British government would retain control over law, order and finance, while aCouncil of Ireland composed of members of the executive of theRepublic of Ireland,Dáil Éireann, the Northern Ireland Executive and the Northern Ireland Assembly would act in a consultative role.^[2] The assembly was to replace the suspendedStormont Parliament, but it was hoped that it would not be dominated by theUlster Unionist Party (UUP) in the same way, and would thus be acceptable to Nationalists.

The Northern Ireland Assembly Bill resulting from the white paper became law on 3 May 1973, and elections for the new assembly were held on 28 June. The agreement was supported by the nationalistSocial Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP), the unionist UUP and the cross-communityAlliance Party. The pro-agreement parties won a clear majority of seats (52 to 26), but a substantial minority inside the Ulster Unionist Party opposed the agreement.

After the assembly elections, negotiations between the pro-white paper parties on the formation of a "power-sharing executive" began. The main concerns wereinternment, policing and the question of a Council of Ireland.

On 21 November agreement was reached on a voluntary coalition of pro-agreement parties (unlike the provisions of theBelfast Agreement, which established thed'Hondt method for the election of ministers, proportionally to the main parties in the assembly). Prominent members of the executive included former UnionistPrime MinisterBrian Faulkner as chief executive,SDLP leaderGerry Fitt as deputy chief executive, future Nobel Laureate and SDLP leaderJohn Hume as Minister for Commerce and leader of the Alliance PartyOliver Napier as Legal Minister and head of theOffice of Law Reform. Other members of the Executive included UnionistBasil McIvor as Minister for Education, UnionistHerbert Kirk as Minister for Finance, SDLP memberAustin Currie as Minister for Housing, UnionistLeslie Morrell as Minister for Agriculture, SDLP memberPaddy Devlin as Minister for Health and Social Services, UnionistRoy Bradford as Minister for Environment, and Unionist John Baxter as Minister for information.^[3] This new power-sharing executive, made up of the above members, took up office and had its first meeting on 1 January 1974.^[3] TheUUP was deeply divided: its Standing Committee voted to participate in the executive by a margin of 132 to 105.

Provisions for a Council of Ireland existed in theGovernment of Ireland Act 1920, but these had never been carried out in practice. Unionists resented the idea of any "interference" by what was thenSouthern Ireland in the territory. In 1973, after agreement had been reached on the formation of an executive, agreement was sought to re-establish a Council of Ireland to stimulate co-operation with the nowRepublic of Ireland. Talks were held between 6 and 9 December in theBerkshire town ofSunningdale between theBritish Prime MinisterEdward Heath, the IrishTaoiseachLiam Cosgrave and the three pro-agreement parties.

The talks agreed on a two-part Council of Ireland:

• TheCouncil of Ministers was to be composed of seven members from the power-sharing executive, and seven members from theIrish Government. It was to have "executive and harmonising functions and a consultative role".
• TheConsultative Assembly was to be made up of 30 members fromDáil Éireann and 30 members from the Northern Ireland Assembly. It was to have "advisory and review functions" only.

On 9 December, acommuniqué announcing the agreement was issued, which later became known as the "Sunningdale Agreement".

It was eventually agreed that the executive functions of the Council would be limited to "tourism, conservation, and aspects of animal health", but this did not reassure the unionists, who saw any influence by the Republic over Northern affairs as a step closer to aunited Ireland. They saw their fears confirmed when SDLP councillorHugh Logue publicly described the Council of Ireland as "the vehicle that would trundle unionists into a united Ireland" in a speech atTrinity College, Dublin.^[4]On 10 December, the day after the agreement was announced, loyalist paramilitaries formed the Ulster Army Council – a coalition of loyalist paramilitary groups, including theUlster Defence Association and theUlster Volunteer Force, which would oppose the agreement.

