Northern Ireland MLAs vote 57 to 24 to abolish the UK's last blasphemy offences

On 9 June 2026 the Northern Ireland Assembly divided 57 to 24 in favour of a new clause abolishing the common law offences of blasphemy and blasphemous libel. The Official Report for that sitting records the Deputy Speaker putting the question, the division figures, and the result: question accordingly agreed to, new clause ordered to stand part of the Bill. Northern Ireland was the last part of the United Kingdom where the offences survived.

The clause runs to one sentence. On the marshalled list of amendments for the sittings of 8 and 9 June 2026, amendment No 73 inserts after clause 23 of the Justice Bill a provision headed "Abolition of offences of blasphemy and blasphemous libel", stating that the common law offences of blasphemy and blasphemous libel are abolished. It stands in the name of Connie Egan, the Alliance Party's justice spokesperson, who announced on 24 February 2026 that she had tabled it, saying blasphemy laws have no place in modern society and that Northern Ireland was the only jurisdiction across these islands still carrying them.

The offences were never used there. FactCheckNI reported on 12 March 2026 that there has never been a prosecution for a blasphemy offence in Northern Ireland, and that the last blasphemy trial anywhere in Ireland was in 1855. The same account dates abolition in England and Wales to 2008, in the Republic of Ireland to 2020 following the 2018 referendum, and in Scotland to 2021.

That disuse was the whole of the argument, in both directions. In the debate of 8 June 2026 the Justice Minister, Naomi Long, told the Chamber the laws are rarely, if ever, used, and that keeping them or removing them was therefore neither an attack on Christianity nor a protection of it, but "lazy politics". She said that as parliamentary champion for the Open Doors network at Westminster she had sat opposite ambassadors from states with blasphemy laws who asked how she could chastise them while Northern Ireland kept its own. Colin McGrath, for the SDLP, made the same credibility point, and Egan intervened to ask what sentencing guidelines those defending the offences had ever sought, given that nobody has been charged.

The case against was made by Brian Kingston, who told the Chamber that the DUP recognised the foundation of Christian values underpinning much of the common law and the constitution, and that its experience was of some political parties and humanist groups seeking to drive faith out of the public square, out of public ceremonies and out of schools. Pressed by Gerry Carroll for an example, Kingston pointed to how left wing comedians treat Christianity compared with other faiths. Jon Burrows intervened from a different angle, warning that comparing Northern Ireland's dormant offences with jurisdictions that jail people was conflating apples with pears, while adding that he agreed with the need to repeal. The Official Report lists 24 members in the Noes lobby.

The change is not yet law. Humanists UK, which campaigned for the repeal and reported the 57 to 24 figure on 9 June 2026, noted that the Justice Bill must still pass Further Consideration Stage and Final Stage before Royal Assent. The Humanist Association of Ireland reported the same figures on 10 June 2026.

The route the repeal took is worth stating plainly, because it was not the Bill's purpose. The Department of Justice introduced the Justice Bill on 17 September 2024 as a 34 clause measure on biometric retention, bail and custody for children and young people, victim and witness services, and system efficiency. The Committee for Justice's report on the Bill, dated 26 March 2026 and produced after 51 meetings and 32 oral evidence sessions with 26 organisations and individuals, does not mention blasphemy anywhere. The repeal arrived afterwards, as one of well over a hundred amendments tabled at Consideration Stage, alongside the repeal of section 4 of the Vagrancy Act 1824 and the Vagrancy (Ireland) Act 1847, new organised crime offences, and roadside drug testing.

Several things remain open. No commencement date has been set, and the clause as drafted carries the number 23A, which at least three other new clauses inserted after clause 23 also carry on the marshalled list, so renumbering is still to come. Further Consideration Stage can revisit the text. Nothing in the amendment touches the separate law on stirring up hatred, and the Assembly did not debate what, if anything, replaces the offences.

The larger claim made by both the Minister and the campaigners, that removing a dead letter in Belfast strengthens the argument against live blasphemy prosecutions elsewhere, is not the kind of proposition that a division list can settle. It has now been tested once. Whether any government that jails people for blasphemy responds to it is unknown.