Contemporaneously with this, women's suffrage was making way within the Conservative Party. At the annual conference of the National Conservative and Unionist Associations at Norwich, Lord Robert Cecil moved "that it is expedient to extend the franchise to all citizens, regardless of sex, who have the qualifications at present required of men for the exercise of the suffrage." The opponents did not venture on a direct negative, but moved "that it is not expedient to grant the parliamentary franchise to women on any terms until this great constitutional change has received the express sanction of the electors." This amendment was carried by a large majority; but Lord Robert Cecil had made a deep impression on the association in connection with this and other subjects debated by them, and his present very leading position in politics was from this date distinctly indicated. Support for suffrage came at this time from another and a much less expected quarter. The Ulster Unionist Council in September, 1913, approved the draft articles of the Ulster Provincial Government which it was intended to set up in the event of the Home Rule Act coming into operation, and these articles embodied the enfranchisement of women on the basis of the Local Government register. Indeed, the Ulster Unionist Council went further than this. For, writing to the Ulster Women's Unionist Association, the secretary of the U.U. Council asked for "names of women willing to act upon the various committees which will on that date (the date of the creation of a Nationalist Parliament) be established. This ensures that those who have so heartily supported us in the past will immediately be co-opted with a view to taking their proper share in the management of the affairs of Ulster whilst we are holding the province on trust for the British nation, in which matter we fully realize that their interests are as much at stake as those of the men." This attitude on the part of the Ulster Unionist Council was all the more satisfactory to us because up to that time we had reason to believe Sir Edward Carson to be among our most determined opponents.