In January 1974, the Ulster Unionist Party narrowly voted against continued participation in the assembly and Faulkner resigned as leader, to be succeeded by the anti-SunningdaleHarry West. The following month ageneral election took place. The Ulster Unionists formed theUnited Ulster Unionist Council (UUUC) as a coalition of anti-agreement unionists with theVanguard Progressive Unionist Party and theDemocratic Unionist Party to stand a single anti-Sunningdale candidate in each constituency. The pro-Sunningdale parties, the SDLP, the Alliance, theNorthern Ireland Labour Party and the "Pro Assembly Unionists" made up of Faulkner's supporters, were disunited and ran candidates against one another. When the results were declared, the UUUC had captured eleven of the twelve constituencies, several of which had been won on split votes. OnlyWest Belfast returned a pro-Sunningdale MP (Gerry Fitt). The UUUC declared that this represented a democratic rejection of the Sunningdale Assembly and Executive, and sought to bring them down by any means possible.

In March 1974, pro-agreement unionists withdrew their support for the agreement, calling for the Republic of Ireland to remove theArticles 2 and 3 of its constitution first (these articles would not be revised until theGood Friday Agreement of 1998).

Following the defeat of a motion condemning power-sharing in the Northern Ireland Assembly, theUlster Workers' Council, a loyalist organisation, called ageneral strike for 15 May. After two weeks of barricades, shortages, rioting and intimidation, Brian Faulkner resigned as chief executive and the Sunningdale Agreement collapsed on 28 May 1974.

The strike succeeded because the British government was reluctant to use force to stop the disruption of essential services, the only significant part of the protest.^[5]

The most crippling aspect of the strike was its effect on electricity supply – theBallylumford power station generated Belfast's electricity and that of most of Northern Ireland. The workforce was overwhelmingly Protestant and effective control was firmly in the hands of UWC.John Hume's plan to cut the Northern Ireland electricity grid in two and rely on the power generated byCoolkeeragh power station (where many Catholics worked) to keepDerry and environs in business while undermining the unionist strikers in the east was rejected by the British Secretary of StateMerlyn Rees.

In later strikes the security forces were prepared to use force immediately, and so intimidatory barricades – essential to the success of the UWC strike – were suppressed from the outset.^[6]

The 1998Good Friday Agreement (GFA), on which the current system ofNorthern Irish devolution is based, closely resembles the Sunningdale Agreement.^[7]SDLP politicianSéamus Mallon, who was part of the negotiations, famously described the agreement as 'Sunningdale for slow learners'.^[8] This assertion has been criticised by political scientists like Richard Wilford andStefan Wolff. The former stated that "there are... significant differences between them [Sunningdale and Belfast], both in terms of content and the circumstances surrounding their negotiation, implementation, and operation".^[9] Among these differences in circumstance was a belief among republicans at the time of the Sunningdale Agreement that a British withdrawal from Northern Ireland was "inevitable", which was no longer the case in 1998.^[10]

• Unionism in Ireland (Sunningdale Agreement and the Ulster Workers' Strike)
• Anglo-Irish Agreement
• Downing Street Declaration
• Good Friday Agreement

• The Sunningdale Agreement on the UK Parliament website
• The Sunningdale Agreement —full text of the agreement, from the CAIN project's website
• The Sunningdale Agreement — Chronology of Main Events —from the same site
• Northern Ireland Constitutional Proposals —text of the British government white paper which led to the agreement
• Ulster Workers' Council Strike —events and background to the UWC general strike, from the CAIN project
• Sunningdale: An Agreement Too Soon?[1]

• 1973 in Northern Ireland
• 1973 in Irish politics
• 1973 in British politics
• Treaties concluded in 1973
• December 1973 in the United Kingdom
• 1970s in Berkshire
• Edward Heath
• Political history of Northern Ireland
• Home rule in the United Kingdom
• The Troubles (Northern Ireland)
• Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead
• Bilateral treaties of Ireland
• Bilateral treaties of the United Kingdom
• Ireland–United Kingdom relations

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