The case embarrassed Labour after it went before the Commission on Racial Equality this year, writes Frank Millar, London Editor
The British Labour Party conference is expected today to lift its ban on the recruitment of members in Northern Ireland. The recommendation by Labour's ruling National Executive to end the anomaly represents a personal victory for Belfast trade unionist Mr Andy McGivern.
He embarrassed the Labour leadership earlier this year when he took the issue to the Commission for Racial Equality, and was set to resume his union-backed challenge to the ban in a private action at London County Court on November 11th.
Disclaiming any other political motives, Mr McGivern describes himself as an "ordinary socialist" who simply wants to join the Labour Party.
But while campaigners for Labour organisation in Northern Ireland characterise the move as an extension of the democratic principle, others see it as a concession to pro-Union "integrationists" running counter to the spirit and intention of the Belfast Agreement.
In an article on this page, Mr Kevin McNamara - a one-time Labour spokesman on Northern Ireland - argues the immediate consequence will be to set Labour "in unwilling competition with our partners in the SDLP."
However he says the real threat "is of triggering a legal and political chain reaction driven by those with an agenda to drag the party of government [in the UK\] into the delicate balance of Northern Ireland politics on the side of hard-line integrationists."
However fellow Labour MP Ms Kate Hoey writes that she is "personally affronted" by the idea that she could retain her membership if she moved to Baghdad or Boston but would have to relinquish it if she returned to her native Belfast.
"It is ridiculous that Irish citizens living in Dublin or London can join but British citizens living in the City of Derry cannot. Undoubtedly it is a fundamental breach of human rights and blatant discrimination by a party that believes in justice and equality."
Speaking on the Labour fringe Sinn Féin's Mr Gerry Kelly said the expected Labour decision would have no impact on his party's support.
However he told the Agreed Ireland Forum: "As an all-Ireland and a united Ireland party our task is to see the end of British political intervention in any part of our country, not an extension of it."
While subscribing to this principle, other Sinn Féin sources yesterday privately admitted they "couldn't care less" about the internal Labour debate and believed it would have no impact on the overall development of the peace and political process in Northern Ireland.