Repeal The Act of Settlement!

This is a vital issue, which isn't going to go away, no matter how much Gordon Brown tries to ignore it:

Gordon Brown is facing calls to repeal laws which bar Catholics from taking the throne, after the prime minister failed to address the controversy in his sweeping constitutional reform programme.

Officials close to one of Britain's most senior Catholics, Cardinal Keith O'Brien, said he would raise demands for the Act of Settlement to be repealed or substantially redrafted when the pair next meet.

And here’s the offending part of the 1701 Act of Settlement, in all its sectarian glory:

That all and every person and persons, who shall or may take or inherit the said Crown, by virtue of the limitation of this present act, and is, are or shall be reconciled to, or shall hold communion with, the See or Church of Rome, or shall profess the popish religion, or shall marry a papist, shall be subject to such incapacities.

We live in a modern, western, liberal democracy, the above wording is certainly not modern, liberal nor democratic. The monarchy’s main role, surely, is to represent the multi-cultural, multi-faith UK of today; how on earth can it do that when 8% of the population are so forcibly discriminated against solely on account of their faith, solely on account of the political and constitutional situation which existed in Europe over three hundred years ago?

The heir to the throne of our country should be able to marry a partner irespective of colour or creed. That is a basic democratic principle.