Government plans to change law on Catholic monarchs

The Government is drafting new laws to end a 307-year-old ban on Roman Catholics becoming Monarch.

The controversial 1701 Act of Settlement states that only Protestant heirs of Sophia, granddaughter of James I, can take the throne and also blocks the monarch from even marrying a Catholic.

Justice Secretary Jack Straw is said to be “working hard” to end the ban, according to Scottish Secretary Jim Murphy.

The East Renfrewshire MP was quoted by The Herald newspaper as saying, “It’s not because I’m a Catholic that I feel it. It’s unfair, wrong and does not fit well into a modern sense of what Britain is about.”

The British monarch has traditionally been “defender of the [Protestant] faith” but Prince Charles has expressed his intentions to change the title to “defender of faith” to reflect Britain’s religious diversity.